Skull Session: Ohio State's New President is a Dude, Steve Spurrier Shares a Message With Ryan Day and Mario Williams Claims USC Has Best WR Room in America

By Chase Brown on August 23, 2023 at 5:00 am
Ryan Day
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Oh, it's good to be back.

After a one-day hiatus from the Skull Session, I have returned.

Let's Caffeinate and Dominate and have a good Wednesday, shall we?

 OH, SO HE'S A DUDE. On Tuesday, the Ohio State Board of Trustees hired Walter "Ted" Carter Jr. as the school's 17th president. And, folks, Carter is a dude. And when I use the word "dude," I mean he is an absolute DUDE.

Carter, 64, is currently the president of the University of Nebraska and will start as Ohio State's president on Jan. 1, 2024. Before he arrived in Lincoln in 2020, Carter was the 62nd superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy (2014-19) and 54th president of the U.S. Naval War College (2013-14).

A 1981 graduate of the Naval Academy, Carter studied oceanography and was a captain of the Midshipmen's ice hockey team. In 1982, Carter became an officer in the Navy. Three years later, in 1985, he graduated from the Navy Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor program – also known as Top Gun – and earned the call sign "Slapshot." Carter, who hails from Newport, Rhode Island, commanded several squadrons in his naval career from 1981-2019 and achieved the rank of vice admiral.

Carter accumulated 6,150 hours in the back seat of F-4, F-14 and F/A-18 aircraft and accompanied pilots in 2,016 carrier-arrested landings – a record among all active and retired U.S. Naval Aviation designators. Carter also flew on 125 combat missions in American military operations in Bosnia, Kuwait, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

But that's not all. Here are some of the awards and decorations Carter won in service of the United States: Navy Distinguished Service Medal, Defense Superior Service Medal (with one bronze oak leaf cluster), Legion of Merit (with three gold stars), Distinguished Flying Cross (with Combat V), Bronze Star, Defense Meritorious Service Medal (with three award stars) and about... mmm... 29 more awards after that.

As I said, a DUDE.

Despite those achievements, Carter said becoming Ohio State's 17th president is the "greatest honor of my career" because it operates "at the highest levels in academics, research, scholarship, clinical care, the arts, athletics and so much more."

Welcome to Buckeye Nation, Vice Admiral Carter. You're already off to an excellent start.

 WHAT'S NEXT FOR RYAN DAY? Many people have opinions about Ryan Day's decision to continue as Ohio State's offensive play-caller this season, even former college football head coaches Tom Osborne and Steve Spurrier.

In an article that posed the question, "Can Ryan Day stay as a play-caller and still win a national championship?" Joey Kaufman of The Columbus Dispatch spoke with Osborne and Spurrier – two play-calling head coaches to win titles – about how they handled both responsibilities and won it all. Within those interviews, Osborne and Spurrier offered Day some unprompted advice:

As Osborne and Spurrier offered their perspectives on calling plays as head coaches, they made sure to stress it wasn’t the only formula for success.

“Every coach has to feel their way along with what works for them,” Osborne said.

“There's all kinds of ways to do it,” Spurrier said.

So what should Day do? Spurrier offered advice unprompted when told Day was looking at giving up play-calling.

“He's had too much success,” Spurrier said. “He doesn't need to do that.”

He empathized with Day in the aftermath of Ohio State's consecutive losses at the end of last season.

“Every time you lose a game, you sort of have that feeling that maybe there's a better way to do it,” Spurrier said, “but that's how he got the job. He was good at offense, calling plays, and I don't think they lost to Georgia because he called some bad plays.”

Reminder: Ohio State scored 41 points in its CFP loss to Georgia. It was the most points the Bulldogs' top-10 defense allowed all season, as only one other team (LSU) scored 30 points or more against the national champions. And another reminder: Day said on the More Than Coach Speak podcast this offseason that he will take the let-it-loose mindset Ohio State had in the UGA loss and carry it over into the 2023 season.

"I think we did a better job in the Peach Bowl of letting it all out, playing aggressively and looking to play the next play and win the next play," Day said. "We didn't look at the scoreboard and say, 'What if we win? What if we lose?' We really focused on winning each situation and each play. ... That is something I will certainly take from this past season and take into 2023."

As Spurrier said, Day is good at offense and calling plays. Whenever he wants to hand over the keys to Brian Hartline, he will hand them over. As a coach with a 45-6 record, two Big Ten titles and three CFP appearances, I trust that Day will know when it is the correct time to do that.

 WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Pro Football Focus' Max Chadwick recently predicted college football award winners in 2023. After he shared his picks for the Heisman (FSU QB Jordan Travis), Bednarik (FSU DE Jared Verse) and Doak Walker (Michigan RB Blake Corum), Chadwick named Marvin Harrison Jr. the future Biletnikoff Award winner and Emeka Egbuka as the runner-up.

Now, duh, all college football fans know Harrison should have won the award last season and will be the frontrunner to win the award this season, so it's not newsworthy for Chadwick to pick Harrison to win or Egbuka to be a runner-up.

Still, their selections make a claim from USC wide receiver Mario Williams to Chadwick easier to disprove – as if I would need additional evidence to disprove its validity: “I think we are the best receiving corps in college football."

USC's top three receivers are Dorian Singer, Williams and Brenden Rice. Singer collected 66 receptions for 1,105 yards and six touchdowns last season for Arizona, while Williams (40/631/5) and Rice (39/611/4) collected 79 receptions for 1,242 and nine touchdowns combined for USC.

In comparison, Harrison recorded 77 catches for 1,263 yards and 14 touchdowns, Egbuka recorded 74 catches for 1,151 yards and 10 touchdowns and Julian Fleming added 34 catches for 533 yards and six touchdowns.

There's a difference – a massive one.

First Jalen McMillen at Washington, then Malachi Corley at Western Kentucky and now Williams at USC. All of them believe their wide receiver rooms are the best in the business, but they are in a battle for second place.

Ohio State is WRU. Except when ESPN writes the articles.

 BACK TO SCHOOL. Class was back in session for Ohio State students on Tuesday, which meant it was time for the Ohio State football media team to take some First Day Pictures and post them to Twitter.

Featured in the post are Tyleik Williams, Joe Royer, Donovan Jackson and Lincoln Kienholz.

All of them had some hilarious notes on their boards. Williams and Royer's favorite class is "lunch." Williams wants to be a tap dancer when he grows up, while Jackson wants to be a synchronized swimmer (let me know if you need contact info for Coach Holly Vargo-Brown, Donovan) and both Kienholz and Royer want to be football players.

Great stuff.

Ohio State's classes are back in session. Ohio State football is back in 10 days. Life is good in Buckeye Nation.

 SONG OF THE DAY. "Great Balls of Fire" by Jerry Lee Lewis.

 CUT TO THE CHASE. Guardians manager Terry Francona hints that this could be his final season (Sad)...  A rare spotless giraffe was born in a Tennessee zoo... Monster hunters are conducting the largest search of Loch Ness in more than 50 years... Stranger dives into New Hampshire lake to find woman's lost phone.

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Kurtis Rourke
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