In less than a decade, Jim Tressel is the face of everything the Buckeyes represent
As the revered leader of Ohio State football -- by definition, the one athletic team beloved from Cleveland to Cincinnati and all points in-between -- Jim Tressel is a living legend to Buckeyes fans. "Of all the coaches I've worked with, he is not only the best coach, he is also the best person, and that is saying a lot," says OSU president Dr. E. Gordon Gee.• Thursday: No. 2 Ohio State vs. Marshall, TV: Big Ten Network; Radio: WKNR AM/850; Latest line: OSU by 28½.
THE BUCKEYES PREVIEW 2010
• Inside The Vest: How Tressel will deal with Marshall
• The top 10 players of the Tressel Era: Bill Livingston
• Four things Doug Lesmerises thinks of OSU-Marshall
• How the sweater vest reflects Jim Tressel's personality
• Big Ten listened to the fans in creating 2011 divisions
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Jim Tressel had everything he wanted at Ohio State, or nearly everything.
The Buckeyes' coach possessed a national title and job security, a historic stadium filled with 105,000 fans on home fall Saturdays, a steady supply of the best high school football players in Ohio and a headlock on the rivalry with Michigan.
But Tressel didn't have lights. He wanted lights on the Buckeyes' practice field outside the Woody Hayes Athletic Center, the football palace named for a coaching legend.
Last July, that request took Tressel to the Toledo living room of the Harmon family, Jole and her husband Jim. The coach was accompanied by Athletic Director Gene Smith and a glossy folder of photos and proposals.
But the Harmons didn't need all that. All they needed was Jim Tressel.
"Without Jim Tressel or a man like Jim Tressel at the helm, there would not have been a donation," Jole Harmon said. "We flat out would not have done it. There isn't a maybe about it. ... Jim Tressel is a man of integrity and high morals and all those things we feel are very important.
"We love football and we love Ohio State and we love tradition, but he is developing young men, and we think that is very powerful. ... I almost get chills up my spine when I think about what he does."
Now entering his 10th season at Ohio State, Tressel has his lights, thanks to the Harmons' $5 million gift.
And the university has a coach who, in less than a decade, has gone from an unknown to an icon.
Ohio State football has always meant wins and Woody Hayes stomping the sidelines. That image will never vanish. But now, if you say Ohio State, you think Hayes, and you think that guy on the sidelines in the sweater vest.
Subtly, yet dramatically, Tressel has shaped Ohio State football in his own image. He has done it in a way that goes beyond his 8-1 record against Michigan, his five straight Big Ten titles, his seven BCS bowls or the Buckeyes' 2002 national championship that ended a 34-year title drought.
In 2010, Ohio State football is Jim Tressel football. To lots of casual sports fans around the country, Jim Tressel is Ohio State University.
That's an image the school is happy to embrace.
"He really has managed to synergize the long, proud history of Ohio State, and mainly doing it right, with the Tressel lifestyle and the Tressel value system," said Dr. John Bruno, an OSU psychology professor and the faculty representative to the athletic department. "And he did it without ruffling feathers."
Whether the reality can match the perception he has created among his supporters isn't the point. His detractors may emphasize some big-game losses or grow exasperated with his play calling.
But from Cleveland to Florida to Pasadena, Calif., everyone knows Jim Tressel's style -- conservative, consistent, comprehensive. And they know neither the coach nor the program are changing anytime soon.
"Some people are all hat and no cowboy. Jim Tressel is all cowboy and no hat," said Ohio State President Dr. E. Gordon Gee, praising his highest-paid employee. "Of all the coaches I've worked with, he is not only the best coach, he is also the best person, and that is saying a lot."
Building a legacy
"We talk among each other about how Tressel is like a mastermind," says senior cornerback Chimdi Chekwa. "He's like a mastermind for creating ways to help us without us even knowing." JIM TRESSEL THROUGH THE YEARS
2001
Preseason AP rank: 23
Final AP rank: 29th
Record: 7-5
Big Ten record: 5-3 (third place)
Bowl: Outback, lost to South Carolina, 31-28
NFL Draft picks: Eight, no first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Three
Academic All-Big Ten players: Nine (seventh in conference)
Gross revenue from Ohio State licensing: $2.440 million
Overall donations to Ohio State: $179.492 million
High moment: The Buckeyes snap a 14-year victory drought in Ann Arbor with a 26-20 upset of No. 11 Michigan on Nov. 24. The result denies the Wolverines a share of the Big Ten title and possible BCS bowl.
