by Leprechaun Express & Steve Welsh
“… Remember when Kelly’s face turned purple as he undressed a quarterback after a foolish turnover? He wants Book to be more willing to roll the dice with downfield flings. That’s one change at Notre Dame, where the vibe is unlike previous fall camps. The Irish are coming off back-to-back seasons of 10 or more wins for the first time since Lou Holtz prowled the sidelines. Both coordinators are in place. There’s a new indoor facility. The strength program is, well, strong. And they have a terrific — and prudent — returning quarterback. …”
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Resurgent Notre Dame rides a 5-1 bubble that has fans and click-hungry media thinking big. Yet strength of schedule is about to go from padded to rock solid.
Heading into the season Notre Dame was a 4-8 ball club, diving into a 12-game regular season featuring 11 teams that made bowls the previous year. The one opponent who had missed bowl season still beat Notre Dame last year and went to the College Football Playoff just two years ago.
So, absent improvement, the Irish did not necessarily have much of an argument as to why, in particular, they could win any one of their 12 games.
What happened next was that, in the first half of the season Notre Dame ended up playing four teams who currently have losing records … only one team ranked when the Irish played them … and one more team with a winning record, unranked at the time, yet ranked now.
At 5-1, Notre Dame fans and the media have lapsed into a predictable blend of overhype and “hope-springs-eternal,” “sky’s-the-limit,” starry-eyed optimism.
(There is even the cringe-worthy habit of celebrating the right kind of loss. The gushy, almost non-apologetic trumpeting of Notre Dame losing by one point to Georgia might be the most head-scratching celebration of defeat since the institution gave Charlie Weis a massive contract extension for losing to USC.)
Looking at it another way, Notre Dame is 0-1 against ranked opponents, 1-1 against teams with winning records, 1-1 against teams currently ranked and 4-0 against teams with a losing record. (To be fair, one of the latter was sitting at .500 until Notre Dame beat them.)
So Notre Dame has played four teams that went from being a bowl team in 2016 to having a losing record. After the fears of a 4-12 Notre Dame potentially going winless, the Irish ended up with a surprisingly well-padded first half of the season.
(Now, to be fair, Notre Dame never pads its schedule as much as a lot of other programs. For example, Notre Dame is one of a very small number of Div. I-A/FBS programs that has never played an opponent from Div. I-AA/FCS. And it is not even that common for Notre Dame to play a team from outside the “Power 5” conferences, mostly with the exception of service academy teams, whom the SEC, of all people, usually rates as Power 5-quality.)
In a big mid-season pendulum swing, Notre Dame, in the second half of the schedule, faces six teams with winning record, including no fewer than four nationally ranked opponents out of six. A fifth team was ranked just last week, and another unranked team has a strong record.
While the Irish deserve some credit for strengthening their quality of play on multiple tracks, they are about to confront a stunning about-face with regard to strength of opposition.
And one pesky detail from the highly-touted defeat to Georgia was that Notre Dame’s supposedly vaunted rushing attack was limited to 55 yards rushing, by the only ranked opponent that was ranked when they played them.
Notre Dame showed that they do not, in fact, have an elite running game. By comparison, when Notre Dame had an elite running game decades ago under Lou Holtz, they would rip off solid yards per play against most elite opponents.
There are a few other problems. One is that Notre Dame does not really have a quarterback. They have a rookie starter in Brandon Wimbush who is inconsistent and plays more like an all-purpose athlete with strong-armed heaves, whose main virtue has been the ability to avoid turnovers. Ian Book showed himself to be a better quarterback, yet failed to avoid turnovers.
The ground game showed itself to be good enough to pad its stats against weaker opponents. But even there, there were issues. The running backs do not have blazing speed, or they would not have been run down from behind by Boston College. The offensive line is not dominant, or they would have had strong production on every down. Instead, Notre Dame padded its stats with individual plays where everything came together in a perfect confluence of events, but their averages on most other plays were not that great, after taking out the big plays. Are some of the players “taking a play off” here and there, a terminology NFL scouts sometimes use?
