Ryan Day opens up on constant changes in college football calendar
The college football calendar has, for the most part, become an unrelenting onslaught for coaches, staffers and even players. Ohio State head coach Ryan Day is not exempt from this nearly year-round grind.
But for all the foibles and shortcomings of the current calendar, Day would leave it alone for the time being. He explained why in a lengthy interview with Fox Sports’ Joel Klatt.
“I’m a firm believer, that when we make a change, we don’t see really the ramifications of that decision for about three to four years down the road. And every time we make a change, it creates a whole ‘nother set of issues. And so we quickly adapt. And when you’re talking about the most competitive environment in the world, then guys are going to figure out ways to gain competitive advantages. So while I agree with you, it puts a lot of stress on December,” Day said.
He continued: “And right now you look at it and say ‘This is crazy.’ I think we really have to think through any change that we make right now. Just to say, ‘Well, let’s move it over here. Let’s make this a contact period. Let’s do this.’ We’ve already had enough change. I’ve been saying this for years. We don’t need to keep changing right now. I think we need to think through, like you said, the bigger picture.”
One of the current apparent shortcomings in the calendar is the early signing day in mid-December. This comes as coaches like Day are usually prepping a team for a big bowl game of a College Football Playoff semifinal.
Even for coaches who aren’t playing any postseason games, to have just a few weeks between your final game and signing a bulk of your recruiting class is a whirlwind.
Day suspects that if you moved it further up to be before the season and shifted it back, it’d still be the same sort of rush and push to get people signed.
And currently, with the disparate nature of the sport and lack of centralized leadership, he’s concerned about making broad changes.
“Because so many people come from different angles. That’s one of the things I’ve learned. Like if I go to the AFCA convention and the head coaches meeting, there’s 100 coaches in there. And there’s big schools, small schools, schools on the west coast, schools on east coast, they all have their own set of issues. And they’re all coming from different angles. So to get everybody to come together as one, to come up with answers, is a huge challenge. And I think that echoes, to your point, of somewhere coming down the road of figuring out how do we get one voice here so we can all go in the same direction,” Day said.
And he’d generally like to see the current era of tinkering with the recruiting calendar to hit a moratorium, if only to let the dust settle as some other major changes hit the sport.
“If there’s going to be some conference alignment. If there’s going to be some things like that, then we can start to go down the road of changing things. But, as we sit here right now, I’m in favor, as hard as it is, of kind of keeping things consistent right now the best we can. Avoid making too many changes,” Day said.