The Ohio State football team had to replace both coordinators this past offseason. It's the price of success after winning a national championship. Chip Kelly went to the Las Vegas Raiders, and Jim Knowles went to Penn State to grab a giant payday.
To replace those coaches, the Buckeyes promoted Briant Hartline to the offensive coordinator job and hired Matt Patricia. While both of them are new to their jobs, they both feel very comfortable in their new roles. Hartline is a coach who has been with Ohio State for years.
Fans expect Hartline to be fine in his new play-calling role. With the talent that he has at his disposal, the Ohio State Buckeyes should be just fine. Patricia had more questions to answer because he hadn't coordinated a good defense in quite a while. Fans should feel great about what they've seen so far.
Why Ohio State football fans should be happy with their coordinators so far
Hartline's play-calling was solid in the Spring Game, although those kinds of games are typically set up for the offense to do well. Patricia's defense was very vanilla throughout that game. The Buckeyes are happy with what he has done during practice, though.
While doing well in practice has been good for both coordinators, nothing will matter until actual games are played. Both Hartline and Patricia will get thrown into the fire in the first game of the season when Texas comes to Columbus in what should be a top-three matchup.
We will find out just how comfortable they are in their new roles once a CFP team comes into the Shoe. Ohio State still has enough talent on both sides of the ball to make both coordinators ' jobs easy. They might be the favorites to run it back and win it all again.