Low moment: One day after the arrest of starting quarterback Steve Bellisari on a drunk-driving charge leads to his suspension, the Buckeyes are ahead of Illinois, 22-21, entering the fourth quarter before losing, 34-22, in the season’s final home game on Nov. 17.
2002
Preseason AP rank: 13
Final AP rank: 1
Record: 14-0
Big Ten record: 8-0 (tied for first)
Bowl: Fiesta, beat Miami, 31-24, 2 OT
NFL Draft picks: Five, no first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Seven
Academic All-Big Ten players: 27 (first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU: $5.152 million
Overall donations to OSU: $195.759 million
High moment: The Buckeyes win their first national title since 1968 with a 31-24 double-overtime victory against Miami in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 3, 2003.
Low moment: In an undefeated season, there are none on the field, but when freshman running back Maurice Clarett publicly accuses OSU officials of lying in the days before the Fiesta Bowl over a disagreement about Clarett’s desire to fly home for a friend’s funeral, it’s a sign of Clarett issues to come.
2003
Preseason AP rank: 2
Final AP rank: 4
Record: 11-2
Big Ten record: 6-2 (tied for second place)
Bowl: Fiesta, beat Kansas State, 35-28
NFL Draft picks: 14, three first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Eight
Academic All-Big Ten players: 21 (First in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $4.707 million
Overall donations to OSU: $203.273 million
High moment: Michael Jenkins’ falling 5-yard touchdown catch from Scott McMullen with 1:35 to play gives Ohio State a 21-20 win over Penn State on Nov. 1 and keeps alive hopes of a national title repeat, as the one-loss Buckeyes will climb to No. 2 in the BCS rankings two weeks later.
Low moment: Clarett is suspended for the season on Sept. 10, and on Nov. 22 the Buckeyes suffer their only Michigan loss of the Tressel era, 35-21 in Ann Arbor, to drop out of the national championship race.
2004
Preseason AP rank: 9
Final AP rank: 20
Record: 8-4
Big Ten record: 4-4 (tied for fifth place)
Bowl: Alamo, beat Oklahoma State, 33-7.
NFL Draft picks: Three, no first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Two
Academic All-Big Ten players: 22 (first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $4.655 million
Overall donations to Ohio State: $204.598 million
High moment: After taking over as the starter against Indiana a month earlier, quarterback Troy Smith from Glenville accounts for 386 yards of total offense in a 37-21 win over favored No. 7 Michigan on Nov. 20 — a game that starts his reputation as a Wolverine killer.
Low moment: The Buckeyes are nearly shut out at Iowa in a 33-7 loss on Oct. 16 that runs their losing streak to three games and drops them out of the top 25 and to 0-3 in Big Ten play for the first time since 1988. Smith is suspended for the Alamo Bowl after taking $500 from a booster.
2005
Preseason AP rank: 6
Final AP rank: 4
Record: 10-2
Big Ten record: 7-1 (tied for first place)
Bowl: Fiesta, beat Notre Dame, 34-20
NFL Draft picks: Nine, five first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: 8
Academic All-Big Ten players: 18 (tied for first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $5.648 million
Overall donations to OSU: $210.012 million
High moment: Troy Smith’s 26-yard pass to a leaping Anthony Gonzalez in the final minutes sets up Antonio Pittman’s game-winning touchdown, as a 25-21 win at Michigan on Nov. 19 gives the Buckeyes a share of the Big Ten title. Smith throws for 300 yards.
Low moment: In Smith’s return to the team after being suspended for the opener, he and Justin Zwick share the quarterback duties against Texas, as Longhorns quarterback Vince Young throws a 24-yard touchdown pass with 2:37 remaining to send the Buckeyes to a 25-22 home defeat in the season’s second game on Sept. 10.
2006
Preseason AP rank: 1
Final AP rank: 2
Record: 12-1
Big Ten record: 8-0 (First place)
Bowl: BCS Championship in Glendale, Ariz., lost to Florida, 41-14.
