If there’s someone who preaches leadership, toughness, and winning football games, it’s Ryan Day. But if you listened to him at Ohio State’s All-Pro Dad event this week, you’d find none of those things sit at the top of his priority list. His most important job title is much simpler and that’s being a dad. And the reason why his message carries so much weight is because of how a childhood wound has shaped nearly every decision he’s made as a father.

“One of the things that at a young age I wanted to do, my number one thing in my life, is I wanted to be a great dad,” Ryan Day said via 10TV’s Adam King. “I lost my father when I was nine and so growing up I didn’t have a father.”

Ryan Day lost his father, Raymond Day, to suicide when he was just nine years old, a tragedy that changed the course of his life and later became the foundation of how he raises his own children. Growing up without a father left a void, but the Ohio State head coach explained that his grandfather, uncles, coaches, and later his father-in-law all helped shape him. That perspective became the handbook for how he approaches parenthood with son RJ and daughters Grace and Nia.

“And then from there I wanted to become a good dad for my son RJ, who’s here tonight,” he said. “For my daughters. I want to be a good husband. I want to show my kids what it looks like to be a good dad. What it looks like to be a good husband. What love looks like.” 

‪As Ryan Day delivered those remarks, RJ Day was right there in attendance. The younger Day committed to Northwestern’s 2027 recruiting class as a QB, following his father’s path. But before becoming a recruiting prospect, he was just a kid growing up inside Ohio State’s football program. He was seven years old when his dad arrived in Columbus as QBs coach in 2017. Two years later, when his dad became Ohio State’s head coach, he was nine, the exact age Ryan was when he lost his father.

“Being here tonight just allows us an opportunity to think about that, to share stories,” he added. “Because there’s nothing more important than that. It’s the best thing that we can do. And the lessons that we’re teaching our youth right now, we’re teaching our sons, we’re teaching our daughters. They are going to bring that with the rest of their life.”

Years ago, Ryan Day admitted that seeing teammates celebrate with their fathers after games fueled a competitive chip on his shoulder.

“I would see somebody run up to their dad and hug them after a game,” he told ESPN in 2021. “OK, you get a dad, but I’m going to beat you on the field.”

That pain eventually turned into purpose.

How tragedy became Ryan Day’s biggest mission

As Ryan Day grew older, he began understanding his father’s death in a different light. What once felt like abandonment became a realization that Raymond Day had been battling an illness that few people discussed openly in the late 1980s.

“There was a point in my life where I just thought he was just mentally weak,” he admitted years later. “And then as you get older, you realize that he was [mentally] sick. That, combined with the fact that nobody talked about it [made] my wife and I [realize] that there’s a generation of young people here that don’t need anybody suffering in silence anymore.”

That revelation changed everything. Rather than keeping the subject buried, Ryan Day turned it into one of the biggest causes of his career. In 2019, he started the Support the Day Fund to assist pediatric and mental health initiatives. Alongside his wife, Nina, he has also began the On Our Sleeves campaign through Nationwide Children’s Hospital. The goal is to help families address mental health challenges before they become crises. 

Inside Ohio State’s football program, he has built one of the strongest mental health support systems in college sports.

“We have psychiatrists, psychologists, athletic counselors for whatever needs to be put into place,” he told CBS sports. “It’s one of the more masculine things you can do is to show vulnerability.”

Yet even with all his success as a coach and advocate, Ryan Day’s most revealing lesson came from a different experience. And that’s watching his own son go through the recruiting process. That journey reinforced everything he already believed about parenting, trust, and putting young people first.