All throughout the offseason, we at Scarlet and Gray Report will start the day by answering a question related to Ohio State football, whether it has to do with the team in 2022, recruiting or looking back at past teams and players.

Al Washington had his ties to Ohio State.

He's from Columbus, going to Bishop Watterson High School. His father, Al Washington Sr., was a linebacker for the Buckeyes from 1977-1980, recording 345 career tackles in his four years.

It seemed destined for Washington to coach at Ohio State, even though his coaching career brought him to Michigan first, helping the Wolverines have the No. 3 overall defense and the No. 2 pass defense in the country in 2018 with all three of his linebackers earning All-Big Ten honors.

So when it came time to rejoin his former Boston College coach and colleague Ryan Day at Ohio State in his first full year as head coach, Washington jumped at the chance.

But after three seasons, Ohio State needed a change. Washington was dismissed as Ohio State's linebackers coach as a new regime arrived: defensive coordinator Jim Knowles, who will take over Washington's position as linebackers coach, safeties coach Perry Eliano and defensive backs coach Tim Walton.

Washington turned down a defensive coordinator position at Tennessee heading into the 2021 season to remain at Ohio State.

Washington leaves the staff along with former Buckeye defensive coordinator Kerry Coombs.

In Washington's first year with the Buckeyes, he seemed to pick up where he left off at Michigan.

Ohio State's defense led the nation in total defense and passing yards allowed in 2019, developing four linebackers into all-conference performers: Malik Harrison, Tuf Borland, Baron Browning and Pete Werner.

Even when the defense struggled mightily in 2020, all four of Washington's linebackers were in the NFL at the start of the 2021 season: Borland, Browning, Werner and Justin Hilliard.

But the struggles started to come in 2021.

Depth became an issue at the linebacker position, after the departure of two members of the room, going into the transfer portal four weeks into the season in Dallas Gant and K'Vaughan Pope, who left the sideline during Ohio State's win against the Zips.

Without Pope or Gant, Washington was left with seven scholarship linebackers to work with, two of which — Reid Carrico and Mitchell Melton — who were unavailable due to injury.

Even before the loss of Gant and Pope, even before the loss of Melton and Carrico, Ohio State's linebackers struggled.

Opposing pass offenses lived in the middle of the field, finding open spots in Ohio State's zone defense consistency, leading to a defense that allowed 246.2 passing yards per game, 6.9 yards per pass attempt and 21 passing touchdowns, along with a 61.6 completion percentage.

The size of the room, along with defensive performance, led to a change from a 4-3 set defense to a 4-2-5 look.

And while the room showed promise for 2022 — another year of development for running back-turned linebacker Steele Chambers, the emergence of Cade Stover as a tight end-turned-linebacker in the Rose Bowl, the tackling machine Tommy Eichenberg became in the Rose Bowl, the development of Arizona State running back transfer DeaMonte Trayanum into a linebacker and the development of five-star CJ Hicks and four-star Gabe Powers in the 2022 class — Washington was not the man for the job.

Jim Knowles is taking over.

Ohio State's new defensive coordinator brought Oklahoma State's linebackers to life over the past three years with the Cowboys, including the emergence of players like Malcolm Rodriguez, who led the team with 123 tackles with 14 tackles-for-loss, and Devin Harper, who had 96 tackles, 11 tackles-for-loss and six sacks.

Knowles coached linebackers for seven years at Duke, while serving as associate head coach and defensive coordinator. He also coached linebackers at Ole Miss in 2003 and Cornell in 1995-96.

With all the room likely coming back for 2022 and with adding additional permanent members such as Stover, Powers, Hicks and Trayanum, it looks like the linebackers room will be the face of the overall change Knowles is set to make for the entire defense.