NFL Draft picks: Eight, two first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: 10
Academic All-Big Ten players: 23 (first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $9.5 million
Overall donations to OSU: $225.455 million
High moment: On Dec. 9 in New York, Troy Smith is awarded the seventh Heisman Trophy in school history, a runaway winner after leading the Buckeyes to a 12-0 record. The Buckeyes began ranked No. 1 in the preseason and stayed there through the start of bowl season, the biggest win a 42-39 victory over Michigan in a No. 1 vs. No. 2 showdown in Columbus on Nov. 18.
Low moment: The favored Buckeyes collapse after receiver Ted Ginn Jr. is injured in the celebration after returning the opening kickoff for a touchdown, and No. 1 Ohio State is embarrassed in a 41-14 blowout loss to Florida in the national title game on Jan. 8, 2007.
2007
Preseason AP rank: 11
Final AP rank: 5
Record: 11-2
Big Ten record: 7-1 (first place)
Bowl: BCS Championship in New Orleans, lost to LSU, 38-24
NFL Draft picks: Three, one first-rounder
All-Big Ten players: Six
Academic All-Big Ten players: 24 (tied for first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $9.4 million
Overall donations to Ohio State: $237.280 million
High moment: On Dec. 1, their 11-1 regular season over, the Buckeyes watch No. 1 Missouri and No. 2 West Virginia lose, opening a place for Ohio State in the BCS National Championship for the second consecutive season. (The Buckeyes will go on to lose to LSU in New Orleans, 38-24.)
Low moment: Ohio State’s 20-game conference winning streak ends with a 28-21 home loss to Illinois on Nov. 10.
2008
Preseason AP rank: 2
Final AP rank: 9
Record: 10-3
Big Ten record: 7-1 (tied for first place)
Bowl: Fiesta, lost to Texas 24-21
NFL Draft picks: Seven, two first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Three
Academic All-Big Ten players: 27 (first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $7.5 million
Overall donations to OSU: $237.052 million
High moment: Star running back Beanie Wells tells freshman quarterback Terrelle Pryor that Pryor is “taking a step into manhood,” and the Buckeyes rally for a 20-17 night win at Wisconsin when Pryor runs in the game-winning touchdown with 1:08 to play.
Low moment: With a star group of seniors returning, the Buckeyes continue their struggles against top-five teams, as No. 5 Ohio State is blown off the field at No. 1 USC, 35-3, on Sept. 13. Wells sits out with an ankle injury. Pryor replaces senior Todd Boeckman as the starting quarterback against Troy the next week.
2009
Preseason AP rank: 6
Final AP rank: 5
Record: 11-2
Big Ten record: 7-1 (first place)
Bowl: Rose, beat Oregon 26-17
NFL Draft picks: Four, no first-rounders
All-Big Ten players: Two
Academic All-Big Ten players: 31 (first in conference)
Gross revenue from OSU licensing: $7.723 million
Overall donations to OSU: $286.937 million
High moment: Playing in its first Rose Bowl in 13 years, Ohio State ends a three-game bowl slide with a 26-17 victory over Oregon. Terrelle Pryor is named the game’s offensive MVP after throwing for 266 yards and rushing for 72 on Jan. 1, 2010.
Low moment: Pryor commits four turnovers in a shocking 26-18 upset at 1-5 Purdue on Oct. 17, as the Buckeyes have their 16-game Big Ten road winning streak snapped.
Totals
Average Preseason AP rank: 8.1
Average Final AP rank: 8.8
Overall record: 94-21
Big Ten record: 59-13
Bowl record: 5-4
Total NFL Draft picks: 61, 13-first rounders
All-Big Ten players: 49
Academic All-Big Ten players: 202
Total gross revenue from OSU licensing: $56,727,098
Overall donations to OSU: $1,693,024,258
— Doug Lesmerises
Like Hayes, winning has allowed Tressel to expand his sphere of influence. It is Tressel's integration into the university as a whole that has created his own legacy in just nine years.
Tressel sees himself as a teacher, and he has become a citizen of the university beyond the bounds of a football field -- from drastically improving the academic standing of the football team, to drawing in donors to numerous university projects, to reviving the culture of Hayes -- in his own style -- for so many people,
"When I look at the assets of Ohio State University, I think one of the major assets is the reputation we have from athletics. But it goes beyond winning," said Leslie H. Wexner, founder of Limited Brands, the Columbus-based apparel company that reported more than $9 billion in earnings last year, and chair of The Ohio State University Board of Trustees. "It goes to the Jim Tressel-Woody Hayes idea of how you win, and that fact that the coach is really interested in the community, interested in broader success, interested in the life success of the athletes, and is significantly more than a lion tamer.
