Why Colorado could be the perfect landing spot for Jonathan Drouin
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Ryan S. Clark, NHL reporter
CENTENNIAL, Colo. — Coming here was not the only option. It was just the best one for Jonathan Drouin.
Every choice has its consequences. Other NHL teams reached out to Drouin and his representatives about joining their club. Those clubs had more salary cap space and offered more money than what the Colorado Avalanche presented to Drouin, which was a one-year contract worth $825,000 — a substantial dip from the $5.5 million annual salary he earned over the past six seasons.
Every choice also has its advantages. Drouin makes this clear while sitting in his stall at the Avs’ rustic practice facility just south of downtown Denver. One of them has to do with the stall just to the right of Drouin. Or rather, who occupies that space. It’s Avs superstar center and perennial Hart Trophy candidate Nathan MacKinnon. They’re best friends and have known each other for more than a decade, dating to when they were teammates with the Halifax Mooseheads in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.
Another advantage is what playing for the Avs represents. It was just this time last year that the Avs were seeking to win a consecutive Stanley Cup. They navigated a series of challenges to win the Central Division and finish with the best regular-season record in the Western Conference, only to then have their title aspirations cut short with a first-round exit by the upstart Seattle Kraken.
Championships are how this current iteration of the Avs is being defined. One key to that has been bringing in players and helping them find higher levels of success than they’d seen before. Forwards such as Andre Burakovsky, Nazem Kadri, Artturi Lehkonen and Valeri Nichushkin all set career highs while playing with Colorado. Defenseman Devon Toews went from a top-four option to a low-key Norris Trophy candidate since playing here. Goaltenders such as Alexandar Georgiev, Philipp Grubauer and Darcy Kuemper also enjoyed the strongest seasons of their careers with the Avs.
Is Drouin next? Can he parlay this opportunity into helping the Avs win their fourth Cup while also showing at 28 years old that the best is yet to come?
“With the team here, everyone could probably achieve their career numbers with the way they play and the way they move the puck,” Drouin said. “But that wasn’t really the main reason [why he signed with the Avalanche]. I don’t really have any goals for me other than finding my game back and helping this team in any way I can.”
SCARS CAN OFTEN go beyond being marks on flesh. They provide illustrations into the pain of a life. In Drouin’s case, he has two scars — one on each wrist — from the surgeries he has endured over the past few years.
Remnants of those incisions are noticeable, not just on Drouin’s body but his mind as well. Those scars were born out of pain and have created doubt, but now they have made Drouin optimistic. This is the first time in a while Drouin said he didn’t spend the offseason rehabbing from wrist surgery before starting his workouts.
Having confidence in a pair of fully healthy wrists is what has made the beginning of Avs’ training camp fruitful for him. Drouin has provided more than enough evidence to show that his wrists are fine. It’s the passes he plays during drills or the shots he takes.
Everything about the way his wrists move is fluid, smooth and uninterrupted — three traits that have not always been the easiest to attain in a career that has faced setbacks.
Expectations have long followed Drouin. Recording a pair of 100-point seasons in the QMJHL does that. So does going No. 3 overall in the 2013 draft to the Tampa Bay Lightning. He played three seasons in Tampa, with his final year there amplifying those expectations as Drouin scored a career-high 21 goals and 53 points.
Friction was also a part of Drouin’s time with the Lightning, which is what eventually led to him being traded to the Montreal Canadiens. Drouin scored 99 points in 158 games in his first two seasons with the Canadiens. Injuries hindered that production, however. In Drouin’s final four seasons, he recorded 87 points in 163 games with 29 points in 58 games in the 2022-23 campaign being his most productive.
Fighting through injuries also came at a time when Drouin was attempting to manage his mental health. He’s open about detailing the life-changing anxiety he experienced more than three years ago.
Drouin said he started experiencing anxiety in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, adding that “being in the bubble didn’t help” — a reference to when the NHL held the 2019-20 Stanley Cup playoffs in bubbles in Edmonton and Toronto.
“The two months in the bubble really lingered,” Drouin said. “I don’t think I could tell you if we didn’t have that bubble I would have been fine or I wouldn’t have had to stop playing. But the bubble and the COVID year in Montreal, we had rules in Canada where you could not leave your house unless you were walking your dog. I’d walk my dog six times a day to get out of my house.”