Historically, one can recall Notre Dame having opponents with similar stat-padding, such as service academy teams. In the past, when Notre Dame was an elite program, it was not unheard of for a service academy team to have huge rushing stat numbers, and be among the nation’s rushing leaders, as Notre Dame is now, but then came up against an elite Notre Dame and see the stats come down. That, of course, is what happened when Notre Dame played Georgia. Except a Navy or Air Force seeing their top-5 rushing stats come down against a Lou Holtz-coached Notre Dame team did not get limited to 55 yards, like Notre Dame did in their impotent performance against Georgia.
If the early season pattern holds, then Notre Dame would lose half their games against remaining opponents with winning records. That would mean, at best, finishing 8-4, a decent turnaround, and on track for the trademark Brian Kelly 8-5 that threatens to make him the Mike Brey of Notre Dame football, if — and it’s a big if — Brian Kelly can improve his performance in the post-season to be as strong as Brey’s has now become.
If Notre Dame continues to be winless against ranked opponents, if the 0-1 turns into 0-5 against ranked opponents, then they would finish, at best, 7-5, Ty Willingham territory.
One interesting added twist is that the unexpectedly padded early season, the unexpected front-loading of easier opponents, combined with the massive offseason coaching staff upheaval, made it harder to envision a scenario in which Notre Dame might announce at mid-season that Brian Kelly would be replaced.
These days, elite programs, or programs with the desire to return to elite status, do not engage in the last-minute firing-and-hiring spectacle that Notre Dame followed with the transitions from Bob Davie to George O’Leary to Tyrone Willingham, the transition from Willingham to Charlie Weis, or the transition from Weis to Kelly. The idea of firing a coach at the beginning of December and scrambling to back their way into hiring a George O’Leary within days or weeks is just not part of the big time.
Following the patterns set, from time to time, by schools like LSU, USC or Florida, Notre Dame would have to start transitioning at mid-season, or earlier, with an interim coach, coach-in-waiting, or some other arrangement with a longer lead time.
Historically, by comparison, one of Notre Dame’s best coaching hires, Ara Parseghian, reportedly took the initiative to call Notre Dame because Hugh Devore had been given an interim status, to serve as a bridge to a new hire. So, a half-century ago, Notre Dame showed some initiative and innovation with their coaching transition, gave themselves a long lead-time, and it paid off.
Of course, it is difficult to envision Notre Dame doing what USC did to Lane Kiffin, when A.D. Pat Haden drove to the airport to fire Kiffin on the tarmac next to the team bus after a late-night loss. That move, of course, was followed by elevating Ed Orgeron, who already was on staff, and already had head coaching background, in the SEC no less.
Yet it still bears noting that, presumably as an unintended side effect, Kelly’s revamping of the assistant coaching staff meant there no Ed Orgeron’s on staff at Notre Dame, no assistant coaches of experience and stature suitable to being an interim head coach for half a season on so big a stage.
Be that as it may, the padded schedule earlier in the season was a pure gift for Brian Kelly. Unless Notre Dame can show strong improvement, and unless they demonstrate the ability to beat ranked opponents, one might surmise a different scenario had the two halves of the season been flipped.
If the final six teams had come first, would Notre Dame be looking at something like a 2-4 record right now? Would the same team, with the same coach and the same players, be sitting at 2-4, just because the schedule was different? Coming off the 4-8 meltdown, then going 2-4, would have meant coaching change war drums beating loudly.
Yet now, even if Notre Dame has yet another Big Skid under Brian Kelly, they lose just a little bit of the current PR fluff at a time, then end up in a minor bowl again, like when they hung tough with Florida State then went into the tank for the entire second half of the season several years ago.
The situation presents a test of character for the Irish, and time will tell whether, or how much, they get exposed for being a little less elite than the wildly inflated College Football Playoff talk might suggest.
The gift of an inflated 5-1 record should inspire much-needed improvement and greater playing intensity, to seize the tremendous opportunity that the inflated record presents. Yet the program still has yet to demonstrate that it can actually turn the corner and return to elite status, and they might simply not have the personnel or the character to do what they need to do, to avoid the skid. Time will tell.
Brian Kelly talks to reporters after Notre Dame’s victory over Miami of Ohio
Already the usual fluffy hype has begun, including the “woulda-coulda-shoulda” excuse-making that tries to celebrate a Notre Dame loss, because it was close and to a good opponent that might rise in the rankings. Heading into their game with Miami of Ohio, Notre Dame is, indeed, 3-1. And, like Gerry Faust, Kelly has Notre Dame floating in and out of the rankings. Yet, to look at it another way, Notre Dame is 0-1 against teams then-barely ranked in the top 15, they are 1-1 at home and they are 3-0 against teams that are unranked. Their three victories come against teams with a combined record of 5-6.
