The Ohio State Buckeyes took a crushing loss to the Oregon Ducks on Saturday, and it all but ends their hopes of reaching the College Football Playoff. Ohio State fell 41-28 to the Ducks in Columbus and now sit at 6-3 with three games left in the regular season.

The day started well for the Buckeyes and went downhill from there. Ohio State scored the first 14 points of the game and looked to be in control early. From there, Oregon rattled off 38 straight points to bury the Buckeyes before they finally answered late in the fourth quarter.

Ohio State is in an unfamiliar spot after the loss to Oregon

The Buckeyes have now lost back-to-back regular-season games for the first time since 2012. Ryan Day’s program is in a spot it hasn’t been in for a long time. Both the College Football Playoff and Big Ten Championship hopes are all but gone following the loss.

What stands out most is how the loss happened. Oregon came into Week 10 as a 3-loss team, and the Ducks had been playing better lately. Still, there’s no reason they should come into Ohio State and put up nearly 400 yards of offense. Oregon made things look easy on both sides of the football, and no one saw a beatdown like that coming.

The bigger picture isn’t any better. Ohio State is 6-5 in its last 11 games dating back to last season. That simply isn’t acceptable for the team in Columbus.

Ryan Day didn’t shy away from the expectations at Ohio State

Ohio State coach Ryan Day didn’t dodge the standard his program is held to after the game. He also shared what he told his team in the locker room.

“You join our program, you understand what the expectations are,” Day said. “I mean you’re expected to win every game here, so to lose three games is unacceptable, and I own that. That’s never going to change from my point of view. And so it doesn’t matter what the situation is, it doesn’t matter what the scenario is. That’s just what it is. So I just told the team in the locker room that you know now we got to weather this storm. It’ll be a storm here, something that none of us are used to at Ohio State. And we’re going to come together tomorrow. We’ll have a team meeting and we’ll figure out what’s next.“

Day owning the result has to happen. However, words only go so far, and the Buckeyes now have to show some sort of response, or this thing could really get away from them.

Big decisions are coming for the Buckeyes

With the playoff all but off the table, Ohio State has a different set of questions in front of it over the final three games. One of them involves its biggest star.

It wouldn’t be a surprise if a player like Jeremiah Smith decided to sit down for the rest of the year. Smith is projected as a top-5 pick in the 2027 NFL draft, and there’s an argument for not risking injury in games that no longer carry playoff stakes. Nothing has been mentioned, but it’s worth watching.

Additionally, Ohio State could have decisions to make on Day’s coaching staff. Any moves there will likely come at the end of the season rather than during it. Still, a 6-3 record and a lopsided home loss to Oregon will put every part of the program under the microscope.

There’s no other way to put it. The next few days, and even the next few weeks, will tell us a lot about this Ohio State team and where the program goes from here.