Drouin also said being a top-three pick and a French Canadian who grew up an hour away from Montreal also contributed to his anxiety. He believed he was ready to carrying those expectations because he grew up watching other players handle them.
“Until you live it,” Drouin said. “No one’s ready for it.”
Longtime NHL agent Allan Walsh, who has known Drouin and represented him since he was a teenager, also grew up in Montreal. Walsh said playing in Montreal comes with “a wholly unique set of challenges and pressures” that no one can fully understand until they encounter it.
Walsh said playing in Montreal means coming off the ice to be greeted by 15 cameras and more than 30 media members on a near-daily basis. There’s also the constant attention that comes when a player is walking down the street, if they visit a local market for groceries or if they eat at a restaurant.
“You want to be welcoming and understand that this is a privileged set of circumstances that you are living under, yet at the same time when things are not going well, it’s just grinding you down every day,” Walsh said. “There’s no getting away from hockey off the ice. What players tend to do in this situation … is you tend to cocoon. You order in your food, you don’t go to the market, you don’t walk down the street, you don’t walk to the park to get some fresh air. You tend to avoid people and crowds. It turns into an isolating and insulated life and that is not always the healthiest lifestyle.”
Although Drouin wasn’t performing to the level he or the fans wanted, it wasn’t the primary reason why he struggled with anxiety.
Sleeping was challenging. Drouin would lie awake at night for hours, only thinking about hockey. He would think about the next game or what happened in the game the day before. Those thoughts forced him to replay an entire game in his head. Every single sequence that he was involved in played in his mind as if it were on a continuous loop that could only be interrupted when he realized he only had two hours to sleep before practice.
“I didn’t really go to sleep until I got help and really someone to talk to about the perspective of getting sleep and getting rest,” Drouin said. “At one point, it was just normal for me. I thought it was normal. I didn’t want help. I didn’t feel like I needed help. When you’re sleeping two or three hours a night, you can’t function as an athlete. You can’t perform the way you want to and your body is not responding either.”
Drouin said he realized he needed help when the Canadiens were in Calgary to play the Flames during the 2020-21 season. During that season, the NHL created what was basically an all-Canadian North Division so those teams could travel across Canada to comply with the nation’s COVID-19 restrictions.
“My body literally shut off on me. I remember that first practice and came to the hotel room and started feeling sick, started feeling tired and started having attacks,” Drouin said. “It was new for me and I thought I was sick. I thought I had a fever or something. Obviously, the doctor came and saw me and there was no fever and now I was even more worried about why I was feeling this way.”
Drouin said that “losing control of my body and having my body control me,” was the breaking point. He called his parents and close friends to open up about what he was experiencing. Drouin described it as one of the hardest and most emotional experiences of his life.
A week after his experience in Calgary, Drouin decided to step away from hockey.
“My parents knew and that was the part that hurt me when I was on the phone with them,” Drouin said. “My parents saw it before I saw it. When that phone call happened, I knew it was time to focus on me for once and get better. I’m still young but I was younger then and knew I still had a lot of years left in the NHL. I couldn’t follow that up for 10 years to live that way and handle that stuff by myself. I knew I needed help. Ever since then, my life has been great and I know how to handle those things.”
Opening up about anxiety and undergoing therapy were the first steps toward personal happiness, Drouin said. He found pleasure professionally the past two years in Montreal as well. The organization went through sweeping changes that led to the Canadiens hiring Kent Hughes as their general manager with Hockey Hall of Fame inductee Martin St. Louis becoming head coach.
Drouin said the arrival of Hughes and St. Louis created a sense of newness with the franchise which he believed gave him a clean slate. It also might have contributed to the past two seasons being among the most productive of his career.
While it’s natural to look at his statistics, Drouin explained how he found more positives in his game, allowing him a sense of comfort.
“The last two years have been good and I haven’t had anxiety, nor have the sleeping issues really come back,” Drouin said. “It’s been very positive.”
MONTREAL ALLOWED DROUIN to fulfill a childhood dream of donning those iconic red, blue and white sweaters that made him fall in love with hockey. But the reality of playing in Montreal at this stage of his career and the Canadiens building for the future did not quite align with Drouin’s aspirations to win a Stanley Cup.
There were opportunities elsewhere. Walsh said that there were “multiple teams with offers on the table and all for more money” while Drouin pondered his future.
He decided it was Colorado or bust.
