Brian Hartline didn’t leave Ohio State looking to slam the door on the way out.
Now the first-year USF head coach, Hartline used his time at the American Conference’s Media Days - the 2026 American Kickoff - to make clear he still holds plenty of respect for the people who shaped him in Columbus. That list starts with Urban Meyer and Ryan Day, and Hartline made it sound like the lessons from that stop will travel with him to Tampa.
“Oh, yeah. I mean, I’m shaped by those men,” Hartline said.
“And so, a lot of what we do will probably resemble a lot of things they believe and how they operate. ... I just love investing in people.
I love maximizing people. I love the receiver position.
The combination of those two things made it an easy passion.
"That passion will continue here. I’ll still be heavily involved with the wideouts because I just need that.
I truly enjoy that. I learned a lot operationally from everybody I’ve been around.
But just being yourself and not trying to trick people.”
Hartline’s comments fit the tone of his departure: no public bitterness, no shots fired, no attempt to turn the move into a score-settling exercise. He could have gone after Day over the messy hand-off in play-calling last December, especially with Ohio State’s season ending in a Big Ten Championship Game loss to Indiana and a CFP exit in the Cotton Bowl Classic against the Canes. Instead, he chose the cleaner route and praised his former boss.
That matters for Hartline’s next chapter. He’s now trying to build something at USF, and while a return to Ohio State someday may always sit in the background, that kind of move would have to wait until the Ryan Day era is over.
Even then, the path is long. For now, Hartline’s best route is to keep stacking wins in Tampa, grow his profile in Florida, and let the timing sort itself out later.
There’s also a practical side to the way he handled his exit. Hartline doesn’t need to create friction with the Ohio State fan base, and USF has its own coaching history to manage after Alex Golesh left for Auburn. For Hartline, the smart play is simple: keep recruiting, keep developing receivers, and keep the same professional edge that carried him through Columbus.
If this was Hartline’s unofficial debut in his new chair, it went about as smoothly as he could have asked.
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