By now, Ryan Day has become accustomed to the highs and lows of coaching football.
After losing a fourth consecutive game to rival Michigan last November, the Ohio State head coach found himself the subject of speculation regarding his job status (and worse). And yet, less than two months later, Day’s not only the toast of Columbus, but the college football world after leading the Buckeyes to the first-ever national championship in the 12-team playoff format.
But even while celebrating the crowning achievement of his career, the 45-year-old head coach was almost instantly served a reminder of how quickly your fortune can change. In a viral moment following Ohio State’s victory over Notre Dame in the national title game, the golf cart carrying Day, Buckeyes quarterback Will Howard and linebacker Cody Simon to their postgame press conference crashed into a wall after its driver failed to properly calculate a turn.
Fortunately, everybody on board was OK and laughing in the immediate aftermath of the crash. It also led many on social media to liken the moment to a famous scene from 1997’s Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, in which the film’s titular character gets stuck while driving a cart in a narrow hallway.
As it turns out, Ryan Day was having the exact same thought.
“I said, ‘We’re in an Austin Powers movie right now,'” the Buckeyes head coach joked while recalling the incident during an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon on Monday night.
Ryan Day added of the crash: “You’re stressed during the game, you finally take a deep breath and so we get on the golf cart to go to the press conference and we are just gunning it through the field. Just dodging around people. And I’m grabbing on like this and then we took the corner and it hit the wall. And if you look back, Will Howard’s laughing his tail off and so is Cody Simon.
“And I’m looking like, ‘You’ve gotta be kidding me right now.’ It’s just amazing how you come right back down to Earth like 20 minutes after [winning the national title].”
But if ever there anyone who should’ve been prepared for such a scenario given the trajectory of his time at Ohio State, perhaps it should have been Ryan Day.
About Ben Axelrod
Ben Axelrod is a veteran of the sports media landscape, having most recently worked for NBC's Cleveland affiliate, WKYC. Prior to his time in Cleveland, he covered Ohio State football and the Big Ten for outlets including Cox Media Group, Bleacher Report, Scout and Rivals.