Football coaches like to preach continuity both on and off the field. For Ryan Day, he’s been a consistent winner at Ohio State since taking over the program in 2019. He has an overall regular-season record of 70-10 and 10 bowl game appearances, including two national championship appearances and the big win in 2024 for the national title.
Off the field, Day has had one consistent presence by his side: his wife of 20 years, Christina Spirou, who goes by the name Nina. How has she shaped his journey?
How Long Have Ryan Day and Nina Spirou Been Together?
The two have been best friends since they met in a tee-ball league in New Hampshire when they were six and seven. Almost as if they sprang to life from the White Stripes song “We’re Going to be Friends,” they became best friends.
In an August 2024 interview with Columbus’ WBNS 10TV, Nina said they “grew up about a mile-and-a-half from each other.” They went to the same schools all through elementary, middle, high school, and college, with Nancy relating a story about a note she kept from middle school.
“There was a note we saved — I think I was in 7th grade — that I wrote and I said I was going to marry Ryan,” Nina said. “We’ve always been best friends.”
Both had sports in their blood. Spirou-Day is the daughter of Southern New Hampshire basketball coach Stan Spirou, who led his teams to two NCAA Division II Final Fours in his career.
Day played quarterback through high school, under the future college and professional head coach Chip Kelly at New Hampshire. Day even hired Kelly as his offensive coordinator during the team’s run to a national championship in 2024.
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Spirou earned a degree in communications, and shortly after, she and Day got married in 2005. She decided to focus on keeping the home fires burning while he worked his way up through the college football coaching ranks.
“Within a 15-year span, we moved 11 times,” Nina told WBNS. “In that time, we had three children. So, it was a lot. From the year we got married to probably when we got to Ohio State, every year or every two years, we were moving. It was very unstable for a long time.”
With Ryan fully entrenched as the Buckeyes’ head coach, the days of moving every couple of years seem to be over for now. They enjoy being the first couple in Columbus, Ohio.
