COLUMBUS, Ohio — Midway through the first quarter, the most pressing concern at Ohio Stadium was whether or not enough was being done to give Marvin Harrison Jr.’s Heisman Trophy candidacy a big enough a boost.

By the time Harrison’s second touchdown of the evening gave the Buckeyes a two-score lead in the first quarter, the game had become incidental.

It was clear that Michigan State would have trouble moving the ball, and Ohio State would have no problem doing so.

Harrison finished the game with three touchdowns, the Buckeyes finished with five as a team, and the focus shifted fairly quickly from the game itself to staying healthy for the remainder of the night.

Ohio State’s 38-3 win was a formality nearly from the get-go, as the process soon became far more important than what showed on the scoreboard and in the box score. And as it turned out, both looked stellar by night’s end.

A quick start

For weeks, Ohio State had been longing for a first half in which there wasn’t any reason to worry about the end result.

Saturday, the Buckeyes got just that.

They scored touchdowns on their first three drives, and last two drives, of the first half to make the game 35-3 at halftime and make the entirety of the second half (and some of the second quarter) merely a formality.

Ohio State had scored four touchdowns on nine game-opening drives this season, but had just one touchdown on the first drive of the night from the Notre Dame game to Saturday. During the six-game stretch, Ohio State kicked one field goal (against Penn State), punted or turned the ball over on downs four times, and scored one touchdown (against Purdue).

Against Michigan State, the Buckeyes followed up their game-opening score with two more to put to rest any thoughts of looking past the Spartans.