Substance over style: Jim Tressel is the man behind the Buckeyes' renaissance.

COACH: We know you were born in Mentor, OH, but grew up in Berea. What was your childhood like?

TRESSEL: My dad (the late Lee Tressel) was the head football coach at Mentor High School. We then moved to Massillon, OH, where he took over its nationally famous football program. I went to school--kindergarten through high school--in Berea, where my dad coached Baldwin-Wallace College.

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My entire childhood was built around football. Our house in Berea was next door to the football stadium. My backyard was my dad's workplace.

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COACH: What sports did you play growing up? What kind of athlete were you?

TRESSEL: I played football, basketball, and baseball in high school. I was kind of an average athlete. In college, I played football for my dad at Baldwin-Wallace and enjoyed it. I then headed out into the coaching world.

COACH: When did you know that you wanted to make coaching your vocation?

TRESSEL: I think it was during my senior year of high school. I was trying to make some decisions and I was considering the [military] academies. I wasn't sure what route I wanted to go. I finally decided that I would rather teach and coach. In fact, all through college I felt I was going to coach high school football. But it didn't work out that way.

COACH: Your father, who won 34 straight games at Mentor High before becoming head coach at Massillon, was a huge influence in your coaching career. Who were some of your other coaching mentors?

TRESSEL: I was fortunate to work for some great guys. In my 11 years as an assistant coach, I worked for Jim Dennis at the University of Akron, who gave me my start by hiring me as a graduate assistant and then as a full-time staff member. I certainly got a great deal of my foundation from him.

I also learned a lot from Tom Reed at Miami of Ohio and Dick McPherson at Syracuse.

We went to Syracuse as part of a brand new staff, and it was a tremendous experience watching Dick build a winning program from scratch. After that I worked at Ohio State for Earl Bruce.

It is astonishing to learn how much you can derive from rolling up your sleeves with the guys you work with from day to day. You learn how to devise your own system and how to approach all the problems that go with coaching. If you're lucky, you then get a chance to try and do it on your own.

COACH: You mentioned your tenure at Miami of Ohio, which has been called the "Cradle of Coaches." Paul Brown, Weeb Ewbank, Ara Parsegehian, Woody Hayes, and Bo Schembechler, among others, honed their craft there. What is it about that program that has spawned such great coaches?

TRESSEL: There's a real strong feeling about education at Miami. It goes all the way back to the McGuffy Readers (the fabled reading instruction books from the early 1800's).

I don't know exactly how Miami became an incubator for outstanding coaches. But it is a great school to experience--a place that believes strongly in teaching, academics, and the culture of football.

COACH: What accounts for Ohio's passion for football on the collegiate and scholastic levels?

TRESSEL: Football is a major part of the states' psyche--a traditional Friday night rallying of communities and the excitement of beginning the new school year. It's very important culturally.

I think a lot of it has to do with pro football, the early years of the Cleveland Browns and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton. Football is part of the youth experience and all the years that follow.

COACH: You are a coach who has worked his way up the ladder the old- fashioned way: with hard work and determination. What words of advice do you have for coaches on the lower levels who are hopeful of making it to the Division 1 ranks?

TRESSEL: The first thing I would advise is to never short-change yourself at whatever level you are coaching.

Coaching is all about how many kids you can impact and what you can do about promoting your school and your community. The impact that the middle school coach, or that high school coach, or Division III college coach has is vital. I watched my dad have impact in tremendous ways. When you get to a level like ours, obviously the realm at which you can impact might be larger in numbers but maybe no larger in effect of what you can do.

I like to tell coaches to be patient, to feel good about whatever level they are coaching, and keep the focus on the kids.

COACH: Tell us about the dream team you had at Youngstown State in 1994? Many people believe it was one of the best teams in the country at any level. What made that team so great?

TRESSEL: We were undefeated national champions. We had a lot of veterans, probably 25 seniors who had played in four championship games, and we were very fortunate to come from Youngstown, Ohio. It is a good, hardnosed town that cares about its football.

The university was kind of a shining star during a tough time. The city lost 42,000 jobs in one year back in the 70's when the steel mills were shut down. As we began to rebuild that region, the university was a huge part of it. People rallied around the good things our kids were doing. It was a great place to be. I enjoyed every one of the 15 years I spent there.

COACH: You were the head coach and athletic director at Youngstown State. How difficult was it to juggle dual roles?

TRESSEL: It was difficult. I had made some calls to guys who were doing it or had done it, like Joe Paterno at Penn State, John Mackovic at Illinois, and Roy Kidd at Eastern Kentucky. They all said it was doable. It was really healthy, because it gave you a broader perspective of where your program fit amidst the rest. And they all gave me the advice that I wouldn't be able to do it forever.

There are two reasons why: Number one is time. To do a good job at both, you just don't have time. The number two problem, I felt, was that as time went on, you could see that you probably weren't doing as good a job at either as you would have liked. I think for a short run--and according to the needs of the school at moment--it was very healthy for me.

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COACH: Having initially coached at Youngstown State, explain the difference in recruiting the first time you walked into a recruit's home as head coach at OSU?

