Luke Fickell: Should He Stay or Should He Go?

First year head coach Luke Fickell is now more than halfway through his season-long tryout for a permanent job. Fickell has been handed a lot of crap in his first year, which makes the difficult task of winning over one of the nation's top fan bases even more difficult. Although the Buckeyes are only sitting at 5-3, Fickell has made himself a strong case to be considered to be the long term answer for the Ohio State football program.

Luke Fickell has done an outstanding job of helping his team improve. Since week 2, there has been steady improvement each week in a team that seemed nearly hopeless against Toledo and Miami (FL). Since then, it has been easy to see that the Buckeyes have been coming together as a team. The struggling offense is finally beginning to mesh in its most critical stretch of games in the season and his fledgling quarterback, Braxton Miller, has grown into the leader that the offense needed. The defense has been stellar all season long, except for the second half meltdown against Nebraska, but I still think that the offense was also to blame for keeping the defense on the field for so long.

Fickell is also doing a good job of setting off-field distractions aside and getting the wins he needs to keep the Buckeyes in Big Ten title contention. Backup running back Jamaal Berry was charged with assault over the last few days just weeks after almost being charged with the same crime in a separate occasion. But Fickell has been able to look past the Berry situation and get solid production out of the running game that has fueled consecutive wins against ranked teams.

Although it will be tough for Fickell to compete against the big-name coaches that are being tossed around in discussions for who will be coach next year (Urban Meyer), I think that he has done a good job so far. He has overcome a shaky start to the season and brought Ohio State back into the Big Ten title discussion. He's found a way to have the offense hit its stride when they need to most, and in my book he's doing what he needs to do to get a new contract at the end of the year.