By: Matt Hinton (Buy Drugs Without Prescription target=”_blank”>Yahoo.com) –
One of the themes of the last couple weeks is contenders, and what makes (or breaks) a team’s shot at No. 1, and as I indicated in premature assessment of Ohio State, OSU — a ubiquitous contender the last four years — looks like a definite “break.” This has much less to do with the Buckeyes’ recent failures in their biggest games (though they’ve become too obvious for even an OSU defender to overlook) than with the much more immediate fact that — well, here, let the Leader’s Mark Schlabach explain it in his latest post-spring top-25:

It’s hard to imagine the Buckeyes’ being as good as last season without star players such as Chris “Beanie” Wells, James Laurinaitis and Malcolm Jenkins.

You don’t have to much further than that, actually, unless you want to add the departures of three-year starting linebacker Marcus Freeman, the leading receivers the last two years, Brian Robiskie and Brian Hartline, and three three-year starters on the offensive line (four if you count tight end Rory Nicol). That group was at the core of a lot of wins in its time, “big” and otherwise. Their departure signals an obvious rebuilding year, and another strong push with a fully formed Terrelle Pryor in 2010.

So why does Schlabach still classify OSU as one of a handful of top contenders for the BCS championship?

How they get to Pasadena: Find a running back to replace Chris “Beanie” Wells. Quarterback Terrelle Pryor should be better in his second season as a starter, but he’ll have to carry a bigger load without Wells lining up behind him. The Buckeyes will probably go with a tailback tandem of Dan “Boom” Herron and Brandon Saine.

Biggest roadblock: at Penn State, Nov. 7

Obviously, Schlabach isn’t so concerned with the defense or that nondescript visit from USC in September. And, to be fair, his assessment of the Buckeyes is probably the highest you’ll find so far.

But if you click that link, you’ll notice OSU is almost unanimously slotted in the 7-8 range in the top-10, and is the runaway Big Ten favorite over the Nittany Lions; presumably, that means most pundits think the Buckeyes will beat Penn State in Happy Valley.

And if that’s the case, with no other likely top-20 teams on the conference schedule, it puts OSU exactly one win away from becoming a mythical championship frontrunner: Over USC in Columbus. That’s what makes such projections and underlying assumptions this early in the year so tenuous; the regular season most certainly is not a playoff, but if you want a scenario that’s totally unique to college football, there it is — Ohio State’s entire trajectory can change with one upset. See Texas last year, a fringe top-10 team that stunned Oklahoma, vaulted to No. 1 in a week and finished seconds from its own championship trip to Miami.

From appearances, Ohio State wouldn’t have to face the kind of gauntlet that awaited the Longhorns from that point forward — if it got by USC, barring a much bigger upset, it would just that roadblock on Nov. 7, at Penn State. In which, it seems, the Buckeyes are already favorites. So maybe the answer is yes, with some breaks and a heroic effort from Terrelle Pryor on Sept. 12, Ohio State is a serious national title contender. As safety Kurt Coleman knows well, the lines are that thin.

But still: 13 new starters? They’re such a longshot, Schlabach. If OSU is a contender, then so are half a dozen others on the outside-looking-in categories.

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