As preseason camp begins this month, Land-Grant Holy Land is diving into its final theme every week of the off-season. This week is all about making predictions that may or may not be reasonable, in fact, some might say they are bold. You can catch up on all of the Theme Week content here and all of our ”Bold Predictions” articles here.
The Ohio State football team accomplished an unimaginable amount in December and January of last season. The Buckeyes went on arguably the greatest four-game run
in the history of college football, they claimed the program’s ninth national title, and reestablished themselves at the top of the college football mountain. However, the thing that I think is most significant from the Buckeyes’ College Football Playoff run is the fact that head coach Ryan Day got the proverbial monkey off his back.
Despite tons of wins over the last three or four seasons, for many in Buckeye Nation, there has been an air of anxiety around the program because no matter what the team accomplished, there always seemed to be a feeling that the other shoe was going to eventually drop. Unfortunately, that footwear often fell in the regular season finale against Michigan.
These disappointments led many Buckeye fans — myself included — to wonder if Day was capable of getting over the hurdles that he seemingly placed in his own path. While a wizard in the schematic and motivational areas of coaching, an obsession to prove that his team was “tough”, and inability to trust his assistant coaches and players in the most inopportune times to becoming oddly overly conservative in big situations, Day’ mental blocks in the biggest games led to many fans living in a constant state of existential dread when it came to the Buckeye football team.
Now, this might say more about those fans than the team or head coach, but there is no denying that fans — including many outside of the #LunaticFringe — were increasingly concerned about whether or not Day could get the Buckeyes back to the upper echelon of college football.
Well, the easiest way to get people to stop worrying about whether or not you can do something is to just go out and do it, and that is exactly what Ryan Day did. Following the fourth-straight loss to Michigan, the head coach seemingly reexamined everything about his team, taking the restrictor plate off of the offense, letting the defense play with an aggression that had appeared to be lacking, and giving his coaches the right to take big swings.
It obviously all paid off last season, and that leads to a much different vibe coming into the 2025 campaign. While this year’s squad will not have the benefit of all of those insanely talented and experienced players that anchored the title run last year, there are plenty of guys waiting in the wings to step up and get their turn.
But even if the team doesn’t repeat, or it stumbles a couple of times throughout the season, I don’t think that there will be the constant storm cloud looming over the fandom, waiting to unleash a torrential downpour at the first sign of trouble. The issues that led to questions about Day’s capabilities have been asked and answered, so I feel like Buckeye fans (and bloggers) can approach this season more like Tigger or Pooh, rather than Eeyore.
Is this a rebuilding year? No, Ohio State doesn’t rebuild. Is it a season when going undefeated and winning each game by double-digits is reasonable? Probably not. However, with the expanded playoffs, teams like OSU have a little bit more margin for error than what was already afforded the best teams from the best conferences. So we (and by we, I am absolutely including myself) don’t need to react like the sky is falling anytime the team doesn’t look perfect.
While there are always going to be outsized expectations and emotions surrounding the Buckeye football team, I do feel like this season is going to be different. I certainly don’t expect the fans to be complacent because of last season’s national title, but I do think that the CFP win brought a certain peace of mind to the fandom. Not every coaching decision has to be observed and evaluated as if it is a referendum on the future of the program. There is an understanding, conscious or otherwise, that there will be peaks and valleys throughout the course of any season, especially one with 15 new starters and a pair of new coordinators.
Will there be moments when fans are frustrated with the team and coaches? Undoubtedly. But I don’t think that those moments of frustration will lead fans en masse to question whether the program is headed in the right direction. While there will assuredly be intense emotions around those moments — as there always will be with all things OSU — I get the sense that they will be met with the awareness that the thing that we most feared no longer carries the same weight. Ryan Day absolutely can get his team to the pinnacle of the sport; they are there, and he has proven that he can do anything asked of him.
Now, there is, of course, one caveat to all of this. If the Buckeyes lose The Game for the fifth straight year, then there will be a healthy helping of all kinds of dread: existential, impending, apocalyptic, nihilistic, ontological, the list goes on and on.
However, since I am predicting that Ohio State will beat That Team Up North in Ann Arbor 35-21 this season, I don’t think that we are going to have to worry about that, so I stand by my bold prediction: There will be no need for widespread existential dread from Ohio State fans this season.
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