4B — January 9, 2019
SportsWednesday
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Bucking the norm

Greg Mattison, Al Washington accept jobs to join Ohio State defensive staff, leaving Harbaugh in the dust

Michigan linebackers coach 
Al Washington will be accepting 
an assistant coaching position 
with Ohio State, according to 
Rivals on Tuesday.
The move comes one day after 
the Wolverines’ defensive line 
coach, Greg Mattison, was named 
the 
Buckeyes’ 
co-defensive 
coordinator, both joining Ryan 
Day, the Buckeyes’ new head 
coach. A Michigan spokesperson 
did not immediately return a 
request for comment.
Washington’s 
loss 
will 
likely be felt the hardest on the 
recruiting trail. At different 
points throughout the season 
Harbaugh 
complimented 
Washington, lumping him in 
with first-year tight ends coach 
Sherrone Moore as staff who 
helped Michigan this season.

“There’s two other coaches 
that don’t get talked about as 
much that are doing a fabulous 
job and that’s Al Washington,” 
Harbaugh said on Nov. 12. “Good 
play out of Khaleke Hudson and 
Josh Uche. His contribution has 
been huge. Just a high-energy 
coach that does a great job with 
recruiting. The other is (tight 
ends coach) Sherrone Moore 
who has done a fabulous job with 
the tight ends. 
“… Just really wanted to 
mention those two coaches in 
particular because you don’t 
hear people talking about them 
that much.”
Washington 
grew 
up 
an 
Ohio State fan, due to his father 
playing 
linebacker 
for 
the 
Buckeyes. He mentioned that he 
heard stories of Ohio State coach 
Woody Hayes and his legendary 
battles with Wolverines coach 
Bo Schembechler growing up. 

At one point, Washington said he 
wanted to play for Ohio State as 
a kid.
He 
didn’t, 
attending 
Boston College instead, and 
Washington’s full conversion 
from Buckeyes fan to Michigan 
coach seemed to be complete. 
Washington was the Wolverines’ 
lead recruiter on players like 
Zach Harrison, attempting to 
convince them that Ann Arbor 
was a better home for them than 
Columbus.
Now, it seems that conversion 
was 
only 
temporary, 
as 
Washington is headed back to 
the place he heard about growing 
up.
Michigan and Ohio State will 
face off Nov. 30 next season.
Despite some staff turnover 
in Columbus, it seems there 
will be more familiar faces on 
the Buckeyes’ sideline than 
previously thought.

MIKE PERSAK
Daily Sports Writer

ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily
Al Washington, one of Michigan’s best recruiters in the state of Ohio, joined the Buckeyes’ coaching staff Tuesday.

A turbulent offseason for 
Michigan football has now 
gone from bad to worse.
Michigan 
defensive 
line 
coach 
Greg 
Mattison 
has 
accepted a job to join the staff at 
Ohio State, as first reported by 
Wolverines Wire on Monday. 
A spokesperson for the team 
did not immediately respond 
for comment. Mattison is set 
to replace Greg Schiano as the 
defensive coordinator of the 
Buckeyes, per multiple reports.
Mattison 
spent 
eight 
seasons on staff at Michigan, 
regularly 
grooming 
a 
top-
tier defensive line. With the 
Wolverines, Mattison coached 
five defensive linemen to first- 
or second-team all-Big Ten 
selections — Taco Charlton, 
Rashan 
Gary, 
Maurice 

Hurst, Chase Winovich and 
Chris Wormley. During his 
tenure, the defensive line was 
frequently the hallmark of the 
team.
This is the culmination of 
Mattison’s second stint with 
the program, joining from the 
Baltimore Ravens in 2010. He 
also coached for the team from 
1992-1996.
Mattison’s departure would 
undoubtedly sting regardless, 
though 
the 
loss 
is 
only 
enhanced by his destination. 
The Buckeyes have beaten 
Michigan 14 of the last 15 
seasons and have yet to lose to 
a Jim Harbaugh-coached team. 
Mattison will join the staff of 
new Ohio State coach Ryan 
Day, who takes over for the 
now-retired Urban Meyer.
The Mattison news comes 
just over a week after the 
Wolverines were embarrassed 

in their bowl game, falling 
41-15 to Florida in the Peach 
Bowl, capping the 10-3 season 
in a dour manner. In the 
interim, several high-profile 
players declared early for the 
NFL draft: Gary, linebacker 
Devin Bush, cornerback David 
Long and tight end Zach 
Gentry. 
Each 
offseason 
under 
Harbaugh 
has 
included 
turnover 
on 
the 
coaching 
staff, with Ed Warriner, Al 
Washington 
and 
Sherrone 
Moore joining the staff last 
year. The Mattison departure 
is the first such move of 2019, 
but did not prove to be the last. 
Tuesday, linebackers coach Al 
Washington joined Mattison in 
Columbus.
And 
for 
Harbaugh 
and 
Michigan, an offseason already 
sure to be rife with questions 
just reached a fever pitch.

MAX MARCOVITCH
Managing Sports Editor

KATELYN MULCAHY/Daily
Greg Mattison left Michigan to take the co-defensive coordinator job at Ohio State under Ryan Day.

