Around 35 minutes into his Wednesday press conference – after a dozen comments about recruiting and a dozen comments about Ohio State’s loss to Michigan – Ryan Day received a closed-ended, direct question.
“Do you expect to be here next year?”
“Yes,” Day responded.
He squared his shoulders with the podium as he awaited another round of inquiries from the crowded team room. The next one didn’t address his future with the program, but more questions came later, including one that asked him if he’s ever considered leaving Ohio State in the past four years.
“No. No. This is a wonderful place. I got a great job. One of the best jobs in America,” he said. “It’s a challenge at times. You know, I’m disappointed about this more than anybody. It crushes me. But we’re gonna continue to move and figure out what it is and overcome this obstacle. We got a great way to make this a little bit better by going and winning the whole thing this year. But then we figure out what it is and get it fixed moving forward. That’s it. It’s my job to make sure I’m focused on this team right now and, with recruiting, to make sure the pieces are ready moving forward. That’s it.”
“No. No. This is a wonderful place. I got a great job. One of the best jobs in America.”– Ryan Day on whether he's considered leaving Ohio State in the past four years
As he reflected Wednesday on The Game, Day said Ohio State needs to play better on offense and special teams.
“I feel like the defense played excellent. Really, from the Oregon game on, some of those adjustments that were made have been excellent. I thought they played really, really hard in this game. Was everything perfect? No. But I thought they played really good,” he said. “When you look at the offensive side of the ball, it was not a good day. It wasn’t a good day across the board on offense. Some of that had to do with the coaching and some of the game planning that went on. There’s no question that we could have done a better job getting the ball to the perimeter.
“I think one of the key points in the game, though, is when you have five trips to the red zone and you only get 10 points. In those moments there, we had a couple of missed field goals, we had the interception, we had the field goal and we had the touchdown. We hadn’t done that up to that moment. That was a big deal. And then, on special teams, we had some other things we didn’t execute well. We had a couple of kicks that weren’t fielded great down on the 7-yard line, which created some coming-out situations. And then we had the two missed field goals.”
Day held himself accountable for those issues. As the team's head coach, he said all mistakes fall at his feet.
“Whether it’s the right guys being in the right spot, the recruiting part of it, the scheme, the coaching – that’s on me,” he said. “When you look back on it, there are definitely ways we could have gotten the ball to the perimeter. I think we threw it 35 times in the game, which I think is Will (Howard’s) second-most throws. It certainly played into it in the red zone and coming out. … There are definitely ways we could have done a better job. It’s the coach’s job to put the guys in the best position to be successful, and that didn’t always happen on Saturday.”
Even some of Day’s most loyal supporters have questioned this week whether the New Hampshire native can beat Michigan or lead Ohio State to its first national title since 2014. Day said he understands their frustration and shared that he’ll continue to persevere as he and the Buckeyes look to accomplish their goals of winning The Game, winning the Big Ten and winning the national championship – none of which they’ve accomplished since 2020, though they still have a chance to accomplish the last goal this year.
“There’s no way to defend losing four years in a row. Sometimes, when you’re really close and feel frustrated, you gotta push through. And that’s what we’re gonna do,” Day said.
