The Associated Press

Ohio State is hiring former Detroit Lions coach Matt Patricia as defensive coordinator, according to a person familiar with the situation.

The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity Wednesday because the agreement had not been announced.

Ohio State coach Ryan Day, who led the Buckeyes to the national championship, agreed in principle last year to a seven-year contract valued at $12.5 million per year.

Day is hiring Patricia to fill the void left by defensive coordinator Jim Knowles leaving for the same job at Penn State.

The 50-year-old Patricia, a Super Bowl-winning defensive coordinator in New England under Bill Belichick, is getting another chance to coach after the Philadelphia Eagles let him go a year ago. Patricia became the Eagles’ defensive play-caller late in the 2023 season and lost his job after their opening-round playoff loss to Tampa Bay.

The Lions fired Patricia during the 2020 season with a 13-29-1 record in two-plus seasons.

Patricia returned to New England as Belichick’s assistant head coach in 2021 and was the offensive line coach and senior advisor for the Patriots in 2022. He was on Belichick’s staff for 14 seasons and was defensive coordinator for six seasons, ending with his unit giving up 41 points and 538 yards to the Eagles in a Super Bowl loss seven years ago.

He earned an aeronautical engineering degree at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he played center and guard. While trying to figure out which career path to follow, the native of Sherrill, New York, was an aeronautical engineer for two years.

Patricia started his coaching career as a graduate assistant at RPI and went on to lead the defensive line at Amherst College and to be a graduate assistant Syracuse before Belichick hired him as an offensive assistant in 2004.

Player found dead

LAS VEGAS — UNLV senior offensive lineman Ben Christman, who transferred after last season from Kentucky, has died, the university announced.

Christman, who was 21, was found dead in an off-campus apartment on Tuesday morning. The university said it didn’t have other details and a cause of death would later be determined by the Clark County Coroner’s Office.

UNLV said Christman’s family and the team have been informed and that counseling services would be provided.

“Our team’s heart is broken to hear of Ben’s passing,” UNLV coach Dan Mullen said in a statement. “Since the day Ben set foot on our campus a month ago, he made the Rebels a better program. Ben was an easy choice for our leadership committee as he had earned the immediate respect, admiration and friendship of all his teammates. Our prayers go out to his family and all who knew him. Ben made the world a better place and he will be missed.”

Christman began his college career at Ohio State as a highly ranked prospect in the 2021 recruiting class. He redshirted that season and played in one game in 2022 before transferring to Kentucky. Christman did not play in 2023 because of a knee injury, but appeared in all 12 games last season on special teams.

He then transferred to UNLV.

“There is little that can be said to lessen the pain of suddenly losing a member of our university family at such a young age, and my heart breaks for all who knew and loved him,” UNLV President Keith Whitfield said in a statement.

Tressel confirmed

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Former Ohio State Buckeyes football coach Jim Tressel was confirmed Wednesday as Ohio’s next lieutenant governor.

State senators and representatives affirmed Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine’s Monday nomination of Tressel in separate floor votes Wednesday: 31-1 in the Senate, 68-27 in the House.

Tressel, 72, succeeds Republican Jon Husted, who was appointed last month to the U.S. Senate seat formerly held by Vice President JD Vance. DeWine has said that Tressel will remain involved in education and workforce development as lieutenant governor.

Tressel retired in 2023 as president of Youngstown State University, a position he had held since 2014. He also worked previously as executive vice president for student success at the University of Akron.

In an Associated Press interview on Wednesday, Tressel confirmed his party identification — it’s Republican — and said he is a supporter of President Donald Trump inasmuch as he always supports the person who Americans elect to the nation’s highest office.

Though he’s not shared even those basic details publicly before, Tressel said he doesn’t view himself entirely as a newcomer.

Tressel spent nearly a decade as head coach of Ohio State University’s football team, leading the Buckeyes to a national championship in 2002 and six Big Ten championships. He was pressured to resign his post there in May 2011 after a memorabilia-for-cash scandal rocked the team.