Michael Cohen
College Football and College Basketball Writer
ATLANTA — As the final few notes of “Carmen Ohio” floated toward the cavernous roof at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, the players and coaches from Ohio State removed their arms from around each other’s shoulders and used them to spell the state where college football’s newest national champion resides. It’s a tradition the Buckeyes honor after every game they play — home or away, win or lose — and never has the mood been happier than it was on Monday night, when the ninth national championship in program history was secured with 34-23 victory over Notre Dame. Dear Alma Mater … O-H-I-O!
From his perch on the celebratory platform where this year’s trophy presentation was just completed, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day offered a variation to the traditional arm movements that conclude the song. Rather than mime the letters O-H-I-O with the rest of his team, as he normally does each week, Day simply hoisted the 50-pound prize made of gold, bronze and stainless steel instead. He’d finally completed the long, painful climb to the top of his highly scrutinized profession.
And how satisfying that moment must have felt after everything Day had stomached over the course of this season and the preceding three, none of which included Big Ten Championships or victories over archrival Michigan. How beautiful the song must have sounded on this night and this stage when juxtaposed with the hollow ringing at Ohio Stadium on Nov. 30, when the Buckeyes suffered their fourth consecutive loss to the Wolverines and a brawl was beginning to erupt near midfield, the pepper-sprayed reality of which failed to resonate with a shell-shocked and stupefied Day. How much lovelier the embrace with his family must have been knowing that his children won’t be harassed when they return to school later this week and his wife won’t be worried by death threats aimed at her husband. Even the more joyous postgame scenes following demolitions of Tennessee, Oregon and Texas came with lingering questions about Day’s future should Ohio State fall short against Notre Dame.
“I think in today’s day and age,” Day said shortly after midnight on Tuesday morning, “there’s just so much that goes with wins and losses and social media, and people have to write articles, and there’s a lot of things that are said that, yeah, certainly have an effect on you and your family. But when you sign up for this job, that’s what you sign up for. You’ve got to be strong enough to withstand those storms, to come out the back end. Now it’s an even better story.”
The story of Ohio State’s win over Notre Dame is about an unstoppable offense that scored touchdowns on its first four possessions and converted nine times in 12 attempts on third down, racing to a 31-7 lead by the middle of the third quarter. It’s about a defense that was walloped on the game’s opening drive and then responded by only surrendering 11 yards over the next four series combined, none of which resulted in points. It’s about a maligned kicker in Jayden Fielding who connected from 46 yards and 33 yards to keep the Fighting Irish at arm’s length in the second half. It’s about a critical third-down conversion just before the two-minute timeout in which the coaching staff entrusted freshman sensation Jeremiah Smith to beat man coverage for a 56-yard completion that effectively sealed the game.
But the story of Ohio State’s national championship can’t be told without exploring the growth and maturation from Day, who took over from Urban Meyer in 2019 and spent the better part of a decade tinkering and toiling before finally perfecting the formula during the first iteration of a 12-team playoff. Which means the story of this year’s title is about things like Day’s choice to hire defensive coordinator Jim Knowles from Oklahoma State and then stick with him after shoddy performances against Michigan (twice) and Georgia, with Knowles ultimately transforming his unit into a force in 2024. It’s about Day’s identification and recruitment of ex-Kansas State quarterback Will Howard (17-of-21, 231 yards, two TDs), whose enviable blend of leadership and talent was exactly what the Buckeyes needed following a disappointing stint with Kyle McCord. It’s about Day’s connection with his 2021 recruiting class, the bulk of which decided to bypass the NFL Draft and return for one more chance to win it all. It’s about Day’s willingness to give up play-calling duties and hire then-UCLA head coach Chip Kelly as offensive coordinator, freeing himself up to be more involved with other parts of the program like roster construction and fundraising, the result of which was one of the most potent transfer portal hauls in the country. It’s about Day’s incredible display of resolve in rebounding from another heinous loss to Michigan and then guiding Ohio State to four consecutive postseason victories against teams ranked seventh, first, third and fifth when the College Football Playoff bracket was revealed.