SportsWednesday Column: Mending the gap

A

h, the college football 
offseason.
A time for those of us 
in Ann Arbor 
to turn our 
collective 
attention to 
John Beilein 
and the 
undefeated 
Michigan 
basketball 
team. After 
the way the 
Wolverines’ 
football team 
finished its season, you can’t 
blame people for being eager to 
do just that.
And yet, Monday, nine days 
after Michigan’s season ended 
in a 26-point loss to Florida in 
the Peach Bowl, my attention 
drifted back to the football 
team for a bit.
That was probably inevitable, 
since college football was rath-
er unavoidable Monday. In case 
you didn’t hear, Clemson beat 
the hell out of Alabama in the 
national championship game 
after beating the hell out of 
Notre Dame in the semifinals.
The transitive property is 
tempting to bring up here as 
someone who follows the Wol-
verines, but it is a dumb metric, 
and in this case, it doesn’t really 
matter. That’s because there are 
two programs seemingly light 
years ahead of the others in the 
country, and they played on 
Monday night.
There are 
programs, like 
Georgia, per-
haps, or maybe 
even Oklahoma 
and Ohio State, 
that can claim to 
be within arm’s 
reach of the 
Tigers and the 
Crimson Tide.
And then 
there are pro-
grams like 
Michigan, which is waiting 
near the front of the line to 
join the elite programs club, 
while the bouncer is letting the 

important people skip the line.
That is fine, in the grand 
scheme of things. By that, I 
mean that things could be 
much, much worse. Ask about 
110 other programs in the coun-
try. Hell, ask the Gators, who 
are playing third-fiddle in their 
conference these days.
But it brings a question to 
mind: How do the Wolverines 
get to the level of Clemson and 
Alabama?
It certainly isn’t through 
what was Michigan’s biggest 
news Monday, which came 
when defensive line coach Greg 
Mattison departed to become 
co-defensive coordinator for 
the Buckeyes — the Wolverines’ 
biggest rival.
On Tuesday, it was 
announced linebackers coach 
Al Washington would join Mat-
tison in Columbus.
These are just the most 
recent Michigan losses to the 
Ohio State in a long string of 
them. The Buckeyes have beat-
en the Wolverines seven times 
in a row and in 14 of the last 15 
meetings.
With seven of those 14 losses, 
Michigan has finished in sec-
ond place in the Big Ten or its 
division. That includes this 
season and 2016 — both years 
when a win over Ohio State 
would have likely pushed the 
Wolverines into the College 
Football Playoff.
Win even a few of those 
games and we aren’t talking 
about the dis-
appointment 
Michigan con-
tinually faces.
And this is 
where Mattison 
and Washing-
ton’s departures 
really hurt. 
Because if there 
was ever a time 
that the Buck-
eyes were vul-
nerable, it would 
be now.
Urban Meyer, a deeply flawed 
man but one of the best coaches 
in college football history, just 

retired. His replacement, Ryan 
Day, is a relatively unknown 
upstart. Yes, he helped orches-
trate the offensive dominance 
Ohio State displayed in its 62-39 
win over the Wolverines this 
season, but it stands to reason 
Day will need some time to fig-
ure everything out.
Or maybe it stood to rea-
son. Since Day 
took over, he has 
won a recruiting 
battle for five-star 
defensive end Zach 
Harrison, who was 
once predicted to 
go to Michigan. 
Then, Day secured 
the transfer of 
Georgia quarter-
back Justin Fields, 
the former No. 1 
prospect in the 
2018 recruiting class. And now, 
Day has hired away two of the 
Wolverines’ best recruiters.
To be fair, staff turnover isn’t 

uncommon with top programs. 
Alabama has had an enormous 
amount of it and has been at 
the top of the heap in college 
football for much of the last 10 
seasons. Of course, the Crimson 
Tide’s turnover often comes 
after a national champion-
ship, whereas the Wolverines’ 
typically comes after a crushing 
loss to Ohio 
State and then 
another defeat 
in whatever 
bowl game 
follows.
This is 
also differ-
ent, because 
Alabama 
doesn’t lose 
its coaches to 
Auburn, and it 
often has the 
talent to make up for any coach-
ing losses.
So Michigan has some 
ground to make up. By some, I 

mean a lot. The way to do it is 
through elite recruiting or elite 
game-planning. Often the two 
go hand in hand.
The Wolverines brought in 
a top-10 recruiting class this 
season, the third in the last four 
seasons under coach Jim Har-
baugh. That is better than most 
teams. It is tied with Ohio State. 
It is not better than Alabama or 
Georgia.
In terms of gameplanning or 
coaching, Michigan has it bet-
ter than nearly every team it 
plays. It does not have it better 
than the Buckeyes. I give you 
the aforementioned 62-39 as 
proof.
That is the kind of loss, a 
23-point blowout to your big-
gest rival, that hampers recruit-
ing and makes it feasible for an 
assistant coach to think about 
jumping ship to said rival. 
And it is also the exact, annu-
al loss that is holding Michigan 
back.

What the Wolverines have 
right now is good enough to 
finish second in the Big Ten 
East every year, remain a top 
10 program in the nation and 
then watch the real big boys in 
college football play for cham-
pionships.
Ask anybody within the pro-
gram if that’s good enough, and 
they will say it isn’t.
What has to change is some-
thing systemic. There either 
has to be a greater buy-in 
within the program to elevate 
players to a new level, a change 
in philosophy to use players’ 
talents more effectively or an 
uptick in recruiting that injects 
Michigan with players too good 
to fail.
That is what separates the 
Wolverines from the top. From 
the Buckeyes, even.
Whether or not Michigan 
is willing and able to make 
the necessary improvements 
remains to be seen.

KATELYN MULCAHY/Daily
Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh lost two of his best assistant coaches, Greg Mattison and Al Washington, to Ohio State and new head coach Ryan Day.

(Michigan) 
does not have it 
better than the 
Buckeyes.

MIKE
PERSAK

If the 
Buckeyes were 
vulnerable, it 
would be now.