“He was very motivated to reunite with Nate,” Walsh said. “Nate was texting him and calling him several times a day, pushing him to come to Denver and to come together again.”
The decision to join the Avalanche was layered. It started with Drouin’s relationship with MacKinnon, the fact that MacKinnon is one of the best players on the planet and is one of the faces on a team expected to complete for another championship. And Colorado made it clear it wanted Drouin.
Drouin also examined his surroundings. Avalanche coach Jared Bednar has not only won a Stanley Cup, but is the third-longest tenured coach in the NHL behind the Lightning’s Jon Cooper and the Pittsburgh Penguins‘ Mike Sullivan. Having a coach with the longevity and success Bednar and his assistants have and them wanting Drouin also was welcoming.
“Management is also sensitive to the challenges you have had before and is excited to bring you in too,” Walsh said. “Players love to go places where they feel wanted. From July 1, Jonathan felt like Colorado really wanted him. Players in the locker room really wanted him and it gave him a chance to turn things over and get a fresh start somewhere.”
Part of the reason the Avalanche has found success in recent years is how they make new players and their families feel welcomed. MacKinnon, who is an alternate captain, is quite involved in the process.
Several stories have been shared about MacKinnon’s intense nature. One came when Burakovsky joined the Avalanche after he was traded from the Washington Capitals. MacKinnon spent part of the offseason examining Burakovsky’s statistics and advised him to shoot more. Burakovsky recorded his first 20-goal season while scoring what was then a career-best 45 points over 58 games of the pandemic-shortened 2019-20 season.
“I think since we have a relationship already it was easier, a little easier for me to kind of do some things that I think he should do on and off the ice,” MacKinnon said. “That’s been a lot easier for a new player. I’m not used to having new players come in that I’m really good friends with. But other than that, I try to make everyone feel welcomed as I can. We have a lot of new faces, so it’s definitely going to be important for us to come together quickly.”
Reuniting with MacKinnon comes with a sense of nostalgia and warm feelings. Drouin smiles when looking back at how MacKinnon would pick him up for school or practices, all while blaring early-2010s hip-hop. Drouin chuckles upon sharing that the biggest difference with the 18-year-old version of MacKinnon who drove him around Halifax versus the 28-year-old who is trying to steer him toward a Stanley Cup is that older MacKinnon is calmer.
Drouin is also realistic. He knows coming to Denver and playing with one of his best friends will be a challenge. Drouin said even as a teenager MacKinnon pushed their teammates considerably. He knows that type of mentality is what has allowed MacKinnon to be one of the best players in the world and also helped the Avs attain a level of success other teams covet.
What Drouin said about MacKinnon on a recent Friday afternoon backs that up. MacKinnon missed practice that day because he wasn’t in Denver or Colorado. He was home in Halifax, where the Mooseheads retired his number.
The following morning, MacKinnon returned, having taken an early morning flight so he could participate on the third day of training camp in late September.
“He hasn’t changed with that part, he was the same in junior where he’d push you to the end of the wall, sees there’s a hole in the wall and wants you to go further,” Drouin said. “I think this is why this team is so good. It looks like there’s a lot of guys who buy into that and become kind of like Nate a little bit. I think that’s why Nate’s had success [because] he’s never really satisfied with anything.”
MacKinnon’s mentality is one thing that defines this iteration of the Avs. Another is how they continue to have success with new players since Bednar and his staff have taken charge.
While Bednar admits that not every new player the Avs have acquired has found their place, there’s evidence that shows a good number of them have. Burakovsky had his three most productive seasons and could have been a three-time 20-goal scorer if not for the pandemic. Kadri went from averaging 0.64 points per game with the Toronto Maple Leafs over 10 seasons to averaging 0.87 points in three seasons with the Avalanche. Lehkonen finished with a career-high 21 goals and 51 points in his first full season with the Avs, while Nichushkin went from a first-rounder who struggled with the Dallas Stars to a hulking two-way presence averaging 0.63 points per game.
What is it about Denver that allows players — especially forwards — to reach the sort of highs they didn’t achieve elsewhere? Bednar said it is a multifaceted process that starts with the front office identifying players whom it believes will excel.
Bednar said if the Avs get those players, the next step is to have them spend time with the team to get acclimated. That gives new players a chance to experience the Avs’ work ethic, how their leaders work, how competitive they are and how much everyone pays attention to details.
