ATLANTA – In pregame warmups, with celebrities such as Joe Montana and Travis Scott on the sidelines, college football’s next big star, Ohio State receiver Jeremiah Smith rocketed down the field, tracked a deep ball over his shoulder and effortlessly caught it.
Chip Kelly, the Buckeyes’ first-year offensive coordinator, had a Cheshire cat smile on his face watching it unfold. He sidled up to his star freshman receiver, whispered something into his ear and had another big grin as Smith gave a satisfactory response. It was a brief yet revealing moment that made you think Kelly and Smith knew Notre Dame was about to be in big trouble trying to stop OSU’s explosive offense.
“I asked him if he was scared,” Kelly recalled to CBS Sports.
The answer? “He said, ‘No.'”
Smith was honest with his coach though he undersold his readiness just a tad. And when it mattered most, Kelly and quarterback Will Howard trusted Smith to come down with the catch that extinguished Notre Dame’s comeback hopes.
Up eight points with less than three minutes remaining in the game, Ohio State faced a critical call on third-and-11 at its own 34-yard line. Failure to convert would give the ball back to a Notre Dame offense that just marched 80 yards down the field on six plays to make it a one-score game.
Ohio State had been content to mostly take what Notre Dame’s defense offered, efficiently moving the ball down the field primarily through short passes and the run game. Smith hadn’t gotten an opportunity to haul in a deep pass like the one he so beautifully caught before the game started.
In the biggest spot of the game, Kelly finally broke out the haymaker.
“It’s only a gutsy call if it doesn’t work,” Kelly said. “I was trying to get a first down and get out of there.”
There were multiple route options on the play for Howard but Kelly trusted his quarterback to make the bold choice if Smith got man coverage. It was a defining storyline headed into the game: Would Notre Dame really stick with its patented man coverage against Smith, already the nation’s best receiver as a true freshman? If it didn’t, Kelly said Howard knew to check down to a receiver.
When it mattered most, Notre Dame stuck with what it knew best and it blew up in its face. Smith ran free down the field and hauled in a 56-yard catch that all but sealed Ohio State’s title win. Buckeyes coach Ryan Day certainly felt that way, running down the sidelines with both arms extended in a celebratory pose.
“We watched it on film and we knew the go-ball was going to be there because the (defensive back) was so far inside,” Ohio State receiver Brandon Inniss told CBS Sports. “We chose Jeremiah and Will to make the play, and that’s what happened.”
Said Day: “I just thought to myself, only one national championship, you only get one opportunity a year to do this. Let’s just lay it on the line and put it out there and be aggressive. And that’s what we did.”
That moment served as the perfect end to what has been a wild ride of a first year for Kelly in Columbus. From the lows of a 10-point offensive output in a loss to Michigan, to a dominant playoff run capped off by a 34-23 College Football Playoff national championship victory over Notre Dame. It just feels right that Kelly, long an offensive innovator, now has a national championship on his resume and that he got to do it with his protege in Day only amplifies the specialness of it.
Before Monday night’s bold play call, Kelly made a bold decision to leave his job as UCLA’s head coach to take on a coordinator role under Day, who had previously worked with him at New Hampshire, the Philadelphia Eagles and San Francisco 49ers. There had been rumblings that Kelly was looking to leave UCLA after six seasons, but had Bill O’Brien not left for Boston College, the opportunity to team back up with Day wouldn’t have existed.
Kelly’s star had fallen from his days as the premier offensive wunderkind in football, marred by a 2-14 record in a lone season as the 49ers’ coach before he was fired. He struggled out of the gate at UCLA, going 10-21 in his first three seasons before finding his footing and stringing together at least eight wins in each of his last three seasons leading the Bruins.
Day believed in Kelly and knew he could be the perfect person to get the most out of Howard, Smith and the rest of a star-studded Ohio State offense. The complete faith Day had in his mentor freed up the Ohio State head coach to give up offensive play-calling duties and spend more time with the rest of his team.
In less than a year, the Buckeyes’ offensive players fell in love with their new offensive coordinator who brought “happiness, camaraderie and belief in ourselves,” according to right tackle Josh Fryar.
“He’s been a mentor to me especially when I was struggling,” Fryar told CBS Sports. “I was struggling through summer; I was struggling through fall camp. I would meet with him almost every single day and he had a quote for me. He said if I was my 10-year old self and you told me I won a national championship what would you say? I just started smiling.”
Kelly was doing an awful lot of smiling on the field inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium after winning his first national championship, too. He had every right to be jubilant too after an offensive masterclass that included Ohio State scoring a touchdown on its first four offensive drives, the first time that has happened in a national championship game. His play-call on Ohio State’s first touchdown of the game, a 9-yard touchdown to Smith, was a beautiful piece of deception that caught Notre Dame off-guard. In a play Kelly grabbed from Alabama’s 2021 title win over Ohio State that resulted in a DeVonta Smith touchdown, Kelly called for Smith to run a fake orbit motion only to send him back out to the flat where he was wide open. Ohio State hadn’t run that specific look all season but Kelly installed it this week and seized the perfect opportunity to utilize it.
Not that he wants any credit for helping Ohio State finally get over the hump and win a national championship under Day. After the game, Kelly insisted it wasn’t about him — “It’s not on my mantle,” he said about the title win — and that the players were the reason Ohio State outlasted Notre Dame. He refused to compare Monday’s accomplishment with the big wins he tallied as a head coach at places like Oregon and the Eagles, quoting Teddy Roosevelt in saying, “Comparison is the thief of joy.” He couldn’t stop raving around the brotherhood, though, that welcomed him with open arms and finished the season as college football’s best team.
“Love is the greatest motivator in the world and these guys love each other,” he said. “It’s awesome to be a part of it.”
A humble Kelly wouldn’t say it but the cathartic joy that emanated down on the field once it was all over, the hugs and tears shared as confetti rained down from above, doesn’t happen without him trading Westwood for Columbus.
He had come painfully close to winning a national championship before Monday — falling just short back in 2010 against a Cam Newton-led Auburn team — and it took teaming up with Day, who faced incredible pressure to win this season, that left no doubt in Atlanta that Ohio State was the best team and finally national champions.
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