Kelly’s Lads now will show whether they can avoid coming out flat against a Miami of Ohio team that does not sound like a big name, yet is the Cradle of Coaches and is 8-3 across their last 11 games, including a bowl loss to an SEC opponent. Coming out flat is a not-uncommon occurrence under Brian Kelly, in an era pock-marked by close games where a Brian Kelly team played down to the level of the opposition, lapsed into a dogfight against a weaker or middling opponent and sometimes did not pull out the win.
Former Notre Dame assistant coach (and former Notre Dame player) Skip Holtz once brought a middling South Florida team (one that finished with a losing record that year) into Notre Dame Stadium and spanked Notre Dame with a three-point Bulls victory. Like Skip Holtz, Miami of Ohio Head Coach Chuck Martin is a former Notre Dame assistant, indeed the offensive coordinator during the only season in the Brian Kelly era where Notre Dame showed signs of almost returning to elite status. So, as a former Notre Dame assistant, Martin will by no means be intimidated by the stadium or the hype and supposed mystique.
Yet, for Kelly, Martin is a much worse scenario, since Martin has had longstanding association with Kelly himself. The situation is a bit more like when Notre Dame basketball coach Mike Brey goes up against Duke and Mike Krzyzewski.
Brey was a Duke assistant during Duke’s greatest heyday and has gradually morphed into a bit of a nemesis for Duke as Notre Dame head coach. That presumably is due to some combination of Brey’s basic ability, his lack of awe for his old stomping grounds and his familiarity with Krzyzewski and Coach K’s system and tendencies.
Kelly may have relinquished offensive play-calling, and his new coordinators may have tweaked things. Yet Notre Dame still is a Brian Kelly program, and Chuck Martin’s familiarity with Kelly goes way back to the small college level (where, incidentally, Martin, as a head coach, matched Kelly’s small college national championship tally).
In a stroke of poetic symmetry, Chuck Martin and Miami of Ohio warmed up for Notre Dame by blowing out Central Michigan last week, Brian Kelly’s former ball club where Kelly first broke into Div. I-A/FBS a little more than a decade ago.
Expect to see Notre Dame to have a marginal size and talent advantage, and try to ride their running game, uneven as it is, to some kind of plodding advantage. However, also expect to see Miami play harder, and Notre Dame potentially to be a bit flat. And remember, even in the games where Notre Dame won by multiple scores this year, things stayed even for a while. Against Michigan State, Notre Dame was even decisively outgained, and only acquitted themselves by seizing opportunities when the Spartans beat themselves with a rash of turnovers.
The law of averages might come back to bite Notre Dame on the neck, if their sporadic quarterback play produces some turnovers. And expect Chuck Martin to have his underdog ballclub to at least play with discipline and intensity.
So we might, indeed, see Notre Dame in a dogfight for at least part of the game, and
for that dogfight to drag on if Notre Dame has had a cozy week believing their own press clippings, and come out flat. Expect Miami to have a chance to win if Notre Dame starts making mistakes and committing turnovers while Miami plays disciplined and plays hard.
But is this a must-win game? Probably.
If Notre Dame loses, they take a 3-2 record into a road game in the Carolinas during hurrican season, against a North Carolina team easy to underestimate with a lulling record, who nevertheless hung within one or two touchdowns of multiple strong opponents. That’s followed up by a game against an elite Southern Cal and tough games against North Carolina State, at Miami of Florida, home against Wake Forest, and on the road against Navy and Stanford.
So if Notre Dame gets upset by Chuck Martin and Miami of Ohio, and falls to 3-2, even if they manage to rebound with a win at North Carolina — not at all a given — they could then find themselves struggling to stay above .500 against a slate of six opponents across the second half of the season who each have the ability to beat Notre Dame.
