After J.J. McCarthy follows through on vow to ‘kill’ Ohio State, how do Ryan Day and Kyle McCord respond?

COLUMBUS, Ohio — On Ohio State football safety Malik Hartford’s lone defensive play against Michigan on Saturday, the true freshman locked eyes with Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy.

As Wolverines receiver Roman Wilson’s route carried him in Hartford’s direction, the safety’s head turned slightly. McCarthy, in that instant, rifled a pass between Hartford and cornerback Denzel Burke into Wilson’s hands for what stood up as a 22-yard touchdown reception.

Stood up, since replay review called into question whether Burke took the ball from Wilson before he completed the catch. Regardless, the decisiveness of a second-year starter — built upon the 600-some pass attempts that came before it — kept showing up on McCarthy’s essentially mistake-free day.

While quarterbacks do not actually face off head-to-head, those semantics did not apply to The Game last Saturday. Not when Ohio State coach Ryan Day chose Kyle McCord over McCarthy in the 2021 recruiting cycle. McCarthy once famously said of the Buckeyes, “I used to love them. Now I want to kill them.”

And so he did. And now Kyle McCord and Ryan Day must respond — not to McCarthy’s words, but to his performance.

McCarthy threw his first pass against Ohio State — a single attempt resulting in a 31-yard completion — as a true freshman. He confronted an eight-game losing skid and helped reverse it into a three-game winning streak.

McCord inherited a losing turn in the rivalry and could not prevent it from becoming a true losing streak. Not his fault alone, but as he saw first hand with C.J. Stroud, Buckeye quarterback legacies are made on Thanksgiving weekend.

The next year of McCord’s life becomes a quest to end that streak. Day, who kept play calling duties for himself in part to maintain his connection with his first-year starting quarterback, must finish a project that started when he took McCord’s commitment in April 2019.

A good example, should they choose to accept it, is McCarthy. His sophomore-year reputation was of a risk-taker who kept tiptoeing to the edge of disaster. Over the course of two seasons, he refined his performance. He made the conversion from fire hazard to freelancing gunslinger.

“He’s never careless,” Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh said Sunday, “but he is fearless.”

Which is not to suggest McCord must become McCarthy. Their personalities and their games differ. So do the responsibilities within their respective offenses.

This is merely a reminder that the process does not end when The Game does. McCord and Day can grow from a full season of individual wins and losses — all 348 pass attempts, and counting.

Consider these two stat lines:

• 64.6% completions, 8.4 yards per attempt, 22 touchdowns, 5 interceptions, 154.97 pass efficiency rating

• 65.8% completions, 9.1 yards per attempt, 24 touchdowns, 6 interceptions, 161.64 pass efficiency rating

The first line? McCarthy in 2022, his first season as a starter. The second? McCord in 2023, his first season as a starter.

Plenty of X factors make those comparisons incomplete. McCord does not possess McCarthy’s mobility. Nor did he operate behind anything resembling a Joe Moore Award-winning offensive line. McCarthy did not benefit from the Marvin Harrison Jr. safety net.

Those numbers, though, set the baseline on what McCord could become. Considering the potential exodus of talent among his 2021 classmates, it probably represents what he must become.

McCarthy’s numbers jumped across the board: 74.3% completions, 9.7 yards per attempt, 176.76 efficiency. This conversation, though, surpasses production. The aura of confidence around McCord tended to grow over the course of games. Saturday continued a sporadic season-long issues with uneven starts, typically building to sharper, in rhythm finishes.

In Saturday’s first quarter, McCord completed 4 of 10 passes for 47 yards with an interception that gave away points. Even if you add in Emeka Egbuka’s blatant third-down drop, that start contributed to Michigan’s 14-3 lead.

McCord then completed 12 of his next 16 for 180 yards with two touchdowns. Perhaps the 32-yard completion down the seam to tight end Cade Stover on OSU’s first possession locked him in. Day frequently pointed out that when McCord’s footwork synched up, special things could happen.

Beginning with the Notre Dame game, McCord completed 60.4% of his attempts while averaging 6.9 yards per attempt. He must find a way to light a fuse earlier in big games. As it turns out, completing 26 of 29 against Rutgers, Michigan State and Minnesota told us little about whether he could come out hot against Michigan’s disruptive defensive front and strong secondary.

The late-game poise coaches and teammates describe showed up, too. Two OSU offensive linemen lay on the ground as Michigan defensive end Jaylen Harrell’s hit on McCord forced the game-sealing interception. With a clean follow through, perhaps the pass reaches Marvin Harrison Jr.. The narrative today would be the former St. Joseph’s Prep connection that allowed the Buckeyes to reclaim their place atop the Big Ten.

Instead, McCarthy improves to 3-0 against the team he swore he would kill. The Game will certainly be more personal than ever for McCord now, too.