Ryan Johansen, who was traded to the Avs in the offseason, echoed those sentiments.
“I remember our last playoff series where they swept up and it felt like there were 20 MacKinnons on the ice and six [Cale] Makars on defense. I’m not kidding. That’s what it felt like,” Johansen said, referencing when he and the Nashville Predators lost to the Avs in a first-round series during the 2022 playoffs. “The speed this team plays with, it’s exciting for me to be a part of it.”
Another newcomer who had a firsthand encounter with it was Ross Colton, who was also traded in the offseason. Colton won a Cup with the Lightning in 2021 and went against the Avs in a six-game Final during the 2022 playoffs.
“The organization I came from had great leadership and guys who knew how to win in the league and you see the same thing here,” Colton said. “Guys who know what it takes to win, how to carry themselves on and off the ice.”
Something else Bednar does with new players is watch 10 of their games from the previous season. He watches how they played early in the season, in the middle and late. He looks for how they performed in good games and bad ones. Bednar said he takes notes to get ideas about how to optimize a player’s usage based on how they operated with their former team.
“When you come in here, you really don’t have a choice but to follow that same thing,” Bednar said. “That’s going to bring out the best in people. I think [Drouin] is a perfect candidate to be able to step in and help us. The first three days of camp, he’s been one of the hardest working guys on the ice. He’s shown real quickness with an ability to make plays and score goals and play with those top guys.”
Sports
‘There was no other option’: The story of Ohio State’s title run from preseason hype to crushing defeat to playoff champion
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Andrea Adelson, ESPN Senior Writer
ATLANTA — Seven weeks and two days ago, Ohio State coach Ryan Day watched as Michigan planted its flag at midfield inside the Horseshoe, chaos ensuing: fans chanting “F— Ryan Day,” his players both fighting back and walking around dazed, the rival Wolverines celebrating.
Seven weeks and two days ago, what unfolded Monday night felt unimaginable: joy, celebration, triumph, Day right in the middle, the whole of Buckeye Nation now back in his corner.
After that devastating loss to Michigan, the first expanded 12-team College Football Playoff delivered a chance at salvation. And the Buckeyes took advantage from the start, outscoring their four postseason opponents by a combined score of 145-75, culminating with a 34-23 victory over Notre Dame for the program’s seventh national championship.
“No great accomplishments are ever achieved without going through adversity,” Day said. “That’s just the truth.” No team has benefited from the College Football Playoff quite like the Buckeyes.
In 2014, they were ranked No. 4 in the inaugural four-team field, beating No. 1 Alabama, then No. 2 Oregon behind third-string quarterback Cardale Jones to hoist the first championship trophy of the CFP era.
This year, they were the No. 8 seed in the first 12-team field. The loss to Michigan — Ohio State’s fourth straight in the series — kept them out of the Big Ten title game. And in any previous season, it would have kept them out of the playoff. But thanks to playoff expansion, the Buckeyes made it when the bracket was revealed Dec. 8.
The future still looked bleak.
Speculation swirled around Day and whether his disgruntled fan base could accept another failure in a season built for a national championship run.
A team meeting after the Michigan loss got heated. Feelings were hashed out, grievances aired.
“There’s multiple ways that you can respond to adversity in life, and that adversity brought us closer as an entire group,” receiver Emeka Egbuka said. “We were able to lift each other up in that moment, and we’ve gotten stronger because of it.”
Michigan would be their catalyst.
TWELVE MONTHS AND 12 days ago, cornerback Denzel Burke made sure to watch the 2024 national championship game all the way to the end so he could see rival Michigan hold up the trophy following a 34-13 win over Washington. He had the game on his phone while at dinner with teammate Lathan Ransom and was so hurt, he had to walk into the bathroom to cool off.
There is no fun in losing to your rival; even less fun is watching your rival win the national championship. Michigan beat Ohio State and won it all last season, thanks in part to a veteran group that put off the NFL to return to school to try and win a championship.
Day wanted the same for the Buckeyes in 2024. To get the better of Michigan, Ohio State would have to be like Michigan. Well, at least in one way. With $20 million to spend in NIL, Ohio State went about convincing its top players to return to school, too. Defensive end Jack Sawyer, who grew up in nearby Pickerington, Ohio, as a huge Buckeyes fan, led the charge.