The Irish are still three wins away from bowl eligibility. One of the most embarrassing factors to emerge last season was not simply that Notre Dame went into the tank at 4-8, or that they curled up in a ball against Southern Cal once things started to go against them (in stark contrast to what the 4-6 Notre Dame team under Lou Holtz who staged an inspired rally to beat a ranked Southern Cal in the Coliseum to close out Holtz’s first season). What was even more embarrasing was the realization that, setting aside all that PR hype about academics, Notre Dame went into that game knowing that they were not, at all, guaranteed a bowl bid exception even if they climbed to a 5-7 record. There has been no indication that they have improved their academic standing, by the actual NCAA measures that count, to go to a bowl at 5-7 (although the number of bowls has proliferated so much, who knows).
If Notre Dame can find a way to win against Miami of Ohio and Chuck Martin, and somehow avoid hurricanes and take care of business at North Carolina, they would at least be one win away from bowl eligibility before heading into the murderer’s row gauntlet of those final six games.
If they lose to Miami of Ohio, in addition to the mathematical implications, that could invoke yet another Brian Kelly tendency — the skid. In addition the the “Flat Game” tradition there’s the tradition of “The Skid.” Losing to Miami of Ohio, then heading to hurricane-ridden Carolinas against a North Carolina team that hung within 5 points of Cal, within 12 points of Louisville and within 10 points of Duke would not bode well for Notre Dame avoiding The Skid.
And, as mentioned, Notre Dame is 0-1 against teams in the top-15. In that final stretch of six opponents, two are ranked in the top-15 and several more should be at least top-25, five of the six are getting votes in the polls. The only opponent in that final stretch who is not getting votes yet is undefeated and has beaten Notre Dame multiple times in the past decade.
A must-win game is a game that helps if you win, and can have a catastrophic impact if you lose.
So is Notre Dame’s match-up with Miami of Ohio a must-win game for Notre Dame?
Probably.
Brian Kelly talks to reporters at his Tuesday press conference heading into Notre Dame’s upcoming home game against Miami of Ohio
On “Inside Notre Dame Football,” Brian Kelly and Jack Nolan take a look at Notre Dame Football’s unfolding season, after the Irish victory over Michigan State in East Lansing and looking ahead to Notre Dame’s upcoming game against Miami of Ohio at Notre Dame Stadium.
Brian Kelly Post-Game Press Conference After Notre Dame Victory Over Michigan State
Brian Kelly talks to reporters after Notre Dame’s win over Boston College in Chestnut Hill
A must-win game, loosely speaking, is a game that helps if you win, but can be disastrous if you lose. A rebuilding Notre Dame team with question marks hanging over its head has such a game against Boston College in Chestnut Hill. And Boston College, in recent decades, has turned into a bitter rivalry and the Eagles usually hand the Irish a dogfight.
Coming off last year’s 4-8 debacle, Notre Dame teeters at 1-1 after a strong win over unranked Temple and a somewhat anemic, excruciating 1-point loss to a Georgia team barely in the top-15.
As with last year’s early skid, and other snowballing moments during the Brian Kelly tenure, momentum is everything, along with the need to take care of business with the win-loss bottom line.
There would be a world of a difference between 1-2 and 2-1 as Notre Dame then heads on to what promises to be a wild primetime tilt against rival Michigan State in Spartan Stadium, followed by a match-up against a resurgent Miami of Ohio. And, courtesy of the ACC, will Notre Dame have yet another hurricane game in the Carolinas when they head to Chapel Hill to face the Tar Heels?
Despite a downturn of their own last year, the Spartans still managed to beat Notre Dame, and are still a strong national program that went to the college football playoff two years ago. Miami of Ohio, in addition to going to a bowl last year, is coached by former Brian Kelly assistant Chuck Martin, who matched Brian Kelly’s two small college national championships as a head coach at Grand Valley State. Time will tell, whether Chuck Martin will pose the same threat to Brian Kelly as, by comparison, Mike Brey poses to Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski in basketball. At the very least, Chuck Martin will not be intimidated by either Notre Dame or Brian Kelly, and will have strong familiarity with Brian Kelly’s past systems and tendencies.
Even if Notre Dame plays well, if they cannot get past Boston College, a 1-2 record could easily snowball to 1-3 after the trip to East Lansing, and Miami of Ohio could turn into Brian Kelly’s Waterloo, a pivotal moment at about the same time in the season when, by comparison, last year, LSU fired a 2-2 Les Miles.
There are multiple wild cards at work with Notre Dame vs. Boston College.
The Catholic connection is not as big an issue as some observers might think, especially since both institutions have been criticized by actual devout Catholics for not being faithful enough to the Faith, or being unduly secularized in various respects.
