Why Ryan Day's decision to quit play-calling was the best decision for the Ohio State football team

Ryan Day has always been a playmaker at heart. He loves the science behind designing the perfect play, calling it at the right time and watching it executed.

And he's good at it, too: Ohio State has had some of the best offenses in the country. Since Day arrived as offensive coordinator in 2018, the Buckeyes have finished in the top 10 in total offense every year except last season.

In this era of college football, it's becoming increasingly difficult for head coaches to justify the time spent on game planning in addition to running a program, recruiting, handling the transfer portal, and fundraising for NIL. That's why Chip Kelly left his head coaching position at UCLA to become Day's offensive coordinator at Ohio State. He wanted to focus on the football side of things.

Day knew he had to change if he wanted to achieve the success he demanded of himself and the fans in Columbus expected. He had to look himself in the mirror, put his pride aside and stop making plays. Not because he wasn't capable of doing so, but because he needed to shift his focus elsewhere.

This decision had a domino effect throughout the program. A full roster and changes in the coaching staff have put Ohio State in a position to win its first national championship since 2014, so much so that 16 writers and editors at The athlete predicted that the Buckeyes would win the national championship before the Buckeyes' opener against Akron on Saturday, out of 28 people surveyed during the preseason.

“I think at the end of the season you have to take a deep breath and think about what's going well and what needs to change to get to where we want to be,” Day said.

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Ohio State's 14-3 loss to Missouri in the Cotton Bowl was a low point in the Day era.

Since taking over the program in 2019, he has the third-highest winning percentage in college football with just eight losses. But that night last December, Heisman finalist Marvin Harrison Jr. wasn't on the field, and the Buckeyes didn't have their starting quarterback because Kyle McCord entered the transfer portal. They looked unprepared, underdog and under-trained after a month off. The 3-point, 203-yard performance capped a disappointing season. That Michigan went on to win the national championship hurt even more.

Nothing last year met the standard Day set for the program, so he said during his post-Cotton Bowl press conference that things needed to change.

“It's hard to process all of this right now, but we need to figure out what's best for the team going forward,” Day said at the time. “It affects a lot of areas. We'll look at it closely and find a solution, but we'll look at everything.”

To Day's credit, he stuck to this idea.

Day's decision to step away from play-calling was best for Ohio State, even if it wasn't an easy decision for the coach. It shows growth and flexibility that he understands he doesn't have to control everything, a problem every new head coach struggles with.

Former Ohio State defensive coordinator Luke Fickell, now at Wisconsin, gave up his playmaking duties when he became head coach at Cincinnati, and he said he doesn't regret that decision.

“When it comes down to Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, I don't spend nearly as much time as (Wisconsin co-coordinators) Mike Tressel and Alex Grinch and those guys fine-tuning the game plan and watching and watching to really be arrogant enough to think I could make better decisions and adjustments during a game than they could,” Fickell said. “And if I did, I think we have the wrong guy.”

New OC Chip Kelly has been head coach since 2009. (Adam Cairns / USA Today Network)

Day spent the winter making sure he got the right guy, or a candidate pool full of the right people. He didn't want to give the job to just anyone. In fact, Day considered giving up play-calling before the 2023 season, but he wasn't ready to hand the responsibility over to first-year coordinator Brian Hartline, the receivers coach who still holds the title of co-offensive coordinator.

This season, however, Day began searching with all his might after former athletic director Gene Smith promised him a raise for the assistants.

He initially landed with Bill O'Brien, the former Penn State and Houston Texans head coach who spent the last three years on the staffs of Alabama and the New England Patriots. But a few weeks after his hiring, O'Brien accepted the head coaching job at Boston College.

He was replaced by Kelly, who made the rare move from head coach to Power 4 coordinator.

Kelly, who was one of Day's mentors, is well suited to take Ohio State's offense to the next level. Combining his innovative thinking and running game skills with Day's passing game is a dream for Ohio State fans and a potential nightmare for defensive coordinators.

The new recruit assured Day that giving up play-calling was the right move.

“It just had to be right,” says Day, “and that’s why we invested so much time and were so thorough.”

The timing of handing over the reins to the offense came at just the right time, as the 2024 offseason was a constant mess for the Buckeyes.

He hired Matt Guerrieri to replace Perry Eliano as safeties coach and named James Laurinaitis the new linebackers coach in February, meaning Day would help coach special teams without a special teams coordinator on the team. With spring football underway and the coaching staff seemingly set, running backs coach Tony Alford left for Michigan. While searching for a replacement for Alford, Day took over the running back room during spring practice before hiring Carlos Locklyn from Oregon.

There was also the transfer portal, another quarterback battle and an increased emphasis on NIL fundraising.

All of that didn't even take into account what happens on the field. Don't get me wrong: Day is still involved in offensive game planning, but being able to feel more free to execute the offense has allowed him to better help the program as a whole. He enjoys spending more time in defensive meetings and providing his input as an offensive player to help a group that is already one of the best in the country.

“Sometimes on defense you see things from a different perspective, and now he brings the idea of, 'Hey, this is how we would try to attack this,' so we can close any gaps quicker,” cornerbacks coach Tim Walton said. “He has a different view and perspective on how they would attack us. That's been beneficial for us.”

Kelly has known Day since he was a young boy and coached with him in the NFL. As a head coach, he's seen Day up close for the first time. He said the most noticeable thing this season has been Day's attention to detail.

“He's detail-oriented, down to 'What's the special teams drill in the 10th period and do we want to be on the right or left hash?'” Kelly said. “His attention to detail is outstanding. There aren't many head coaches I know that are that detailed in everything they do. Usually it's 'OK, I'm the head coach, this is your period, do whatever you want, and they overdo it.' He holds his staff accountable, but the details of how he plans practice and how we schedule meetings and walkthroughs are outstanding.”

An often overlooked aspect of running a program is the message a coach sends on a daily basis. This sets the tone for the training and culture he wants to build, and Day has had more time to focus on that this offseason as well.

“I can have staff meetings to think about how I want to address the team and what areas I want to give employees,” Day said. “All of that has allowed me to do that, and I think it's helped the team and the company culture.”

Although he can no longer call the game, there is no extra rest for Day. He is not only the head coach at Ohio State, but also the CEO of a well-known football brand that is supposed to be run like a Fortune 500 company.

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He has restructured a program that faced significant questions after its loss to Missouri and now hopes to win the national championship with a squad that his predecessor Urban Meyer said “could be the best squad in college football in the last decade.”

Despite all the criticism Day received after the Cotton Bowl (and most of it was justified), he had a flawless offseason. Now comes the hardest part: living up to expectations.

Nobody gets a trophy for winning a championship in the offseason. It just adds pressure, which is nothing new for Day after three straight losses to rival Michigan. Whenever he's asked about urgency, he responds with the same answer: “If you want to know what urgency is like, try losing a game against Ohio State.”

He has missed the playoffs in two of the last three years and hasn't beaten Michigan since 2019. Something had to change this offseason, and Day deserves credit for starting with himself.

(Top photo: Justin Casterline / Getty Images)