COLUMBUS, Ohio — Brian Hartline never saw himself leaving Ohio State.

The former Buckeye wide receiver from 2005-08 saw Columbus as home.

"I have a strong passion here,” Hartline said in November. "All I care about is this room. It's my only focus and my sole focus. I'd be lying if I said I would focus outside of that."

Hartline's wide receiver room has been one of the best in the country, recording three All-Americans: first-team members Chris Olave and Garrett Wilson and second-team member Jaxon Smith-Njigba.

In 2022, Hartline's role as wide receivers coach will not change, recruiting and mentoring some of the best wide receivers in the country for the past four years.

Head coach Ryan Day just increased his responsibility, promoting him to passing game coordinator.

“Brian is a dedicated Ohio State Buckeye,” Day said. “He is the top wide receiver’s coach in college football and he has continued to develop as an offensive coach to the point where we want him to have more of an impact on our offensive game plan. His taking over as passing game coordinator will allow for this.”

The reigning wide receivers coach of the year, Hartline helped lead an Ohio State passing offense that set the Big Ten and college football on fire in 2021, leading the conference with 380.9 passing yards per game, 10 yards per pass attempts and 46 touchdowns, along with a 70.6% completion rate: second to Purdue by .1%.

And its a pass offense that Hartline has helped continue to build in his wide receiver room.

Despite both Wilson and Olave deciding to sit out the Rose Bowl, the 35-year-old assistant coach had multiple young four- and five-star receivers waiting in the wings to join Smith-Njigba, including freshman Emeka Egbuka, sophomore Julian Fleming and freshman Marvin Harrison Jr., who brought in his first three career touchdown passes against Utah.

This is a room that just continues to get stronger, bringing in four receivers — four-star Caleb Burton, four-star Kyion Grayes, four-star Kaleb Brown and four-star Kojo Antwi — in the 2022 recruiting class.

For Hartline, this has developed into the norm, replenishing already a seemingly filled room with young talent to be developed later on.

To Ohio State, this is no surprise and, really, is just a stepping stone for what the program views as an important future to the Buckeye offense.