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Ryan Day credits Chip Kelly, offensive staff for role in winning national championship

IMG_6598by:Nick Kosko01/25/25

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Chip Kelly didn’t have to come coach under his former protege Ryan Day at Ohio State, but he did it anyway.

It was quite the turn to go from UCLA head coach to Ohio State offensive coordinator and take a back seat from the CEO part of the job. But Kelly’s arrival was integral to Ohio State winning the national championship this season.

Was he the missing link? Maybe. But Day was grateful for Kelly’s contributions in 2024.

“Very excited to see, you know, a big smile on his face after the game,” Day said of Kelly. “You know, for him to come and leave the head coaching position, to come work with me meant a lot, because he’s obviously someone who’s a mentor to me, and certainly would not be where I am without him, and he has just a great feel for the game. He really helped me this year (and I) spent more time outside of the quarterback room. 

“Certainly I was involved very much with the offense, but it allowed me to spread out a little bit and spend more time with the guys on defense, again, not as much as I’d like to, but still enough to just bounce in and out. And I think it brought us all together.” 

Ohio State’s offense was loaded with QB Will Howard, RBs Quinshon Judkins and TreVeyon Henderson and WRs Jeremiah Smith and Emeka Egbuka. Kelly had plenty of options to work with.

He brought the best out of all of them, according to Day.

“And I think the guys would agree and wouldn’t have got that done without Chip (Kelly),” Day said. “But I also want to just make sure that I recognize the guys on offense, you know, the offensive staff, I think will will tell you between Brian Hartline, Justin Fry, Kenan Bailey, Billy Fessler, you know, Carlos Laughlin, you know, go through all the different guys in that room. We got a great staff in there. And I thought, again, they came up with a great game plan, but they work at it. I mean, work their tails off at this thing. And, you know, it really showed itself … When you get in the playoffs … 

“It becomes almost what I feel, almost more like the NFL. You got to wipe the slate clean, and you got to, you got to put a whole new game plan together in about 10 days, and you got to go put it on the field. And hats off to our coaches.”