However, the series, in recent decades, turned into a sometimes-bitter, hard-fought rivalry where one can often “throw out the records” and expect a dogfight. (Of course, this year, both teams have the same record at 1-1, although they followed different paths to get there.)
The intensity of the rivalry dates back to the 1990s when, after Notre Dame humiliated a top-10 Boston College team with a massive blowout, Boston College returned the favor the following year by knocking a Lou Holtz-coached Notre Dame team out of what could have been a consensus national championship. In Tyrone Willingham’s first season, the Eagles handed Notre Dame their first loss on a fluke play, after Notre Dame had beaten Florida State in Tallahassee (although Notre Dame continued the skid with a loss at Southern Cal). A few years ago, a close, low-scoring nature of a Notre Dame win over Boston College knocked Notre Dame out of playoff consideration (although Notre Dame then followed up with a close loss at Stanford).
Even though the teams have not necessarily played every year, and even though many games have been close, the sporadic series also has produced winning streaks, for Boston College and then for Notre Dame.
In the past, some commentators would claim that a number of Boston College players might have preferred to play for Notre Dame, and therefore had something to prove. In any event, apparently the game looms very, very large on Boston College’s radar.
While Boston College is not as big a rival for Notre Dame as, for example, Southern Cal, Notre Dame certainly has to be conscious of the history involved and the solid threat posed by the Eagles, a power conference team from the ACC with strong foundations, talented players, great coaches and a history of success, including a bowl win this past season over a B1G/Big Ten opponent.
And the game, of course, is on Boston College’s home turf in Chestnut Hill. Notre Dame did luck out with having made travel plans to get there early, in part because the game was originally set for a noon start.
If Notre Dame can survive, a 2-1 record could help provide some insurance heading into Michigan State and Miami of Ohio. Even a loss in East Lansing would leave Notre Dame at .500, and they could then buckle down to try to survive Miami of Ohio.
But if Notre Dame limps home at 1-2, with a loss over an unranked opponent, it maximizes perceptions of the potential to drop to 1-3, with a loss to Miami of Ohio a real possibility, and raising questions about Brian Kelly’s future.
A half-century ago, Notre Dame was innovative when they went with an interim coach status for Hugh Devore, a factor that, as the story goes, contributed to them drawing interest from, and landing, Ara Parseghian.
In more recent years, Notre Dame floundered a bit trying to go with the idea of firing a coach in late-November or early-December, then hire a replacement in one or two weeks. Meanwhile, a variety of programs have gone with mid-season firings, mid-season switches to interim-coach arrangements, or other innovations like long-term coach-in-waiting arrangements.
If Notre Dame does end up needing a change at head coach, questions will start to arise about whether Notre Dame will need to do something mid-season, if they start sliding again to 1-3 or 2-3.
Also on the horizon is what seems like an almost perverse insistence by the ACC to schedule Notre Dame in the Carolinas during hurricane season every year. The ACC has Notre Dame playing North Carolina in Chapel at almost the same time that Notre Dame had competitive but disastrous losses at Clemson and N.C. State amidst hurricane weather or something similar. So do not look for much relief on the horizon after the Boston College-Michigan State-Miami of Ohio gauntlet.
And ranked teams like Southern Cal, Miami of Florida and Stanford still await the Irish later in the year.
One curious twist for Notre Dame, a paradox of sorts, is that, with the program rebuilding after the 4-8 catastrophe, and Brian Kelly trying to survive in his job, it’s actually, arguably, the middling games that count the most this year, not the biggest games. If Notre Dame can beat the ranked teams, as they almost did with Georgia, that certainly would help. Yet losses to those teams would doom neither their overall record or Brian Kelly’s survivability. However, failing to take care of business against teams they can beat more readily would be more of a black eye, and would also start tilting the accumulated bottom line with the win-loss record.
It does not help when some of those teams Notre Dame can handle have a big asterisk next to them, starting with Boston College being a bitter rival who always handles Notre Dame a dogfight, and one that is hosting on their home turf.
Brian Kelly and Jack Nolan talk about Notre Dame Football’s unfolding season, following their 1-point game with Georgia and heading into their road trip to Boston College.
