After beating top ranked Texas last week in the most-viewed opening week matchup in the history of college football with 16.6 million viewers tuned in, defending national champions Ohio State, and Ryan Day are back at #1 in the country as they're set to welcome FCS foe Grambling State, led by Mickey Joseph to The Shoe this weekend
Before providing his thoughts on the matchup, Joseph decided to have a bit of fun at his presser yesterday.
"Well, first of all, they've got a great band, and we've got a great band. So we're going to compete, as a band," he shared with a grin.
"I'm just joking right now," he added as a few chuckles filled the room.
After the lighthearted moment, Joseph provided some perspective on what the mentality is like for an FCS program hitting the road to take on the top ranked team in major college football and the defending national champions.
"We understand what we're getting into. We understand what's going to happen. We understand there isn't balance in the scholarships, and there's not balance in what they have resources-wise and what we have resources-wise. We all know why we're playing the game."
Ohio State is set to pay a total of $3 million for guarantee games against Grambling and Ohio, with $1 million to Mickey and his squad before allocating nearly twice-that ($1.9 million) to the Bobcats for their visit on September 13th, per The Columbus Dispatch.
"I spoke to the coaches today and said the game has to be clean. It had better be clean. Clean to me means that we better not have 9 on the field. We'd better not have 13 people on the field. It's clean. Play within the system, and we swing. We fight every play."
"We know right now, they're probably going to be the #1 team in the country, so it's a great opportunity."
Joseph goes on to compliment coach Day's approach to coaching this year's team before the coaching veteran with recent previous stops as an assistant at LSU and Nebraska added, "Sometime's, when you have a talented group, they are harder to coach than a non-talented group. He's got a talented group and he and his coaches have done a great job getting those kids prepared to have a great showing against Texas."
Joseph is in year two leading the program, coming off a 5-7 finish last fall, the Tigers are 1-0 after drubbing Langston (an NAIA program based in Oklahoma Joseph previously led for a few seasons back in 2011 and 2012) 55-7 last week.
Hear more from Joseph in the clip.