Within short order, he and seven others — defensive end JT Tuimoloau, tailback TreVeyon Henderson, defensive tackle Tyleik Williams, defensive tackle Ty Hamilton, offensive lineman Donovan Jackson, Egbuka and Burke — put off the NFL to come back to school for one more year.
“It just kind of fueled our fire a little bit to come back and hoist the national championship trophy,” Burke said. “To be able to see them win it all like that, we wanted a piece of that.”
Player retention and development has been huge: The Buckeyes started 19 players who signed with the school and have combined for more than 520 starts. Many in the signing class of 2021, the foundation for this team, returned because they had contributed nothing to the trophy case inside the Woody Hayes Athletic Center and refused to let their careers end that way.
“This might be the biggest example of selflessness I have ever been a part of,” linebacker Cody Simon said. “So many guys had the opportunity to go first round, second round in the NFL draft. They all came back to play another year together.
“I commend all those guys who made a decision and all the guys who came in who were outside of our program because it takes a lot to get this all to work together.”
Day signed a top-tier recruiting class, including receiver Jeremiah Smith, and brought in key transfer portal acquisitions — quarterback Will Howard, safety Caleb Downs and running back Quinshon Judkins chief among them. Ohio State would enter 2024 as one of the most talented teams in the country. Expectations were clear from the start.
“At this time last year, which is crazy to think about, guys decided to come back and put their personal goals aside to achieve this goal,” Ransom said. “It’s pretty special. I hate when people say, ‘Win or bust,’ but we did everything to come back to win.”
Day knew he needed something to help his players best understand the journey on which they were about to embark. In their first preseason meeting last year, Day showed the team a picture of a lighthouse in the middle of a storm in the ocean. The lighthouse keeper, he told them, was counting on the lighthouse to be built with the right foundation to withstand the storm.
Then he told the story of three bricklayers building St. Paul’s Cathedral, and the importance of each brick being laid the right way. He told the players that every day after practice, he would hand out a scarlet and gray brick to one player. It would be his job to build a foundation for what was to come. The bricks could not be placed randomly or haphazardly. Building that foundation had to be done the right way.
Every day as players walked out to practice, they had a view of the bricks being stacked. Every day on the way back into the locker room, they had a view of the bricks being stacked. Over 100 bricks are now stacked perfectly, forming a foundational wall. “That wall is built for anything — the fire that we went through, the perseverance that we have, and here we are now,” Burke said.
“Storms are going to come,” Day said. “How is the foundation built? Was it built on a true foundation of rock or of sand? We knew those storms were coming. We didn’t know when, but that was ultimately going to allow us to withstand those storms.”
THE BIGGEST STORM came Nov. 30. The Buckeyes entered their rivalry game against Michigan as a 20.5-point favorite, ranked No. 2 in the CFP and with massive matchup advantages up and down the depth chart.
The Wolverines lost nearly every key offensive player from their 2023 national championship team and were 6-5 under first-year coach Sherrone Moore. Two of their best players were injured for the Ohio State game.
Finally, the Ryan Day Redemption Arc would be written.
Then the game kicked off. Michigan dominated up front, handcuffing Ohio State from doing much. Inexplicably, the Buckeyes could not get the ball to Smith to make enough of a difference, and Ohio State was shut out in the second half at home for the first time in 13 years.
When the final seconds ticked off the clock, Michigan had won 13-10 in one of the biggest upsets in the history of the rivalry. As the Wolverines planted their flag at midfield, Sawyer came charging up, tearing the Michigan flag down. He could be heard on video screaming, “They’re not f—ing planting the flag again on our field, bro!”
Day stood there silently, seemingly in disbelief. Though he ranks No. 1 among active head coaches in win percentage, Day has been judged by one thing: his record against Michigan. Day has gone 47-1 against all other Big Ten opponents in his career. But what did he do against the Wolverines? To date, he is 1-4. As a result, Ohio State has not won a Big Ten title since the truncated 2020 COVID-19 season, a year in which the rivals did not play.
Vitriol was directed at both Day and his players in the immediate aftermath of this season’s Michigan loss, and sports talk focused on whether Day needed to win the national championship to save his job. Athletic director Ross Bjork tried to quell the speculation when he gave a vote of confidence to Day in December, telling 97.1 The Fan in Columbus, “The season’s not over. The book is not closed.”
In that same interview, Bjork asked his Ohio State fans not to sell their tickets to Tennessee fans for their first-round playoff game in Columbus.
