Chris Holtmann reaffirms commitment to Ohio State: 'I'm not going to Notre Dame'
COLUMBUS — Ohio State head coach Chris Holtmann publicly stating that he was committed to the Buckeyes last month after a streak-snapping win over Illinois couldn’t stop the rumor mill, apparently.
Longtime college basketball writer Dick Weiss of the New York Daily News tweeted Tuesday that Notre Dame was “reportedly zeroing in” on Holtmann for its head coaching vacancy. Holtmann had been linked to the job as a possible candidate after Mike Brey announced in mid-January that he’d be stepping down from his post with the Fighting Irish.
But Holtmann isn’t going anywhere. He reaffirmed his February commitment Wednesday.
“I’m not going to Notre Dame,” Holtmann told The Columbus Dispatch. “I stand by what I publicly said. I’m committed to being here.”
Here’s what Holtmann said on Feb. 26 when he was asked if he was prepared to commit to Ohio State.
“Yes, absolutely,” Holtmann said. “I love it here. I love it here, and Gene [Smith] and I have been very open about our plan in terms of moving forward and what our plan was after last year with somewhat of a rebuild roster — what that was going to look like, how young we were going to be, our commitment to playing young guys, to backing that up with another young class.”
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Holtmann continued: “It’s a little bit hard to do sometimes when you’re going into Year Six, and you’re saying, ‘OK, hey, we’re gonna philosophically look at how we want to build this thing to give us maybe our greatest potential as a program. But I think we have played our young guys, we have another good class coming, and there is some real excitement in that amidst the tremendous disappointment with how some things have gone.”
Holtmann was then asked, as a follow-up, if that’s a “firm commitment” to him staying at Ohio State.
“Absolutely,” Holtmann said in response.
Holtmann signed an extension through the 2027-28 season last offseason and has been with the program six seasons. This is the first time the Buckeyes have missed the NCAA Tournament since he took over as head coach — excluding the year it was canceled because of COVID-19 — but Holtmann is still looking for his first Sweet Sixteen appearance with the Buckeyes, who have been knocked out of the Round of 32 three times in his tenure.
Ohio State is bringing in its second consecutive top-10 recruiting class this offseason. The Buckeyes endured losing streaks of five and nine games this season but picked up the pieces for a late-season resurgence that saw them become the lowest seed in Big Ten Tournament history to reach the semifinals. Still, it was Ohio State’s first losing season since 2003-04.
