Being completely truthful with myself I think we had a chance to win the game last night.  Our defense started well and our offense was finally driving when we have the now infamous Fumble Stands call by the Booth Review.  That is at least a 10pt swing, since we were in field goal territory and gave them a huge lift to get that turnover.  Not saying the defense was blameless for letting them score because I know we couldn't keep them down all game.  But still it was a huge reverse in direction and just think if we had scored that first TD, would have been an entirely different game.  Next you have the now infamously horrendous Safety call.  Again you can fault TT for getting himself in that position in the first place, but at worst we should have punted and gave them a shorter field.  Buffalo was basically given 2pts free and a ton of momentum and demoralizing our guys in the process.  Buffalo is a team you can't afford to get behind on with that run game and defense.  Of course we shot our own selves in the foot with penalties, TT's lack of sharpness, WR drops, and the eventual break downs on defense.  It is a real shame the Refs played such a huge part in this game, these are two good MAC teams that deserved to play a fair and balanced game to see who might be the best in the East.  And I am sorry, as much as I respect Buffalo and think they are a good team I won't just give them this victory.  The impact from the Refs is too huge to ignore and completely changed the dynamics of this game and was no where close to being fair and balanced.  I am not saying that in a fair and balanced game we would be guaranteed to beat them, but I think it was a 50/50 that as the game got going got stacked in the Buffs favor.

Good poll!  I voted for Other.  I think Buffalo definitely was the better team last night (and is better overall than Ohio) but for me, it was Ohio's lack of mental toughness that I'd vote for. 

In today's Cleveland Plain Dealer Elton Alexander's headline was "Safety That Wasn't a Safety sends OU in a Tailspin."  If that's true, and it seems there's a lot of agreement that call and the overall poor job by the refs was the primary cause of Ohio's loss, then shame on Ohio.  Sure it was a piss poor call but terrible calls are made every game.  Real champions overcome those hurdles.  That's what disappoints me the most-Ohio apparently didn't have the mental discipline to overcome that call.  Until they do, they will never win the MAC.

We seemed to be swimming up-hill all night. From the refs, penalties, drops, Hey Diddle Diddle playcalling, to the Bulls completely manhandling us in the 2nd half on both sides of the ball. Throw in our adventures in Punting from both  kicking the ball to fielding the ball and truth be told NONE of it was ready for Primetime.

Wait a minute!  How could it have been worse?  The bad refs made it worse, if we had good refs and replay that game is closer.  Again not saying we win, but it was made worse by the screw job we were given by the refs.

We lost before we pulled into the stadium parking lot. 

We do seem to have a troubling history of our noteworthy senior athletes crapping the bed during the curtain call seasons.  While their overall body of work is to be celebrated they underachive in the regular season/when it counts

Refs put us down early (we played well on defense in the first quarter). The tone was set, TT will not run the ball or roll out, Beau does not have the holes to run through that he once had. Also, the play calling was terrible. Beau up the middle will not win against good teams. The defense could not stop the run after the first quarter (why was that? Emotional breakdown?) If Donte Foster was ripping them like the last few weeks, and if the refs didn't suck, we should have been ahead of this team; therefore, they would have gone away from the run game. We lost because of misfortune (I'm not crying about it we lost) and poor play on all sides of the ball. Oh, don't forget special teams.

Monroe, please. Credit to Buffalo. Bottom line.  Buffalo is better. They play the same game Ohio does and are better at it.  Ohio countered Oliver for a while. Carrie gets an interception.  Over time Oliver's creases got bigger. Carrie starts cheating into run support and Neutz is open over the top.  Again, the same thing Ohio likes to create with Beau and Cochran, just Buffalo is better at it this year. L.C. must have posted this ten times, Buffalo wore down the Ohio front. Credit Buffalo.   Ohio did counter Mack. He had 5 total tackles, far from a career day. The problem was Buffalo is good enough that six other Buffalo defenders had five or more too. They are good enough that if you sell out to handle or run away from Mr. Mack, Mr. Bean, Mr. Franklin, Mr. Way and Mr. Bachtelle will eat you up.  Credit to Buffalo.  Monroe, say it with me now. "Credit to Buffalo."

Good post. I agree, especially the bolded part. Since I'm not in the Athens area, I don't know what is being reported. But I wonder why this is not part of media coverage.

T^2 has previously said that he is just making the read, and the read says to hand it off. From that, I think it leaves the following possibilities:
(a) The scheme is defective/defenses have figured it out. If so, it's time to change things up.
(b) We don't have the players capable of executing the scheme/O-line isn't properly blocking/RBs aren't making the right cuts. If so, it's time to change things up.
(c) T^2 doesn't want to risk injury, is erring on the side of caution, and isn't actually making the correct read. If so, it's time to change things up.
(d) A combination of the above.

My personal opinion: (d). The offense is not nearly as creative as it was in 2011 when it was first installed. We all hoped that familiarity would allow the offense to build on itself. It seems that it has instead gotten into a rut and that defenses have figured out the keys to stopping the half dozen or so plays we run. It also seems like we do not have the right players, particularly at the skill positions, like we did in 2011. Not that we don't have athletes now...we have lots of talent. But it just feels different now. In 2011, was there any doubt that when we needed a 3rd down conversion, Dunlop was going to get open? Bates was a threat to run, throw, or catch any time he was on the field, and T^2 just found a way to win. And that last one leads me to believe that T^2 is more hesitant since that injury last season. The switch was flipped off after that and even though he is (supposedly) healthy now it just never was flipped back on. It's not just the read option...he's throwing the ball away more after the pocket breaks instead of using his legs.

Note: I don't mean any of this as criticism of any player, and maybe the stats don't back up my statements. This is totally an eyeball test. But it doesn't appear to me that this scheme with this set of players is going to work. And since at the college level it's easier to replace a scheme than find new players, I think the coaches need to spend some time revisiting what we are trying to do on offense.