By: Doug Lesmerises (Cleveland Plain Dealer) —
Columbus- Terrelle Pryor’s personality has been as much of a topic heading into his first road game as a starter Saturday as his passing skills.
Is he tough enough? Is he calm enough? Can he handle Wisconsin’s Camp Randall Stadium? He expressed no doubt after Saturday’s win over Minnesota about playing in Madison, Wis., and teammates say they have no questions after watching the way the freshman quarterback handles his business.

“Everybody has seen Terrelle play and he has never played like a freshman at all,” running back Beanie Wells said. “To me, him being a freshman is irrelevant because he’s the type of guy who’s going to go out and play hard no matter who we’re playing.

“He’s a competitor and you really don’t find that too much in quarterbacks. Quarterbacks are usually laid-back guys, but Terrelle is a guy who’s going to get in your face and I love that about him.”

In that way, Wells sees a piece of OSU Heisman winner Troy Smith.

“When I look at Terrelle, who I think of is Troy,” Wells said. “It’s incredible the similarities those two guys have.”

“I would say he wouldn’t be intimidated at all,” left guard Jim Cordle said. “Just in how his confidence is and how his poise is in the huddle, I think it’ll be fun to see how he handles it. I have 100 percent confidence he’ll be fine and he won’t be rattled at all.”

Even if players or coaches were worried, there’s not much that could be done. Said offensive coordinator Jim Bollman: “You gotta kind of think beyond his age at some point. It’s like, he’s our quarterback. No matter how old he is, he’s our quarterback.”

No limits:

Bollman admitted there’s a line with how much you can ask Pryor to handle. But Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel said he doesn’t believe the Buckeyes are forced to hold anything back from their playbook at this point, because he doesn’t want to do it all anyway.

“I’m not looking to have the biggest package in the world,” Tressel said. “I’m looking to have the most effective one. Give enough so you apply pressure to the preparation of the defense, but do it well enough so that you’re really applying pressure.”

Injury update:

Tressel said freshman backup right tackle J.B. Shugarts hurt his shoulder this week and might not be available Saturday. Starting tight end Rory Nicol is out with an ankle injury suffered against Minnesota and backup middle linebacker Austin Spitler remains out with a leg injury.

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