Ryan Day previews how different Ohio State will look on offense with Chip Kelly calling plays

With NIL and the transfer portal adding more to head coach’s plates outside of the X’s and O’s, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day has taken a step back and given up his offensive playcalling duties ahead of the 2024 season. A responsibility that will now be handed down to new offensive coordinator Chip Kelly.

Kelly joined the Buckeyes this offseason following nearly 14 consecutive seasons as an NFL and college head coach. Dialing his focus fully on calling plays versus the aforementioned new responsibilities of being a college head coach after a six-year tenure at UCLA.

Day recently sat down with Joel Klatt as a part of Klatt’s Big Noon Conversations series, asking the Ohio State head man if the team’s prolific offense will look different this upcoming season under Kelly.

“Yeah, I think so. I don’t think it’ll look drastically different, maybe just to some of watching the game, but you’ll see schematically some different things,” Kelly said. “And you know Chip’s history of running the ball speaks for itself and we got some really good running backs and he’s creative in what he does. What we’ve done passing the ball here kind of speaks for itself, so I think there’ll be a combination of those things.”

Ohio State has been prolific in the passing game for many years now, with 10 wide receivers and two quarterbacks currently in the NFL (six first-round selections) after posting big-time numbers in Columbus.

But during that same time period, Kelly was turning UCLA into a prolific offense rushing the football. Ranking first in the Pac-12 in rushing yards per game the past two seasons and second in the league the two seasons prior to that. As Day and Kelly now join forces for the fourth time in their respective coaching careers and will look be dominant through the air and the ground.

“But the great thing for me was that when I came here, I came from his system. So we brought in what Urban [Meyer] did and kind of molded those things together when we were here those first couple of years. And then as time has gone on, he’s kind of done a little something different at UCLA, we did a little something here,” Day explained. “So now we’re kind of coming back together.”

The Buckeyes definitely have the personnel to maintain their offensive excellence.

Dual-threat quarterback Will Howard joined the team this offseason and the running back duo of Quinshon Judkins and TreVeyon Henderson is viewed by many as the best one-two punch in the country. That paired with their typical talent at wide receiver leaves Ohio State with the sole task of getting up to speed on their nuanced system.

“The tough part was he came in right before spring started,” Day said referring to Kelly. “So we just kind of got it started, got it going, put the base things in, got some fundamentals down, focused on techniques and those things. And I think now the next couple of months, we’re really going to dig into what the install looks like going into preseason.”

Between their roster and coaching staff upgrades, the expectations are sky-high for Ohio State this upcoming season. And it will be fascinating to see if their offense specifically can maintain their standards with a new sheriff in town calling the shots.