“If Notre Dame fires Brian Kelly at some point this season or after it, Saturday night will be framed as the beginning of the end. That would be a narrow interpretation of reality. Kelly entered this season on the hot seat after canning both of his coordinators and losing his starting quarterback early to the NFL draft. It’s possible he started moving toward the end a while ago. But the Fighting Irish gave him a chance to turn things around this season, and a 20–19 loss to Georgia in Week 2 would mark the first sign in 2017 that he was not able to pull it off. …”
Brian Kelly met with reporters on Tuesday to provide updates on Notre Dame Football and preview Notre Dame’s upcoming primetime game against the Georgia Bulldogs.
“Inside Notre Dame Football” with Brian Kelly and Jack Nolan takes a look at Notre Dame Football following the Irish win over Temple and during preparation for Notre Dame’s upcoming game against Georgia.
Brian Kelly post-game press conference after Notre Dame’s season-opening 49-16 win over Temple on Saturday, Sept. 2.
“Based on scuttlebutt, I half-expected Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly to show up 10 minutes late to Tuesday’s news conference because a campus bake sale benefiting the football program delayed him. …”
Brian Kelly talks to reporters previewing Notre Dame’s 2017 season opener against Temple.
“… So a team with an NFL-caliber quarterback in DeShone Kizer, a team that opened the season ranked 10th in the nation, couldn’t win five games because the head coach was … too distracted? This is supposed to pass for an actual excuse? So it wasn’t that an out-of-touch Kelly made awful decisions regarding his staff? Kelly fired defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder after Notre Dame’s 1-3 start and in the offseason brought in a new offensive coordinator, new special teams coach, new strength coach and, according to SI.com’s Pete Thamel, a total of 17 new staffers. My word, can Kelly hire someone to give him a dose of reality? …”
“Following Sunday’s open scrimmage inside Notre Dame Stadium, Fighting Irish head coach Brian Kelly had a few announcements. …”
“Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly said he spent too much time fundraising last season and not enough time overseeing his football team. ‘It f—ed up last year’s team,’ Kelly told Bleacher Report in a story published Thursday. Notre Dame was considered one of the biggest underachievers in football last season. The Irish were ranked No. 10 in the preseason but went 4-8 in 2016, losing seven games in the fourth quarter. …”
“… FootballScoop.com reported Wednesday that ‘Notre Dame would be willing to negotiate an exit from the 6-year extension Kelly signed just last year should the right opportunity arise.’ His name was connected to the Oregon job, which became open Tuesday night after the school fired fourth-year head coach Mark Helfrich. …”
“‘I felt that I was clear with the media following yesterday’s game at USC when I was asked about my desire to be back as the head football coach at Notre Dame, but in light of media reports that surfaced afterward, let me restate my position. I have not been, am not, and will not be interested in options outside of Notre Dame. I’m fully committed to leading this program in the future.'”
“‘Tis’ the season to be climbing upon #Santa’s lap and hoping your wish comes true. In the case of Notre Dame football fans doing so with visions of a new leader for their favorite program in 2017, they need to be very cautious in what they are dreaming of. For if veteran Fighting Irish coach Brian Kelly is pushed out the door (or leaves on his own volition), this is a program that will have a difficult time finding someone that would do a significantly better job than he has. …”
“Following reports from Yahoo! Sports and ESPN that he was exploring other jobs through his representatives, Brian Kelly released an overnight statement to double down on staying with the Irish.”
“… NOTRE DAME: Though Brian Kelly said unequivocally that he would be back … and has publicly had the support of athletics director Jack Swarbrick, school officials were furious about reports over the weekend that his representatives are exploring coaching options for Kelly outside of Notre Dame. … The tension between Notre Dame, Kelly and his agent Trace Armstrong dates to last season when, according to a person with knowledge of the situation, there was at least a conversation on behalf of Kelly with Southern Cal, who ultimately gave the job to Clay Helton. After that, Notre Dame awarded Kelly a six-year extension, and you can’t blame the school for being upset that its loyalty is being repaid less than a year later by rumors that he’s looking to leave. ….”
“… Kelly’s players also backed him after the Irish wrapped up their worst season since Charlie Weis went 3-9 in 2007 with a dreary, waterlogged loss in Los Angeles. …”
“With Brian Kelly’s future at Notre Dame uncertain, it may be time to begin looking for other options to lead the Irish. After a 4-8 season, Notre Dame is faced with their biggest decision since 2010. No one knows whether or not Notre Dame is actively thinking of replacing Brian Kelly. As assumptions fly, many believe he won’t be the Irish’s head coach in 2017, but no one is certain.”