“We knew that we could play better than what we presented,” guard Donovan Jackson said. “So having people tell us we’re trash, terrible, garbage, half of us should transfer, half of us should leave the state of Ohio. No, we know how good we are.”
IN THE FOUR-TEAM CFP era, Ohio State made five playoff appearances and finished ranked No. 5 or 6 three other times. In fact, the Buckeyes ranked in the top seven in every final CFP poll, including No. 7 last year at 11-1. That lone loss to Michigan precluded them from making the four-team field.
The loss to Michigan this year served a far different purpose.
“The new format has allowed our team to grow and build throughout the season, and as much as losses hurt, they really allow us as coaches and players to take a hard look at the issues and get them addressed,” Day said.
The team meeting after the Michigan game got loud and emotional. Fingers were pointed, mistakes were rehashed, but players and Day took accountability. In times of great adversity, either you fold under the pressure or you rise to greatness. Ohio State chose not to break.
“There was no other option for us,” Simon said. “You go from feeling sorry for yourself to now we’ve got to rewrite the history for this season and this team.”
Kickoff against the Vols came on a chilly night at the Shoe, three weeks removed from the Michigan loss. Nobody knew how the Buckeyes would respond.
The nation got its answer two minutes and 14 seconds into the game. Then four minutes later. Then five minutes after that. By the time the first quarter ended, Ohio State had a 21-0 lead as it overwhelmed what had been one of the best defenses in the country, while completely stymying Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava and his high-powered offense.
Day said after the 42-17 win, “You could tell from the jump that they had a look in their eyes that they were going to win this game.”
Next up: a rematch with No. 1 Oregon in the CFP quarterfinals at the Rose Bowl. The undefeated Big Ten champion Ducks handed the Buckeyes their first defeat back in October, after Howard lost track of the game clock while trying to drive for a game-winning score, running with four seconds left and sliding as time ran out in the 32-31 loss.
There would be no need for late-game heroics this time around. Once again, Ohio State bulldozed its way to a massive lead, going up 34-0 before winning 41-21. After two rounds, the Buckeyes had harnessed all their talent and potential and were playing like the “championship or bust team” many envisioned when the season began.
There was more to come. Before the semifinal against Texas at the Cotton Bowl, Day had a simple message for his team: “To leave a legacy, become your own legend.”
With the game on the line in the fourth quarter, leave it to the player who dreamed about winning an Ohio State national title as a little boy throwing a football in his backyard with his dad, to do just that.
Sawyer strip-sacked Quinn Ewers on fourth-and-goal from the 8 with 2:13 left, then returned the fumble 83 yards to put the game out of reach and give the Buckeyes a 28-14 win.
The image of Day standing silently next to a riled-up Sawyer after the Michigan game was replaced with the image of Day unclipping his headset and jumping into a giant bear hug from Sawyer on the sideline screaming, “YEAHHHHHHHHHHHH!” A hug so powerful, it appeared to break a camera the CFP had placed on Sawyer after the play.
“The resiliency of this team, from a month ago, it’s been incredible,” Sawyer said afterward. “I love Columbus. I love the state of Ohio. I love Ohio State football. I’m so fortunate to be playing in the national championship my last year here.”
Just like the semifinal, the national championship game needed a fourth-quarter play to seal the win. This time, it was Smith and his 57-yard reception with 2:29 left that ended any Notre Dame comeback hopes.
Ohio State trailed for the first time in this CFP after the Fighting Irish opened the game with a clock-busting drive that nearly lasted 10 minutes and ended with a Riley Leonard touchdown run.
Then the Buckeyes showed off their wealth of depth and talent during a critical portion of the game — the rest of the first half and start of the second — pulling ahead and proving right those who chose them in the preseason to bring home another national championship. Their offensive line opened up huge holes for Henderson and Judkins while allowing virtually no one to come near Howard. The Notre Dame defense was flummoxed — alternating between man and zone — unable to answer for Judkins nor for a mobile Howard, who was all too eager to take off when the running lanes opened. Ohio State converted all six of its third-down attempts in the first half, and Howard opened the game with 13 straight completions — a record for most completions to start a national championship game.
The Buckeyes raced out to a 28-7 lead after their first series of the third quarter and then held on against an inspired Notre Dame effort. Afterward, a raucous Ohio State crowd chanted Ryan Day’s name as he walked off the field.
