Ryan Day

Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith has publicly backed head football coach Ryan Day despite back-to-back losses to archrival Michigan, telling ESPN's Heather Dinich that he is his "CEO" and that they've spoken about what they "need to do better."

"My standards are high; our team standards are high," Smith said.

"So we talk about how do we get better and how do we make sure we are able to win the championships that we aspire to win? We look at each individual contest that got in the way of that, and we're trying to figure out what's the strategy to mitigate that. When we lose, it's highly disappointing, but I break things down and look at things objectively, and we have good conversations about what we need to do better."

Day has been the Buckeyes head coach since 2019. He's led Ohio State to the College Football Playoff semifinal three times (2019, 2020, 2022) and a national championship appearance once (2020).

Ohio State has finished in the Top Six of the Associated Press poll in all four of his seasons but has notably fallen to reigning back-to-back Big Ten champion Michigan each of the past two years after winning 15 of the past 16 games in the rivalry.

Michigan has notably crushed Ohio State in each of these matchups, defeating the Buckeyes 42-27 in 2021 before winning 45-23 in 2022.

The first loss prevented OSU from making the CFP field. The second game did not as Ohio State snuck in as the No. 4 team. The Buckeyes gave eventual national champion Georgia all it could handle before losing 42-41.

The offense has been mostly sensational under Day, with the Buckeyes finishing third, 11th, first and second in points per game in each of the last four years, respectively.

The defense has not been as good, as evidenced by the Michigan losses and the performances in the College Football Playoff. OSU finished fourth in points per game allowed in 2019 in Division I FBS play, but the team regressed to tied for 43rd in 2020. The Buckeyes have been 38th and 24th in the past two years.

Day understands that Ohio State needs to improve defensively, specifically in limiting explosive plays, per comments to Dinich:

"The rivalry game's obviously very, very important," Day told ESPN.

"When you look at those games, and you see these single plays that really cost us the game. When you're talking about on defense, giving up explosive plays, certainly that's very, very important. That's how games can go sideways. And so we have to identify that, get that fixed, and that hurt us in the Georgia game as well. That was something we talked about a lot in the offseason, or we're continually talking about now in the spring, but I really like the team that we have coming back."

Day also said he believes his team has the talent to accomplish its goals.

"When you look at the roster, all you want to do is identify, OK, does this look like the teams we've had in the past?" Day said. "Do we have enough talent to reach our goals year after year? And the answer is yes. We definitely have it."

Ohio State will open the 2023 season on the road against Indiana on Sept. 2.

What felt inevitable is now official—Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud is heading to the NFL.

That shouldn't come as a surprise. The two-time Heisman Trophy finalist had another spectacular season in 2022, throwing for 3,688 yards, 41 touchdowns and six interceptions while completing 66.3 percent of his passes.

He's a potential top-five pick, so heading to the NFL was the right decision. But it creates a major question mark at the most important position on the field for the Buckeyes, quarterback.

Here's a look at how the offensive depth chart might look in the 2023 season:

• QB: Kyle McCord / Devin Brown
• RB: Miyan Williams / TreVeyon Henderson / Dallan Hayden / Chip Trayanum
• WR (X): Marvin Harrison Jr. / Jayden Ballard
• WR (Z): Julian Fleming / Kyion Grayes
• SWR: Emeka Egbuka / Kaleb Brown
• TE: Cade Stover / Gee Scott Jr. / Joe Royer
• LT: Zen Michalski
• LG: Donovan Jackson 
• C: Luke Wypler / Jakob James
• RG: Tegra Tshabola
• RT: Josh Fryar

And here are the notable incoming freshmen on the offensive side of the ball for the Buckeyes, per 247Sports.com:

• 5-stars: WR Brandon Inniss
• 4-stars: WR Noah Rogers, IOL Luke Montgomery, WR Carnell Tate, TE Jelani Thurman, QB Lincoln Kienholz, IOL Joshua Padilla, IOL Austin Siereveld, WR Bryson Rodgers

So that group of players could also worm their way into the depth chart situation.

Overall, this will still be a stacked team, rife with offensive weapons. The healthy one-two punch of Williams and Henderson at running back—both battled injuries this past season—will make the Buckeyes dangerous on the ground.

Harrison Jr., meanwhile, may be the most talented player in all of college football, period, next season. Certainly, he and Egbuka comprise the most dangerous receiving duo in the sport.

So whoever emerges as the starting quarterback—and barring a big move in the transfer portal, McCord is the clear frontrunner—he won't have any shortage of playmakers to rely on.

Expecting anybody to replicate Stroud's impressive run over the past two seasons is probably folly. But the Buckeyes have enough talent that they only need a quarterback who can avoid bad decisions and costly turnovers.

Get the ball to the explosive playmakers and let them handle the rest, in other words.

Ohio State football head coach Ryan Day announced Friday that wide receivers coach Brian Hartline will add offensive coordinator duties to his responsibilities.

Hartline replaces ex-OC/tight ends coach Kevin Wilson, who left the Buckeyes to become Tulsa's new head coach.

The news comes after ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit reported on the Jan. 2 edition of College GameDay (h/t the Columbus Dispatch's Colin Gay) that Day "mentioned in our production meetings he's going to stop calling plays next year because he needs to become more of a manager as a head coach."

He later rephrased his comments with a less declarative remark about Day's potential decision, saying that "he's thinking about relinquishing those [responsibilities] which would be the first time ever. I don't know who, Brian Hartline, or whoever, would be involved."

We'll see if Hartline becomes the team's new playcaller, but at the least, he's now the team's new offensive coordinator as Ohio State looks to improve upon a 2022 season in which it finished 11-2 and lost a 42-41 heartbreaker to eventual national champion Georgia in the College Football Playoff semifinals.

On3 named Hartline as the best position coach in the country in 2022, and it's easy to see why.

Hartline has coached numerous Ohio State players who are excelling in the NFL, including the New York Jets' Garrett Wilson, the New Orleans Saints' Chris Olave, the Washington Commanders' Terry McLaurin and the Indianapolis Colts' Parris Campbell. Olave and Wilson were both first-round picks in last year's draft.

Hartline was tasked with coaching up a new crop of starting wideouts in 2022 after Olave and Wilson left for the NFL and Jaxson Smith-Njigba, who led the team with 95 catches and 1,606 yards in 2021, missed the entire year with hamstring issues.

Ultimately, the new OSU star wide receivers excelled. Marvin Harrison Jr. led the way with 77 catches, 1,263 yards and 14 touchdowns, and Emeka Egbuka posted a 74/1,151/10 stat line. Julian Fleming also fared well as the No. 3 wideout with 34 receptions, 533 yards and six touchdowns.

Day praised his work with the wideouts when announcing the move.

Hartline played at Ohio State from 2005-08, and the Miami Dolphins selected him with the No. 108 overall pick in the 2009 NFL draft. He stuck with Miami through the 2014 season before ending his career with the 2015 Cleveland Browns. Hartline caught 344 passes for 4,766 yards and 14 touchdowns for his career.

The 36-year-old returned to OSU as the team's offensive quality control assistant in 2017 before earning a promotion to wide receivers coach in 2018.