CHICAGO – A year ago nobody would have expected to see a pair of Michigan coaches turning in their Maize and Blue for Scarlet and Gray but sometimes that is just how the coaching profession works.

First-year head coach Ryan Day surprised many involved in the Ohio State vs. Michigan rivalry by looking north when it came time to build his first coaching staff and plucking Greg Mattison and Al Washington away from Jim Harbaugh’s Wolverines.

The tandem have now been part of the Ohio State program for several months and have gone through their first spring practice season with the Buckeyes as the calendar moves rapidly toward training camp and the eventual start of the 2019 season.

Don’t expect there to be any sentimental moments on Harbaugh’s part when the two teams meet at the end of November based on his brief yet pointed answer when asked about the tandem during the recent Big Ten football media days.

“I don't really have any thoughts on that anymore,” Harbaugh said last week. “I'll just refer you back to the comments that I made about I really love our staff at the University of Michigan right now.”

The Ohio State players were just as shocked when they learned that coaches that they had seen on the other side of the rivalry last season were going to be leading their rooms on the defensive side of the ball in 2019.

It did not take anyone on the Ohio State side of things long to embrace the move, however.

Defensive end Jonathon Cooper still will have Larry Johnson leading his position group but now also has another wily veteran in Mattison offering up his expertise.

“I honestly had no idea what was (going to) happen in the offseason,” Cooper said. “When it did happen, I was surprised and a little shocked, but I embrace it. He’s a great coach. He’s an amazing coach with a lot of experience, and I’m excited to have him on the staff.”

Mattison has been coaching college football longer than Ryan Day has been alive and had been with the Wolverines since 2011, in his second stint with Michigan. Mattison was with Ohio State’s biggest rival when the Buckeyes could not solve Michigan and of course recently when the Buckeyes had a stranglehold on the series.

This is not about who Mattison coached before. The players know none of that matters now.

“Him being from ‘The Team Up North’ didn’t really affect us that much because he came to coach us,” Cooper added.

It was an odd moment for everyone the first time that Mattison donned an Ohio State shirt, at least for appearances. The last time that Mattison wore a color that was even close to scarlet was back in the early 90s when he was coaching the D-line at Texas A&M, and that was more of a maroon.

Change is just part of the job, and both the elder statesman Mattison and the younger Washington acclimated quickly to new surroundings and new traditions.

“I feel like they did as soon as they took the job,” Cooper said. “As soon as they stepped on campus. As soon as they spoke to us. There’s the saying, ‘Once a Buckeye, always a Buckeye.’ As soon as they became Buckeyes, we accepted them that way. They’re our family and they’re our coaches, so we’re going to do everything we can to accept them and do what they say.”

After a bit of an off-year in 2018 on the defensive side of the ball, the entire defense is hungry to prove that was the exception and not the new norm.

“We like seeing the plans he has for the defense,” Cooper said. “I think he’s a special coach and I think we’re going to have a special year with him.”