"He beats Michigan and he helps the university win in a broader way."
Tressel projects that image beyond campus as well. Consider Cynthia Robiskie, mother of former OSU receiver Brian Robiskie, who was ready to end her son's recruitment as soon as she saw Tressel walking up her driveway in a suit with an American flag pin in his lapel.
"I know every coach in college football on a very friendly basis," said ESPN analyst and former Ohio State quarterback Kirk Herbstreit, "and I can tell you he has a very distinct, very unique personality that separates him from any other coach in the country.
"He may not be flashy ... but if I was a parent, and I have four boys, I want to know about the coach, and I want to know about his strengths and his weaknesses, what he's like when it's really stressful, how does he handle his players, and to me he scores off the charts in those areas."
Somehow, in this era, Tressel has managed to turn his lack of sizzle into a focus on his substance. He sells his vision of a program to mothers and fathers, while seemingly unconcerned about whether it's viewed as cool or not. That may cost him some recruits -- but entice others.
"Some of the [coaches], they're car salesmen," OSU senior All-American candidate Cameron Heyward said. "They're trying to sell you on something that's not even real. But my mom got sold on not just football, but coach Tressel tries to connect with you spiritually, with family, academically. There's so much that goes into it."
Once on campus, Tressel "plants seeds" and believes he reaches every one of his players in one way or another. His influence can be gauged, at least in part, by the "whatnot phenomenon." Twenty-year-old athletes don't use the term "whatnot" in conversation unless they're taking something from their coach, who drops it about five times per news conference. Many Buckeyes say it on a regular basis.
"When he talks, his words are powerful and whatnot," former OSU defensive end Thaddeus Gibson said when asked specifically about his "whatnot" usage last season. "Wow. I didn't even know I did it."
"We talk among each other about how Tressel is like a mastermind," senior cornerback Chimdi Chekwa said during preseason camp. "He's like a mastermind for creating ways to help us without us even knowing.
"I think most of the guys, even if they don't know it, they take it in. A lot of guys coming in maybe even want to rebel a little bit and want to say, 'I don't care about that, all I care about is football.'
"But then you hear the senior speeches and you hear guys say things and you'd never think a guy would think like that. In the end, he molds you without you ever even knowing it."
The changes are tangible as well. According to Dr. Bruno, the faculty rep, the football team's GPA has risen in Tressel's tenure from about a 2.5 his first year to around a 3.0. From the 2003-04 season, when the NCAA's Academic Progress Rate was first tabulated, to the 2008-09 season, Ohio State's APR for football has jumped from 892 to 975, out of a 1,000-point scale.
Bruno calls the 83-point increase "remarkable."
In 2001, the Buckeyes had nine players on the Big Ten's All-Academic football team, which ranked seventh in the conference. Since 2002, the Buckeyes have led the league or tied for the league lead each season. The total of 202 All-Academic Big Ten players in nine years under Tressel is 45 more than Minnesota, the team with the second-most players on the list.
And at Ohio State's own scholar-athlete banquet each spring, which honors all athletes with a 3.0 GPA or better, Bruno said the football team's representation has nearly doubled from when Tressel first arrived, with 45 players earning the honor last spring.
"We used to have about 20 to 24, and of those, not a lot of them would attend the banquet," Bruno said. "Football was not very well-represented. Now, if you're in town for the banquet, you're there. And it's considered a point of pride for the football players."
'They listen to him'
More than a coach: The football team's GPA has risen in Tressel's tenure from about a 2.5 his first year to around a 3.0.It's not only academic. Studies show that athletics typically don't influence donations to a university as a whole, but Peter Weiler, Ohio State's vice president for development, said he has seen repeatedly what Tressel does to affect fundraising for the university overall. Stories like the Harmons' aren't unusual. The connection is often an emotional one.
"There's a big difference between a winning football program, and a winning football program that has a coach like Jim Tressel. And that does make difference," Weiler said. "People are attracted to him, they listen to him, he guides their thinking. People do give to people -- if they trust and like them and believe in what they do."
The athletic department keeps track of the community service hours each team logs, and over the past two years, the football team, obviously with a larger roster than other sports, has logged 1,442 hours of service, second only to the men's track and field team's 1,633 hours. Men's lacrosse was the only other sport with more than 1,000 hours.