“I don’t know if it surprises other people,” Kelly said on Monday night, “[but] it didn’t surprise me because he’s built for this. I told him that a long time ago when he became the head coach here. ‘Go run with it because you’re built for it.’ I’m just really happy for him. And the way he led this group — the players will say the same thing — how he stood tall through everything. They always talk about Ohio Against the World. At times, it was the Woody Hayes Athletic Center against the world because it was just us.”
And yet, the expectation was always that Ohio State would come to Atlanta and clobber Notre Dame, just as the Buckeyes clobbered their previous three playoff opponents by a combined score of 111-52. Sporadic chants of “O-H! … I-O!” began rattling around downtown Atlanta shortly after 1 p.m. on Monday as hundreds of fans marched, parade style, along Peachtree Street and toward the stadium, all of them bundled against unseasonably cold temperatures. The cheers from Ohio State’s pregame demonstration were audible more than 60 floors above ground level through thick windows at the media hotel, a testament to both the passion of Ohio State’s fan base and how invigorating loosely enforced open-container laws can be. A few blocks south, at the intersection of Marietta Street NW and Centennial Olympic Park Drive, a rotating billboard flashed an Ohio State advertisement on repeat. “We’re taking everything one game at a time,” it said in perfect coach speak that would have made Day proud.
Their marketing effort was deployed a stone’s throw from SkyView Atlanta, the giant Ferris wheel across the street from where fans of both schools posed in front of the Olympic rings. A family of Fighting Irish faithful wore matching shamrock hats that wrapped around their heads and under their chins, with faces jutting through the middle where each leaf converged. Closer to the stadium, where parking attendants warmed themselves using propane heating tanks, the Notre Dame equipment truck was painted from aft to cabin with a statistic that won’t need updating: 11 CONSENSUS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS,” it read in white letters bookended by shamrocks.
And for a moment, albeit somewhat briefly, the possibility of another national title for Notre Dame felt distinctly real. That the Fighting Irish transformed their opening possession into an 18-play, 75-yard odyssey that featured one punishing run after another from quarterback Riley Leonard, who plowed through Knowles’ defense with relative ease, incubated the flickering notion that head coach Marcus Freeman and his band of independent underdogs could actually hang with the most explosive team in college football. When Leonard loped across the goal line untouched for a 1-yard score that gave Notre Dame an early lead, the stadium’s exuberantly green minority unleashed an eardrum-rattling roar. So perplexed was Day by what had happened that he spent the entire media timeout before the ensuing kickoff studying film on a tablet, hovering near the 35-yard line between occasional aimless wanders.
“I would say that first drive was kind of uncharacteristic of us,” linebacker Cody Simon said. “We expected to go out there and kind of dominate.”
The domination came soon enough, and with it some visceral displays of emotion from Day that underscored just how much he craved this national title after years of personal and familial strain. He pumped his fist twice and raised his leg when tailback Quinshon Judkins powered through tacklers and into the end zone for a 14-7 advantage. He joined the crowd in a Bronx cheer when Notre Dame’s offense was flagged for holding, the first such penalty against an Ohio State opponent since September. He leaped in the air and waved his arms excitedly when a fake punt-pass by the Fighting Irish fell incomplete a few feet from where Day was standing. And when his players doused him with Gatorade in the waning moments — at which point the Buckeyes’ victory was assured — he jumped into the arms of offensive tackle Josh Fryar and bellowed with delight.
Roughly 20 minutes later, after the trophy ceremony and the playing of “Carmen Ohio” came and went, Day walked off the field beneath the thickest patch of Ohio State’s fans. Only seven weeks had passed since Day made that same walk following a disastrous home loss to Michigan, at which point expletives and insults and calls for him to resign were loudly hurled in his direction. This time, Day simply raised his right hand while thousands of Buckeyes showered him with cheers.
“Nothing is guaranteed,” Day said. “But I always — in the back of my mind — felt that the people of Ohio and all of Buckeye Nation, after going through difficult times and seeing a team and a bunch of coaches go through difficult times to achieve their goal, it would mean even more. And I hope they’re all proud of what we’ve done.”
Michael Cohen covers college football and basketball for FOX Sports with an emphasis on the Big Ten. Follow him at @Michael_Cohen13.
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