TRESSEL: Obviously, there is a big difference. I had been an assistant at Ohio State and then became the head coach at Youngstown State. All of a sudden, some places that I could talk to the top recruit, I couldn't go anymore. But that's the reality of the level of coaching. It still comes down to the fact that I think when you walk in to talk to a recruit, or his family, or his high school coach, or his guidance counselor, they have to be assured that you will care about the young person.

That's what I learned most from my dad: That you have to care about every person, and if you'll build your program around care, you'll have a chance to succeed.

COACH: How do you maintain relationships with high school coaches? Are you hands on or do you tend to delegate that task to your assistants?

TRESSEL: The recruiting windows are so much smaller than they used to be. But I'm out there recruiting every time I'm allowed to be in the high schools.

We have a big high school clinic on campus every year that draws about 1,100 or 1,200 coaches. We also keep our doors open during spring practice. Plus, the Ohio State Coaches Association has a big clinic of its own in Columbus, with about 2,000 coaches. Over the summer, we have a youth camp. Our 2004 camp attracted a little over 4,000 kids and we brought in 250 coaches to work with us.

We try to serve the coaches' needs and train their people. We want to make sure that they know we're here to serve as the flagship school in Ohio and serve the game of football and the coaches.

COACH: What did you learn from the Maurice Clarett situation and how has that changed your approach to recruiting?

TRESSEL: It probably hasn't changed my approach to recruiting at all. I believe it increases everyone's awareness of how many challenges are out there and how many people outside of your program will ply your players with poor advice. All of this intensifies our problems and makes it harder to counsel the kinds on making good decisions and aligning themselves with the right people.

COACH: What is your greatest coaching attribute? And what do you feel you have to improve upon?

TRESSEL: I have to improve upon a lot of things because the game changes so fast. If you wanted to write a football book, it would probably be obsolete by the time you completed it. The kids also change, though most of what they are about doesn't. It's the little nuances that create problems and cause changes.

I think we have put together a staff of coaches who care about the kids and know the game--people who have kept up with the changes and the evolution of the game. I think we have done a good job of making sure they know we care about all the phases of their life. I think our players will produce in the classroom, on the field, and in the community a lot better if we keep letting them know what is important. And I think our staff does.

COACH: What is your take on Internet recruiting sites and do they benefit coaches and college football as a whole?

TRESSEL: We have graduate assistants who keep a little bead on what's going on out there and take note of the misconceptions.

A young man may talk to an Internet reporter and tell him he's being recruited by Ohio State. And he might not be.

Or it could go the other way. He might say he hasn't heard from Ohio State and he really wants to. So we keep abreast of what's going on.

Does it help the kids? I'm not sure that it does. I think it's one more thing that takes them away from the task at hand--all the Internet reporters and recruiting services that call them on the phone and interrupt their studies, social life, their rest, time with their families, or their training. I'm not sure that kids need any more on their plate.

COACH: You are a coach who is a stickler for academic results. In fact, the GPA of your players at Youngstown State during your last two seasons was 3.0 or better during the fall semester. How much do you stress the importance and relevance of succeeding in the classroom?

TRESSEL: It's huge. No matter how good the player, he is not going to play football forever. We want to maximize his academic potential while we have him.

Hopefully, the players will have found something they are passionate about and that they will enjoy doing the rest of their lives. And an academic background and training for that is critical.

We have worked at that. Our GPA continues to rise at Ohio State. I think our cumulative team GPA is 2.8, which is pretty darn good. We've had the most Academic All-Big Ten players two years in a row (2002-03). So we're doing some good things and it's so crucial.

COACH: How would you describe your coaching methodology? Also, what are your offensive and defensive philosophies?

TRESSEL: I think it starts with, "What can your players do?" As coaches, we can't get caught up in saying, "OK, here's my system. Young man, see if you can fit into it."

I think it should go the other way around. It's bringing in good, quality people who can play football. Working hard to figure out what they do best. And then building your system around that.

For instance, in my 15 years at Youngstown State, we had five different quarterbacks go to the national championship game, and they were all different. They did different things and ran different schemes. Yes, there were some fundamentals that were the same, but I think you really need to focus on the special talents of each player. We do that offensively, defensively, and on special teams.

We're an aggressive, pressure-defensive football team with the onus on speed. It's fairly complicated. Yet, we want to play fast. So it has to be simple.

Offensively, we want to be balanced. Our goal is to rush for 200 yards every game and throw for 250.

As for what schemes we use, we go all the way from two backs, two tights, and a flanker to no backs and five wides. In this day and age, you have to do a bit of all of it because, first, you need to attack people in different ways and, second, you need to attack your own defense in practice to prepare them.

COACH: You have brought a renewed spirit to Ohio State football. Among other things, you have players stay on field after games to recite the school fight song. Do you feel your actions have galvanized the program?

TRESSEL: There are a lot of things that we try to do to ensure the kids have the total experience at Ohio State. We talked about the academics and we do a lot community service, too. I think it's important that our players get to partake in some of those traditions that our fans and graduates talk about for the rest of their lives.

There were some things that our staff decided we wanted to be a part of. Obviously, we can't be involved in all of them. We can't go out and watch "Script Ohio" at halftime and things like that, because we are busy. But the things that we can be a part of, we want our players to remember.

COACH: Have you ever had the urge to dot the I during "Script Ohio"?

TRESSEL: No, no (laughter). Because that means you are retired or you're fired. So I just assume not.

Interview By Kevin Newell