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What was new Rutgers coach Chris Ash's biggest impact at Ohio State?
It seems hard to argue taking a job at Ohio State less than two years ago turned out to be a great move for Chris Ash.
The recently introduced head coach at Rutgers had held major-college jobs before -- including defensive coordinator at Wisconsin and Arkansas -- but the project in Columbus was unique.
The Buckeyes recruit at a different level than the Badgers or the Razorbacks, so the players on hand were expected to succeed. Except the year before Ash hit Columbus, Ohio State gave up more total passing yards than any team in school history.
So Ash became secondary coach and co-defensive coordinator (with long-time OSU assistant Luke Fickell) at a place where recruiting is good, success is expected and yet there was nowhere to go but up in his particular area of expertise.
And up is exactly where the Buckeyes went in 2014, winning the national championship with a defense that was at its best in the last three games of the year.
It was a stark contrast from the year before, when Ohio State ended the season by allowing 41 points to a previously hapless Michigan offense, gave up a 34-point explosion from a so-so Michigan State scoring unit in the Big Ten championship game and then was embarrassed again in an 40-35 Orange Bowl loss to Clemson. In all, Ohio State allowed 1,617 yards in those games.
While a shift to a cover 4 scheme generated headlines, Ash himself ascribed the Buckeyes' improvement to something else.
“If you ask me the No. 1 thing we did well last year, that was tackling," Ash said in spring 2015. "That really made a difference in the defense. You can say what you want about 4-3, 3-4, coverages and all that stuff, if a team is going to be any good, you’re gonna be good at getting off blocks and you’re going to be good at tackling. We did that exceptionally well, and that’s not by accident. That was by design. We spent an insane amount of time trying to work on our blow delivery, not just with the defense or DBs but the whole football team. When you can watch guys get good hand position and get off blocks like we did late in the year you’re going to be a better defense."
What specifically changed? An emphasis on controlling an opponent's center of gravity whether making or defeating a block and a move to rugby-style tackling.
The latter Ash spearheaded after being intrigued by the success Pete Carroll had with it in the NFL with the Seahawks.
"It was a fairly big change, it really was," Ash said. "Philosophically, everything you’ve been taught in the game of football, how you tackle, we were going against that."
But the shift was practical for multiple reasons.
"It eliminated some injuries but it also was a lot more effective," Ash said.
He admitted there was some reluctance to change even among the coaches, but he saw the results as the season wore on.
"We got off the field on third down. Why? Because we made tackles," Ash said. "A lot of the things we did good statistically goes back to what? Getting off blocks and tackling more so than what we did schematically than anything.”
How the Buckeyes respond to Ash's absence and what effect he can have on the Rutgers program remains to be seen, but both Ash and Ohio State seem to have been made better by their time together.
The Buckeyes continued to progress on that side of the ball this season, and Ash sounded like Buckeye boss Urban Meyer during his introductory press conference when he talked about the importance of leadership, culture and alignment of personnel within the program.
"The culture here at Rutgers will give us a chance for success," Ash said Monday. "The culture will beat strategy every single time.
"We have to get the right culture here within our locker room and within our meeting room and on the field with these players, but it's going to take great people and it's going to take the right culture and it's going to take alignment by everybody involved, and if we do that, we'll have a chance for success."
Ultimately, Ash's impact on Ohio State can be summed up fairly neatly.
In the last game the Buckeyes played before Ash arrived, they scored the most points they ever have in one game without winning.
In the last game of the first season with Ash on the staff, they raised the national championship trophy.
Such an immediate impact at his new school is probably too much to ask -- Ash himself refused to say how many wins might equal a successful season -- but it has to be encouraging for fans of the Scarlet Knights to see what their new coach has done.
