Ohio State’s Ryan Day Names Former Michigan Assistant Al Washington Linebackers Coach

Ohio State head football coach Ryan Day named Al Washington as the linebackers coach on his first staff in Columbus on Tuesday, marking the second straight day he hired an assistant away from Michigan.

Washington, a Columbus native who played collegiately at Boston College while Day was on staff with the Eagles, was a defensive assistant at Michigan last season. He replaces Billy Davis at Ohio State after Davis spent two years as linebackers coach under Urban Meyer.

On Monday, Day named Greg Mattison, who had been Michigan’s defensive line coach, as one of two co-defensive coordinators, along with Jeff Hafley.

Washington graduated from Columbus Bishop Watterson in 2002 and his father, Al Sr., played linebackers for Woody Hayes at Ohio State from 1977-80. The older Washington is eighth in program history with 345 total tackles.

“Al Washington is going to be a terrific addition to our coaching staff,” Day said. “I’ve known him as a player and as a coach and I know his family very well. I think his familiarity with this region as a coach and as a recruiter is going to be very impactful, as will his leadership with our linebackers unit.”

Washington has been a collegiate coach for 12 years, starting as the defensive line coach at RPI in 2007. He was a graduate assistant at N.C. State in 2008 and the defensive line coach at Slippery Rock from 2009-10. From there, Washington spent one year as linebackers coach at Elon University before returning in 2012 to Boston College to be the assistant special teams and assistant defensive line coach. He took over as running backs coach from 2013-15 then coached special teams and defensive line in 2016. He was on Luke Fickell’s staff at Cincinnati in 2017 as defensive line coach before joining the Wolverines for the 2018 season as a defensive assistant.

Washington joins Mattison, Hafley and defensive line coach Larry Johnson as official members of Day’s defensive staff.

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