Big-money coordinator has Ohio State defense humming

IOWA CITY — When you’re THE Ohio State University, you can thrown a bunch of bones at any assistant coach you think might be of help to your big-time football program.

That’s what happened this past offseason.

In an attempt to shore up a struggling defense, the Buckeyes made some coaching changes. First and foremost was the hiring of Jim Knowles to be defensive coordinator.

Knowles was given $1.9-million reasons to leave Oklahoma State, where he had the same position for head coach Mike Gundy. That’s now his annual salary under the three-year contract he signed, the highest-paid assistant coach in Ohio State history.

He’d been making $800,000 at Oklahoma State. For comparison, longtime Iowa defensive coordinator Phil Parker makes $1.1 million a season.

Knowles was a head coach at Cornell University, his alma mater, from 2004 to 2009, compiling a 26-34 record. He then was defensive coordinator for David Cutcliffe at Duke and at Oklahoma State until being Columbus bound.

Buckeyes head coach Ryan Day demoted defensive coordinator Kerry Coombs after a blowout loss to Alabama in the 2021 national championship game and a season-opening loss to Oregon last season. Matt Barnes took over defensive playcalling.

Knowles is employing a 4-2-5 safety heavy scheme in which cornerbacks generally play one-on-one press coverage on the outside. Blitzing is another staple of the new Buckeyes D.

“I think the pursuit, and every defense wants to be great pursuing the football, but I call it smart swarm,” Knowles said. “I think (it’s) our angles, guys understanding the field, understanding where their help is. It’s an 11-man game, and taking great angles to the football is something I think you can see when you watch a game. There’s a right way and a wrong way to miss a tackle, because you will miss. But if you’re on the right angle, good things can still happen.”

Ohio State has gotten immediate results from the change in defensive coordinator and scheme.

It goes into Saturday’s home game against the Iowa Hawkeyes allowing 253.5 yards per game, which ranks fifth nationally in the FBS. The Buckeyes allow 15.7 points per game, which ranks 10th nationally.

Ohio State has been really good at stopping the opponents’ run game. Overall, this does not appear to be an optimal matchup for Iowa’s offense, though is there one?

“I think the way that a fan or anyone can watch our defense, just be in the right place, understand the plays they’re getting,” Knowles said. “I think the way we adjust is a trademark of what we do. If something’s hurting us, we fix it. I think that’s my job. I have to do that. And we have a system, that’s how we’ve built it so we can adjust when we have to adjust.

“Then I like to think of pressure as a trademark of the system. And that’s not necessarily just through blitzing, but it’s also through just making the quarterback take a little extra time to read, which gives our guys a chance to rush.”

Defensive names to watch Saturday for Ohio State are lineman Mike Hall Jr. and linebacker Tommy Eichenberg, both of whom are playing at high levels. Steele Chambers was a running back when he first got to campus but is now a starting linebacker.

The only question mark thus far has been cornerback, though go back to the national rankings for this unit as a whole, and it doesn’t appear to be much of a question. Let’s just say the acquisition of Knowles has been $1.9 million pretty well spent, it appears.

“The goal is to keep him here as long as we can, but that is a challenge in today’s day and age,” said Day. “You see that across the country, everyone is hanging on to staff and trying to do the best we can. But the good news is, we were able to go get who we felt was the best fit here.

“If you go look at a list and go pay a bunch of money to the highest guy, then you know they’re going to come in for the money or whatever. In this situation, it was the right fit on our end, it was the right fit on his end. Anytime we do that, we try to project the best we can so he’s here for a while and we have stability.”

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