Josh Pate is very high on the Ohio State Buckeyes in his college football program rankings, and it’s hard to argue
The Buckeyes have built one of the very best football programs there are.
The Ohio State Buckeyes couldn’t go back-to-back with national championships and instead were bounced out of the College Football Playoff in the quarterfinal against Miami.
Ohio State went perfect all season until two straight losses ended its season with the first being against Indiana in the Big Ten Championship. Even if the Buckeyes came up short for the 2025 season, it is easy to feel good about the program going forward.
Josh Pate has Ohio State ranked as the top college football program
On a recent airing of Josh Pate’s college football show, he ranked the Buckeyes as the No. 1 program in college football. To go along with ranking the Buckeyes at the top, Pate had plenty of positive things to say about them.
“I think Ohio State is the top program in the country,” Pate said recently. “Ohio State is 37-6 over the past three years. They’ve got a national championship mixed in here. They are a top-five recruiting program in the country.”
They are a very, very high-value portal program — translation, they don’t need to flood themselves with a bunch of transfers because they recruit and develop very well, but when they do need to, they can be very selective and very effective in the transfer portal.”
Ohio State and more so Ryan Day’s ability to hire the right coaching staff has been impressive lately. The starting decisions alone have been a major part of the recent Ohio State success. Coach Day is trying to do the same thing this offseason by bringing in Arthur Smith from the NFL to be the play-caller.
“They’re just excellent at staffing. I don’t know that many programs at all are doing it better. Just think about what’s happened the past three years at Ohio State. You had two coordinator turnover situations, just this past year it happened.”
You lose Chip Kelly, who was a foundational piece of that (title) run and then you elevate from within. But then, you also go and get Matt Patricia because Jim Knowles moves on, and if anything, they improved defensively, which is just really hard to do. That is supreme organizational structure there.”
Ohio State’s schedule in 2026 is a tough one that’ll be its most interesting slate of games in a while. The Buckeyes play Texas, Oregon, Indiana, and Michigan. That’s not counting the West Coast trip to USC.
Still, expectations are as high as ever for Day and the Buckeyes. 2025 didn’t end how they wanted it to, and going out negatively in 2026 in Jeremiah Smith’s last season wouldn’t be a great look at all.
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