Ryan Day reveals Ohio State's starting returners on kicks, punts
Ohio State has designated who their returners will be on special teams for this season.
On Thursday, Ryan Day clarified which players will be returning what with the media. That began with kickoffs with Jayden Ballard and Carnell Tate bringing them back for the Buckeyes.
“You know, JB is going to, you know, take the first kickoff return and Carnell is also going to be right there,” said Day. “Those are our two guys there.”
“In terms of kickoff return, Jayden Ballard will do the first kickoff. We’ll go from there,” Day said.
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Ballard was the leading punt returner for Ohio State last fall with him bringing in nine for 49 yards and 5.4 yards per return. He did return one kick as a sophomore.
As for Tate, these will be his first returns as he enters his sophomore season.
Then, in punt returns, Day said they’re going to have several players contributing there. That group starts with Brandon Inniss and Emeka Egbuka among others.
“We’re a little bit by committee in the back end on punt returning,” said Day. “Brandon Inniss is there, Emeka is there. You know, we have a few guys back there we can use. I think you’ll see a couple of them there.”
Like Tate, Inniss has yet to make any returns as he too goes into his sophomore year.
Egbuka, though, is naturally the most experienced of them all as a fourth-year graduate student with 39 returns to his name. He has brought back 21 kicks, all of which came in his first two seasons, for 605 yards at an average of 28.8 per while also returning 18 punts in the past two years for 98 yards at 5.4 per.
These will be the returners in both aspects of special teams to start with when Ohio State kicks it off against Akron on Saturday at 3:30 ET on CBS.
Day reveals Chip Kelly will call games from the press box
Ryan Day recently shared that Chip Kelly is going to call games from the press box this season.
As Day explained, by being up in the box, Kelly will have the ability to be more organized overall. Because of that, it will allow him to call the game better and should benefit the Buckeyes offense.
“His plan is to be up in the box,” Day said. “I think, for him, being able to get organized up there. He’s got the tablet up there. He’s got his call sheet up there. He can really be clean after every series. I think that’s one of the things twoo that he and I were talking about was that when you’re on the sideline and you’re the head coach. You have your call sheet but it’s hard to get your next series ready when you’re doing all these other things.”
“When you’re up there, you’ve got a desk, you can sit down and you get your thoughts organized for the next series,” Day said. “You can go through everything. You can communicate well. So that’s gonna be his plan.”