They may not be able to call themselves Big Ten champions. They may not have a win over That Team Up North.
But the Buckeyes have something to celebrate that is theirs, and only theirs: the national championship.
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David Purdum, ESPN Staff Writer
The top two favorites to win next season’s College Football Playoff will square off in Week 1, when Ohio State hosts Texas on Aug. 30.
The Longhorns and the defending-champion Buckeyes enter the offseason as the favorites to win the 2025-26 College Football Playoff at sportsbooks. Texas, which is poised to begin the Arch Manning era, opened as the national title favorite at +450 at ESPN BET, followed by the Buckeyes (+500) and Georgia (+600). Ohio State is the favorite at other sportsbooks, but those three teams top the early odds across the betting market.
Oregon and Penn State, each at +750, round out the teams with odds shorter than 10-1 in ESPN BET’s opening numbers.
Ohio State held off Notre Dame in Monday’s College Football Playoff National Championship game, capping a dominant postseason run. The Fighting Irish opened at +1500 to win next season’s title at ESPN BET.
Manning is expected to be the Longhorns’ starting quarterback with Quinn Ewers declaring for the NFL draft. FanDuel has Manning as the second favorite to win next season’s Heisman Trophy, behind LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier.
The transfer portal has added to the challenges sportsbooks face when creating odds to win the following season’s national championship.
“We will take our power ratings for 2025 and make the proper adjustments to account for recruiting, returning production and transfer portal changes,” said Joey Feazel, a trader at Caesars Sportsbook. “It is a challenging process at times, but year after year, we are getting better at it.”
The preseason betting favorite to capture the national championship has not won it since Alabama in 2017.
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Mark Schlabach, ESPN Senior Writer
ATLANTA — Maybe Ohio State football fans will like coach Ryan Day now.
Fifty-one days after suffering the worst loss of his career, Day guided the No. 8 Buckeyes to their first national championship in 10 years with a 34-23 victory over No. 7 Notre Dame in the CFP National Championship presented by AT&T on Monday night.
The Buckeyes led the Irish 31-7 midway through the third quarter, but the Irish kept fighting and pulled to within one score and a two-point conversion with just more than four minutes remaining.
Notre Dame quarterback Riley Leonard threw a 34-yard touchdown pass to Jaden Greathouse with 3:03 left in the third and tossed a two-point play to tailback Jeremiyah Love to make it 31-15. Then, after a late defensive stop, Leonard found Greathouse again for a 30-yard touchdown and Beaux Collins converted the two-point attempt to pull the Irish within 31-23 with 4:15 left.
The Buckeyes finally put the Irish away for good when quarterback Will Howard threw a deep ball to freshman Jeremiah Smith, who beat cornerback Christian Gray for a 56-yard gain to the Irish 10. That led to Jayden Fielding‘s 33-yard field goal that put the Buckeyes up 11 with 26 seconds left.
The victory was redemption for Day, whose team fell to rival Michigan, the so-called “School Up North,” for the fourth straight time in a stunning 13-10 defeat at home on Nov. 30. That loss, in which the Buckeyes were 21-point favorites, knocked them out of the Big Ten championship game.
But the defeat didn’t eliminate Ohio State from the first 12-team CFP, and the Buckeyes took down No. 9 Tennessee in the first round, No. 1 Oregon in the quarterfinals and No. 5 Texas in the semifinals before beating the Fighting Irish in their 16th game of the season.
“I say all the time to our players, the first time you got on a bike you didn’t just ride the bike, you fell down, and how quickly did you learn from falling down to get back on the bike to learn to ride a bike?” Day said. “Well, it’s like that in life. You learn from going through difficult times like that.”
That was what made Monday night so special for Day and everyone around him.
“I think he’s done a great job, and I think he understands the weight of what this job is,” Ohio State offensive coordinator Chip Kelly said this week. “That comes with the territory. He’s shown who he is, and I think he’s done an unbelievable job in that situation.”
Ohio State’s players said Day accepted some of the blame for coming up short against Michigan again. But the shocking defeat might have been exactly what the Buckeyes needed in order to capture the seventh national title in program history.
“We had to address all the issues we had on the team,” Buckeyes defensive tackle Tyleik Williams said. “Everybody spoke up and just fixed those problems that we had. The leadership on this team is like I’ve never seen. That wouldn’t have happened a couple years ago.”
