Dante Smith OSU defensive lineman Kenny Peterson takes down Washington State quarterback Jason Gesser after Gesser threw a pass in the second quarter.

COLUMBUS -- Conventional wisdom says Pac-10 teams win pretty and Big Ten teams win by the bludgeon.

One look at Jason Gesser gave you an indication which method worked best Saturday.

Gesser limped to the podium to address the media after his Washington State team absorbed a 25-7 loss vs. Ohio State. The Cougar quarterback sat down with a grimace, and carried the look of someone who'd taken a few too many hard hits.

His words backed up his appearance.

"They kept on coming. They kept on hitting you," Gesser said. "It wasn't like they hit you and you got back up and it discouraged them. They wanted to hit you hard every time."

And offense, too, considering Buckeye back Maurice Clarett rushed for a bruising 230 yards as OSU prevailed in a game pitting two of the nation's Top-10 ranked clubs.

OSUs physical game wasn't as noticeable in the first half.

WSU looked good early, taking the crowd out of the game by driving 80 yards on 11 plays on its opening drive. Gesser capped the drive with a five-yard pass to Devard Darling that gave the visitors a 7-3 lead.

The Cougars led 7-6 at the break, and Cougar coach Mike Price felt comfortable with the game, even though his club had squandered a scoring chance when the hold was botched on Drew Dunning's 29-yard second-quarter field goal attempt.

"At halftime I felt like we were going to be OK, because bad things didn't happen to us in the whole first quarter and the whole first half of the game," Price said.

The cumulative effect of OSU's physical play started to erode this confidence in the second half. Clarett, who rushed for 36 yards in the first half, exceeded that with his first carry in the second half, breaking several tackles and busting a 44 yard-run that set the Buckeyes up at the WSU 47.

Six plays later Clarett was at it again, this time with a play that perhaps symbolized the Cougars' second-half troubles. Clarett took the handoff and ran right, running through tackle attempts by WSU defensive backs Jason David and Erik Coleman, then finishing the run with a punishing hit on cornerback Marcus Trufant.

Clarett scored on the next play from three yards to give Ohio State a 13-7 lead. The Buckeyes never trailed after that.

Clarett's 230 rushing yards were the most racked up on the Cougar defense since Oregon's Onterrio Smith went for 275 last year. Coleman saw few similarities between the backs, though.

"Onterrio is a shifty back and (Clarett's) a power runner," he said. "He's a big boy. He's a load. Onterrio makes you miss. (Clarett) makes you miss by running through you."

Price concurred.

"We had guys there, didn't we?" he said. "Then 'bang,' he just bounced right off them. He's a hard guy to tackle, no question about that."

Clarett's dominance kept WSU's offense off the field for most of the second half. When the offense was on the field, Gesser was pressured relentlessly, sacked twice and generally kept out of sync.

The Cougar offense moved into Ohio State territory only twice in the second half. The team mustered 91 yards of second-half offense and was sent limping back to Pullman.

"We're beat up," Price said. "It was a man's football game today."

Originally published Sunday, September 15, 2002