Chris Holtmann coaching future at Ohio State: ‘Absolutely’ committed

On Feb 27, 2023

The toughest season of Chris Holtmann’s coaching career found a ray of sunshine with Sunday’s win against Illinois. For the first time all month, and the first time since Jan. 21, Ohio State left the court with a win on the scoreboard and more than enough excitement to go around.

The Buckeyes snapped their nine-game losing streak with a 72-60 win against Illinois in front of 14,212 fans at Value City Arena. After singing “Carmen Ohio” on the court, players rushed to the Buckeye Nuthouse student section to high-five as many as they could on their way to the locker room.

It’s just one win against the backdrop of a difficult season, but it’s part of a process Holtmann said he remains committed to even as questions about his job security or future intentions have picked up steam in recent weeks. Although Ohio State director of athletics Gene Smith told The Dispatch that Holtmann “is our coach of the future,” earlier this month the Buckeyes coach has been linked as a possible candidate for high-major openings at Notre Dame and Ole Miss by national media reports.

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Sunday, after a win that moved Ohio State to 12-17 overall and 4-14 in the Big Ten, Holtmann was asked if he wanted to be at Ohio State presuming that the administration wants him to return.

“Yes, absolutely,” Holtmann said. “I love it here. I love it here, and Gene and I have been very open about our plan in terms of moving forward and what our plan was after last year with somewhat of a rebuilt roster, what that was going to look like, how young we were gonna be, our commitment to playing young guys to backing it up with another young class.”

The Buckeyes signed a five-man class for 2022 that ranked No. 8 nationally, and four of those players started in the win against the Illini. Ohio State has a four-man class inked for 2023 that is currently ranked No. 6 and features three top-50 players.

Smith and Holtmann have committed to building the roster with highly rated youth, a process they have acknowledged will have bumps along the way. This is the first season Ohio State will finish with a sub-.500 record since going 14-16 in 2003-04, and Holtmann has publicly acknowledged the frustrations in multiple interviews along the way. The Buckeyes have come close to bringing home hardware, missing a share of the Big Ten title by one game in his first season and losing to Illinois in overtime of the 2021 conference tournament, but have not won a trophy or title during Holtmann’s first five seasons.

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That commitment to playing young players and asking for patience against such a backdrop has presented obvious challenges.

“It’s a little bit hard to do sometimes when you’re going into year six and saying, ‘OK, we’re gonna philosophically look at how we wanna build this thing to give us maybe our greatest potential as a program,’ but we have played our young guys,” he said. “We have another good class coming and there is some real excitement in that amidst the tremendous disappointment with how some things have gone.”