CHAMPAIGN — Illinois quarterback Luke Altmyer said he was the most excited he has ever been for a game Saturday against Ohio State.

The No. 17 Illini hosted the country’s No. 1 team at Gies Memorial Stadium for the first time since 2006. Fans dressed in orange for the Illini’s sold-out Orange Out game gathered before dawn for Fox Big Noon Kickoff. The production was in town for the second time in three weeks after the Illini made good with a down-to-the-wire win over USC in its first visit.

It was the type of day Altmyer had dreamed about as a kid, he said.

“You only get it once,” Altmyer said. “I ain’t going to have another opportunity like that, probably, to be able to play at home, in front of a sold-out crowd, beautiful day, against the No. 1 team. That doesn’t come often.”

The Illini couldn’t rise to the moment.

By the end of Saturday, as Ohio State closed out its 34-16 victory, the Illini’s excitement had melted into disappointment — and perhaps regret. Illinois turnovers and mistakes led to Ohio State starting inside the Illini 40-yard line on four of its six scoring drives, including three in the first half.

An interception gave the Buckeyes the ball at the Illinois 35. A special teams gaffe put them at the 38. An Illini fumble started them at the 26. And another fumble let them start at the 24.

The Buckeyes (6-0, 3-0 Big Ten) scored a touchdown, a field goal and two more touchdowns on those drives as they built a 20-3 halftime lead and then snuffed out a second-half comeback attempt quickly.

“A lot of emotion,” Altmyer said. “Maybe that factored into some of the miscues early, just being really excited and maybe losing a little bit of focus there for some of our guys. Something we’re not used to. Not going to get used to this feeling at all.”

Altmyer, who finished 30-for-44 for 248 yards and a touchdown, hadn’t thrown an interception in the first six games for Illinois (5-2, 2-2).

But that changed in the first quarter Saturday on his third-down pass intended for Hank Beatty. Jermaine Mathews was tight on Beatty and tipped the ball, and Payton Pierce scooped it out of the air for a pick.

Illinois receiver Hank Beatty reacts after coming up just short of the goal line during the second half against Ohio State on Oct. 11, 2025, at Memorial Stadium in Champaign. (Michael Hickey/Getty Images)

Six plays later, Ohio State scored on C.J. Donaldson’s 1-yard touchdown run for a 10-0 lead.

The Buckeyes lengthened their lead to 13-0 following a special teams gaffe with Illini long snapper Lane Hansen out with a shoulder injury.

On a low snap from backup long snapper Patrick Mahoney, punter Keelan Crimmins put his knee on the ground, giving Ohio State the ball at the Illinois 38-yard line. The Illini defense held the Buckeyes to a 31-yard field goal.

“Literally when I saw we put the knee down on the punt, I was like, ‘What else can happen?’” Illinois coach Bret Bielema said. “That was kind of one of those ‘Woe is me.’ But if you begin to feel that way and you accept it, you’re never going to get anywhere.

“We fought our ass off to get to this point, to make this a game to draw some attention. Not just because Ohio State was coming to town but because we had two ranked teams. I’m not going to diminish that. I’m super proud of what we have accomplished. But it also was a good indicator that we’re nowhere close to where we need to go to get this thing to be more consistent against a really good team.”

A Ca’Lil Valentine fumble in the second quarter and an Altmyer fumble on a strip-sack in the third quarter later led to Ohio State touchdowns.

The Illinois defense, which felt like it had given up too many big plays this season, went into the day with an emphasis on making Ohio State earn it.

The short fields turned that mission upside down

“Previously on the back end, we’ve had a hard time limiting explosives, so that was a big emphasis for this game,” safety Matthew Bailey said. “Basically we were going into the drive where they already had an explosive. … It felt like we were just playing defense. We had already had that big play against us.”

The Illini actually outgained the Buckeyes in total yards 295-272, much of that late in the second quarter and in the second half as they allowed Altmyer to operate an up-tempo offense. They became the first team to score two touchdowns on Ohio State, which entered the day as the best scoring defense in FBS, allowing just five points per game.

Bielema said the Illini, who were dealing with injuries to running backs Kaden Feagin (shoulder) and Valentine (ankle), should have gone up-tempo earlier in the game because Ohio State’s defense “couldn’t do (expletive) with it.”

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Illinois cut Ohio State’s lead to 20-10 on the opening drive of the third quarter.

Altmyer handed the ball off to Beatty, who pitched it to Aidan Laughery, who scored on a 1-yard touchdown run.

But Ohio State responded with its one lengthy touchdown drive, a 14-play, 63-yard, grind-it-out push that took 7:52 off the clock. Donaldson scored on a 2-yard touchdown run to push the Buckeyes ahead 27-10.

Ohio State converted 8 of 15 third downs in the game and its only fourth-down try on that drive. Quarterback Julian Sayin completed 19 of 27 passes for 166 yards and two touchdowns.

The Illini gave plenty of credit to Ohio State, with Altmyer saying he expects them “to be playing late into the year, early into next year, I imagine.” But they still head into their bye week with a bad taste from the mistakes that made sure they never had a chance.

“Those opportunities don’t come around very often,” Bielema said. “We made it a really big moment, but now we created a memory you don’t want to have. But we’ve got to learn from it. We’ve got to learn from it. As coaches, we’ve got to take a deep dive into why those things popped up. We can’t just say, ‘Oh, we had a turnover. Oh, we couldn’t get off the field.’ Like, why? Are we putting our players in the best positions? Are we asking them to do something they can’t do?”

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