“… At 3:37 a.m. Sunday, Kelly issued a statement disputing such reports. …”
“Brian Kelly is denying reports that he is exploring coaching options beyond Notre Dame. After Notre Dame’s season-ending loss to USC on Saturday dropped the Fighting Irish’s record to 4-8, both Yahoo Sports and ESPN reported Kelly — through his representativeness — had reached out to other college football programs. He may also consider opportunities in the NFL, a source told ESPN.”
“… 2016 is simply when the wheels fell off. Kelly’s deficiencies have been noticeable for some time. The disturbing way in which he completely mishandled the death of student videographer Declan Sullivan and his marked disinterest in the suicide of Lizzy Seeberg weren’t enough to get Notre Dame’s attention. …”
“During one of several embarrassments in a 4-8 season full of them, #NotreDame coach #BrianKelly defended his style by referring to himself in the third person. ‘I’m being Brian Kelly, so if people have a problem with that, then they’re not going to be friends or fans of Notre Dame football,’ Kelly said in mid-October. ‘I’m just going to be who I am.’ Therein lies Notre Dame’s biggest problem … Kelly being Kelly. … Kelly’s hubris stands in the way of Notre Dame restoring its football program to exemplary status from one damaged by academic scandal, an underachieving roster and a coach incapable of looking in the mirror. Everybody knows Notre Dame needs to hire a dynamic defensive coordinator and retool the offense, likely with a new quarterback. But self-improvement poses Kelly’s greatest challenge. …”
“Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick has maintained all season long that coach Brian Kelly would return to South Bend in 2017, but Swarbrick can only guarantee that he has no plans to fire Kelly. He doesn’t know what might be in Kelly’s plans, and according to one report, Kelly’s plans just might involve leaving on his own. Yahoo’s Pat Forde is reporting that Kelly ‘has reached out through representatives to explore coaching options outside Notre Dame.'”
“In a hotel room in California late Saturday night, doubling down on recruiting and auditing the existing spring practice structure, Brian Kelly was eventually nudged out of his cocoon. … ”
“In three words, Brian Kelly expressed his desire to return as Notre Dame’s football coach …. ‘I’ll be back,’ he said with … Jack Swarbrick, nodding and smiling in the audience at the … Coliseum after a 45-27 loss against USC. But when all was said and done with the Irish’s forgettable 4-8 season … more was said than done. Then, in the wee hours of Sunday morning, even more was said about how Kelly does not intend to be done as head coach of the Irish. In a tweet sent after 2 a.m., the school released a statement in wake of a Yahoo report … suggesting Kelly had been putting out feelers for other jobs. …”
“Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly says he is ”fully committed” to staying at the school after the Fighting Irish finished with their second-worst record in five decades. An embarrassing 45-27 loss to USC left Notre Dame with a 4-8 mark. Kelly stated his intentions in a statement released by the school early Sunday ….”
“Inside Notre Dame Football” with Brian Kelly, Jack Nolan and Notre Dame players, after the conclusion of Notre Dame’s 2016 campaign.
“Notre Dame finished this season with a 4-8 record, its worst mark since 2007, leaving head coach Brian Kelly’s future with the program up in the air. ….”
“Just a year ago, Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly nearly made the college football playoff. However, he sits in a much different position currently, after a disappointing 4-8 season. While The Fighting Irish were still reeling from a 45-27 loss at USC, it was reported first by Yahoo, and later by ESPN, that Kelly’s representatives were exploring options for the coach aside from being on the sidelines in South Bend next season.”
Brian Kelly met with reporters after Notre Dame’s season-ending game against Southern Cal in the Los Angeles Coliseum.
“… This will be the fourth of Kelly’s seven seasons that the Irish finish outside of the AP Top 25. The negative energy burdening some of those teams has been palpable, and an obvious problem. …”
“#NotreDame football coach #BrianKelly is exploring options through his representatives to possibly leave the Fighting Irish program, a source said Saturday. Kelly’s representatives have had contact with other universities, a source told ESPN. Yahoo! Sports first reported Kelly’s interest in the possibility of leaving Notre Dame. ….”
