Eric Boggs
Legendary college football coach Lou Holtz passed away at the age of 89, leaving behind a career that shaped generations of players, coaches, and fans across the country. While he is most widely known for leading Notre Dame Fighting Irish football to its last national championship in 1988, his story carries a meaningful and personal connection to Ohio State that Buckeye fans will always appreciate.
Holtz’s journey began in East Liverpool, Ohio, and after playing linebacker at Kent State, he quickly worked his way into the college coaching ranks. One of the most important stops in his career came in 1968, when he served as an assistant under the legendary Woody Hayes at Ohio State. That season ended with a national championship and a Rose Bowl victory over USC and O.J. Simpson, cementing its place as one of the most iconic teams in program history. Though Holtz spent just one year in Columbus, he often credited Hayes as one of the most influential figures in his life, second only to his wife. The lessons he learned about discipline, preparation, and demanding excellence became pillars of his own coaching philosophy.
After leaving Ohio State, Holtz embarked on a head coaching career that would span 33 seasons and include stops at William & Mary, NC State, Arkansas, Minnesota, and even a brief stint with the NFL’s New York Jets. His defining chapter, of course, came at Notre Dame, where he compiled a 100-30-2 record over 11 seasons and delivered a perfect 12-0 national title run in 1988. He later returned to coaching at South Carolina before transitioning into broadcasting, becoming a familiar voice on both CBS and ESPN for years.
Holtz’s coaching tree also connects directly back to Columbus. Urban Meyer worked under Holtz at Notre Dame and carried many of those lessons into his own championship runs at Florida and Ohio State. Concepts like daily discipline and never peaking too early became cornerstones of Meyer’s approach, tracing a clear philosophical line from Hayes to Holtz to Meyer. Holtz even returned to Ohio State in 2017 as a guest coach for the Buckeyes’ spring game, reconnecting with the program that helped shape him.
In his later years, Holtz remained part of the Ohio State conversation in a different way. His public comments questioning the toughness of Ryan Day’s Buckeyes before their 2023 matchup with Notre Dame sparked one of the more memorable postgame moments in recent history. After Ohio State’s dramatic 17-14 win in South Bend, Day passionately responded on national television, asking where Holtz was to hear his answer. The exchange created headlines, and Holtz would later make another pointed remark before the 2025 national championship meeting between the programs.
Yet from an Ohio State perspective, those comments can also be viewed through a familiar lens. Holtz was shaped by Hayes, and Hayes was never shy about challenging his own. In many ways, it felt less like personal criticism and more like an old-school coach demanding that a proud program live up to its standard. That competitive fire is part of what made Holtz who he was.
Over the course of his career, Holtz amassed 249 wins, earned induction into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2008, and was later ranked by ESPN as one of the greatest coaches in the sport’s history. His impact stretched far beyond wins and losses. For Ohio State fans, his legacy is intertwined with one magical season in 1968 and a coaching philosophy that helped influence multiple Buckeye championship runs.
College football lost a giant, but his fingerprints remain on the game — including in Columbus, where a young assistant once learned from Woody Hayes what it truly meant to uphold a championship standard.