"We'll see the impact of Jim Tressel 20 years from now through his football players," said Pat Chun, OSU's associate athletic director for external relations, "because he ingrained into them the wonderful things you get from giving."
The totality of The Tressel Way is why he's at Ohio State in the first place. The 15-year Youngstown State head coach was chosen to replace John Cooper in 2001 for more than his winning record and four national championships in a lower football division.
Wexner, then between stints on the OSU board of trustees, found the choice "curious," as many other fans did at the time.
David Brown, then an OSU associate athletic director who is now a regional vice president for IMG College, the company that handles Ohio State's multimedia rights, was among them.
"My first impression was, 'Couldn't we have gotten a bigger name? This is Ohio State.'" Brown said. "But after the first press conference it changed for me. I thought, 'This guy gets it.'"
That's what then-President Brit Kirwan and Athletic Director Andy Geiger saw when making the hire, said Akron's David Brennan, vice president of the board of trustees at the time. Off the field mattered as much as on it.
"I think it was the deciding factor," Brennan said. "We were very conscious of the academic stress, or lack thereof, previous to Jim. He was definitely a mark above anybody else we were looking at. And he has proven to be exactly that."
Charting a course
"Ohio State still has some history we don't have our fingerprints on, and it has a lot of future that we don't," Tressel said. "But right now we are the caretakers and we're trying to take care of it the best we can."To be more than a football coach at Ohio State is to conjure memories of Hayes, though Tressel is the first to quash them.
"I'm not going to be there 28 years," Tressel said, "so you can't get to that level until you've paid your dues that long."
What Tressel can do is remind fans and former players of what Ohio State football was at its best. Wexner isn't alone when he says Hayes and Tressel are "cut from the same cloth."
"Look at the loyalty, the tradition, the love of the game for the true sportsmanship of it, and Woody and Jim would be almost parallel until you get to Woody's personality," said OSU legend Rex Kern, Hayes' greatest quarterback and Tressel's favorite player growing up. "Jim doesn't have that explosiveness. I know he's got it inside, but it doesn't play out the way Woody's played out.
"He's charting his own course, and history will bear that out. But I couldn't be more proud of the program and what it stands for."
So for those who want wins, Tressel has delivered. Ohio State's 94-21 record in Tressel's nine years is the second-best record for a single coach still at his school, trailing only the 101-16 mark of Texas' Mack Brown.
If the Buckeyes start the season 6-0, Tressel will reach 100 wins as a Buckeye in 121 games. Hayes reached 100 wins in 144 games, Cooper in 138.
The ride hasn't always been smooth.
Consecutive national title game losses in the 2006 and 2007 seasons are still fresh wounds in some ways. The Buckeyes have lost six straight games to teams ranked in the top five, and losses often bring calls for Tressel to hire an offensive coordinator. The 2003 accusations of impropriety leveled against the program by former star running back Maurice Clarett may never fully fade. An NCAA investigation found a $500 booster gift to quarterback Troy Smith, but no major violations.
Some criticized Tressel for not standing up more for the Ohio State-Michigan rivalry during the uncertainty of Big Ten expansion.
But Tressel isn't a rabble-rouser. In that way he isn't Woody. Ready to begin his 10th season, Tressel in many ways still sees himself as the temporary captain of the ship, along for the ride as much as steering it.
"Ohio State still has some history we don't have our fingerprints on, and it has a lot of future that we don't," Tressel said. "But right now we are the caretakers and we're trying to take care of it the best we can.
"I remember saying to my wife when we got here, 'This is going to be a lot of work, but don't worry because it would be a miracle if we'd be here 10 years.' So it's not going to be forever, but here we are 10 years, and I guess it's a miracle."
As the 22nd coach of a program playing its 121st season, Tressel can try to claim himself as a cog in the assembly line of Buckeye tradition, even if others see him as more.
He knows just where this program stands. When he referenced the Buckeyes' No. 1 ranking in the past 100 years of college football, with a .735 winning percentage that leads Notre Dame's .733, did the numbers even need to be double-checked?
"Go look back at the last 100 seasons of college football," Tressel implored. "The team with the highest winning percentage is Ohio State. I would say we're caretakers."
For nearly a decade, Tressel has taken that care in his own way -- a way that won't soon be forgotten.