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Ohio State AD Gene Smith announces his retirement, effective July 2024

IMG_6598by:Nick Kosko•08/09/23•

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(Photo by Kirk Irwin/Getty Images)

Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith announced he’ll retire effective June 30, 2024, according to On3’s Pete Nakos. The AD will be in place next July.

Smith was named AD at Ohio State back in March of 2005 and served as the athletic director of Arizona State, Eastern Michigan and Iowa State prior to his tenure in Columbus. A former football player himself, Smith played four seasons at Notre Dame and won a national title in 1973.

He was a former assistant coach at Notre Dame after his graduation in 1977.

As athletic director at Ohio State, Smith oversaw immense success throughout the athletic department, including a football national title in 2014 under former coach Urban Meyer, the first title in the College Football Playoff era.

In total, Smith oversaw nine national titles as Ohio State’s athletic director. In 2010, Smith won the Carl Maddox Sport Management Award and was given the James J. Corbett Memorial Award in 2016.

Among other achievements at Ohio State, Smith saw a record 2019-20 year. Ohio State had 647 scholar athletes, 457 Academic All-Big Ten selections and 257 student athletes earn their degrees.

In the Big Ten, Ohio State was dominant under Smith. The Buckeyes won 105 team and 331 individual conference championships.

In addition more than 90% of graduating seniors earned jobs, enrolled in graduate school or move onto professional sports.

Football is king throughout college sports. Ohio State is no different as the Buckeyes have come oh-so-close to winning another national title.

Ryan Day is knocking on the door of one and Smith expressed confidence in the head coach.

“When we hired him, I told him, ‘You’ve got to stay in your wheelhouse and call plays. There’ll be a natural point in time in your career where that changes,’” Smith told ESPN. “So that’s not for me to decide; that’s for him to decide …

“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.”