Football: Binjimen Victor takes his turn in the spotlight
With a 26-14 deficit to overcome with eight minutes to go in the fourth quarter, the Ohio State wide receivers knew they had a job to do.
Redshirt sophomore quarterback Dwayne Haskins had trouble getting the ball downfield against the Penn State secondary, completing 15 of 29 pass attempts for 132 yards with a touchdown and an interception through the first three quarters of the game.
With a veteran group, the receivers did what their goal has been with the first-time quarterback all season: to have his back.
With a 12-point deficit and no momentum, it was not a matter of when it would happen. As a group, they said they knew it would happen. It was a matter of who.
That’s when Binjimen Victor came into the picture.
Haskins trotted onto the field for the second drive of the second quarter, quickly recorded completions to two wide receivers, senior C.J. Saunders and junior Austin Mack. After an incompletion to Mack, Haskins saw something in the Penn State defense he had been preparing for.
“I look back and if we got a certain pressure, which we did get that pressure, we were going to change the play and I look back and Coach [Ryan] Day said ‘Run it,’” Haskins said. “I see it coming and I don’t know what to do, so I snap the ball, I see it coming, I pulled up and I see Ben and I was like, ‘I have to make a play.’”
Victor said he was running through the middle on a dig route and was not even the primary receiver on the play. The junior receiver had to look back to him to see if a play could be made.
However, as the ball came to him, Victor felt as though his time had come.
“I just had to make a play for my team,” Victor said. “I just felt I had to put it on my back.”
Victor caught the overthrown ball in the air with a defender draped on his leg, trying to bring him down, The receiver shook him off and, according to Victor, all he saw was green grass, and took off.
However, it wasn’t all green grass for Victor.
With defenders coming after him in the open field, redshirt senior wide receivers Johnnie Dixon and Parris Campbell each picked a man and kept him away from their teammate.
For Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer, the combination of the catch and the block brought life back into the Ohio State sideline.
“It gave the whole sideline hope,” Meyer said. “Defense gets the ball back to the offense, even though it’s way down deep in there and then one of the great drives in Ohio State history.”
Victor scored on the 47-yard play, bringing Ohio State within one score halfway through the fourth quarter.
The Buckeyes would eventually beat the No. 9 Nittany Lions 27-26, with Victor’s play standing out as the key moment in the comeback.
Entire article:
https://www.thelantern.com/2018/09/football-binjimen-victor-takes-his-turn-in-the-spotlight/