With a 70-10 record, Day now has the second-best winning percentage (87.5%) among coaches with at least 80 FBS games. Only Walter Camp, who coached at Stanford and Yale in the late 1800s, had a better winning percentage (90.7%).
And with Michigan having claimed the last four-team CFP following the 2023 season, the Big Ten captured consecutive national titles for the first time since 1940-42, when Minnesota won back-to-back titles and Ohio State added a third.
Monday’s game also was redemption for Howard, the Kansas State transfer who struggled in his first start against Michigan. Against Notre Dame, Howard completed 17 of 21 passes for 231 yards with two touchdown passes, while running 16 times for 57 yards.
Quinshon Judkins, an Ole Miss transfer, ran 11 times for 100 yards with three total touchdowns. Smith caught five passes for 88 yards with one score.
Leonard led the Irish with 255 yards on 22-for-31 passing with two touchdowns. Greathouse caught six passes for 128 yards with two scores.
This one was especially satisfying for the Big Ten because it came in the SEC’s backyard. The SEC was left out of the CFP title game for the second straight season, which hadn’t happened since 2004-05.
Notre Dame, which was trying to capture its first national championship since 1988, had its 13-game winning streak snapped. It was Ohio State’s seventh straight victory against the Irish.
After falling behind 7-0 on the game’s opening drive, Ohio State quickly answered with a touchdown of its own and never took its foot off the gas. On the Buckeyes’ first possession, TreVeyon Henderson ran for 19 yards to move the ball to the Notre Dame 40. Then Judkins ran for 15 after catching a screen pass from Howard.
On second-and-5 at the 8, Smith went into motion toward Howard. But then Smith stopped and ran back to the right. When Notre Dame’s secondary blew the coverage, Smith caught a pass in the flat and easily ran into the end zone to tie the score at 7-all with 14:10 left in the first half.
It was the first opening-drive touchdown the Notre Dame defense had allowed since a 49-7 win against Stanford at home on Oct. 12.
After two penalties backed the Irish up and forced them to punt on their next possession, Ohio State needed just two plays to move across the 50. Howard scrambled for 11 yards on third-and-5 at the Notre Dame 43. He ran for three more on third-and-2 at the 12. On the next play, Judkins stiff-armed linebacker Jaiden Ausberry to the ground and scored on a 9-yard run to make it 14-7 with 6:15 remaining.
Things unraveled for the Irish on their next possession. On third-and-5 at their 30, tight end Mitchell Evans went into motion. Center Pat Coogan‘s snap to Leonard hit Evans, who recovered the fumble at the Irish 26, forcing another punt.
The Buckeyes took over at their 20 with just under five minutes to play in the half. Howard delivered big on two third-and-7 plays. At the OSU 23, he threw a 19-yard pass to Brandon Inniss. At the OSU 45, he completed a 20-yarder to the sliding Carnell Tate.
On second-and-4 at the Notre Dame 6, Howard found Judkins, who was all alone in the end zone for another touchdown to make it 21-7 with 27 seconds to go in the half.
The Buckeyes had possession to start the second half, and they didn’t need long to score again. On the second play, Judkins burst through the line and ran past linebacker Jack Kiser. Cornerback Leonard Moore finally pulled down Judkins after a 70-yard gain to the Irish 5. Judkins scored his third touchdown of the game on a 1-yard run three plays later to give Ohio State a 28-7 lead.
The Irish failed to pull off a fake punt at their 33 on their next possession, leading to Fielding’s 46-yard field goal that made it 31-7.
Notre Dame’s first possession of the game couldn’t have been scripted any better. The Irish picked up six first downs over the first 9 minutes, 45 seconds, with Leonard running for four and throwing for two more.
When the Buckeyes stopped Leonard on third-and-1 at the Ohio State 45 with about 11 minutes to go in the quarter, coach Marcus Freeman left his offense on the field. Leonard ran three yards and a first down. On third-and-3 from the OSU 7, Ohio State pulled Leonard down for a 2-yard gain. The Irish went again on fourth-and-1, and Leonard lowered his shoulder and ran for 4 yards.
Leonard ran into the end untouched on the next play, giving the Fighting Irish a 7-0 lead with 5:15 to go in the first.
Unfortunately, that was about as good as it would get for Notre Dame’s offense in the first half. The Irish went three-and-out on their next two drives and gained just 18 yards the rest of the half.
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