“By The Numbers … 2 Losing seasons suffered by Brian Kelly in his 26 years as a college head coach. His first year at Central Michigan in 2004 produced a 4-7 mark, and his seventh at Notre Dame resulted in a worse 4-8. … 3 Teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision, since the divisions were established in 1978, that still have never played a Football Champions Series opponent (formerly lower than Division 1-A): Notre Dame, USC and UCLA. …”
“Brian Kelly’s worst season at Notre Dame took an embarrassing turn … the NCAA announced that academic misconduct orchestrated by a student athletic trainer will cost the storied program all 21 victories from the 2012-13 seasons, including the 12-0 run that vaulted the Fighting Irish into the national championship game against Alabama. … just the fourth time the NCAA has cited Notre Dame for a major rules violation. … The school ripped the NCAA for its decision to vacate the wins and immediately said it would appeal. … The Division I Committee on Infractions panel also put Notre Dame on probation for a year and ordered a $5,000 fine, penalties the school agreed with. There were no bowl or scholarship punishments. … Kelly … said he doesn’t believe he has any culpability in the case and has no reason to believe he won’t be back as Notre Dame’s coach next season. …”
“Notre Dame will be forced to vacate victories in the 2012 and 2013 football season due to NCAA violations by a student-trainer.
The NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions panel ruled the trainer violated ethical conduct rules when she committed academic misconduct for two football players by completing their coursework. The two players and another also committed individual academic misconduct, and Notre Dame ruled they violated the school’s academic integrity policy.
The student-trainer also provided six other players with impermissible academic extra benefits in a total of 18 classes. …”
“A former University of #NotreDame student athletic trainer violated #NCAA ethical conduct rules when she committed academic misconduct for two football student-athletes and provided six other #football student-athletes with impermissible academic extra benefits, according to a Division I Committee on Infractions panel. One additional football student-athlete committed academic misconduct on his own.
The panel prescribed one year of probation, a two-year show-cause order and disassociation for the former student trainer, and a $5,000 fine for the university. During that time, if a member school hires the former student trainer in an athletically related position, she and the school must appear before a Committee on Infractions panel. ….”
“The NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions (COI) is an independent administrative body of the NCAA comprised of individuals from the Division I membership and the public. The committee decides infractions cases involving member institutions and their staffs.1
This case involved academic violations in the football program at the University of Notre Dame. A panel of the committee considered this case through the cooperative summary disposition process in which all parties agreed to the primary facts and violations, as fully set forth in the summary disposition report (SDR). The panel proposed further penalties to the institution, including vacation of team records. The institution challenged the appropriateness of the proposed vacation of team records at an expedited penalty hearing. The institution has the opportunity to appeal that penalty. ….”
Brian Kelly hosts his radio show heading into Notre Dame’s match-up with Virginia Tech, featuring Brian Kelly, Jack Nolan and Notre Dame players.
Brian Kelly talks to reporters after Thursday practice heading into Notre Dame’s game against Virginia Tech.
“… just eight ND players who will run out of the tunnel … are exhausting their eligibility …. Only six of them came to Notre Dame as recruited high school prospects. … Increasingly, a share of the elite seniors on a five-year track and true juniors are going to cannonball into the NFL Draft pool early. … of the 13 ND three-and-out juniors in the 26 years the NFL Draft rules have allowed them, eight have happened [under] Brian Kelly … and five have come in the past three drafts. … those blocked on the depth chart by younger players often will seek grad transfers or will put the “40-year decision” mantra to work before their NCAA clock elapses. … on top of that, there’s … medical hardships, transfers and dismissals.”
“On the whole, #NotreDame hasn’t gotten the job done on the field this season. But the Irish’s 4-6 record doesn’t mean coach Brian Kelly will be without one once the season ends. … Nonetheless, barring a sweep of the final two games — Saturday against Virginia Tech and Nov. 26 at USC — this will be the first season Kelly won’t finish with a winning record at Notre Dame. …”
“Today, Notre Dame is 4-6 — and yet there were inquiries during head coach Brian Kelly’s weekly press conference about whether the team would be receptive to going to a bowl game, even with a possible 5-7 record. … ‘I haven’t given it much thought, to be honest with you,’ replied Kelly when asked if the school would play in a bowl with a 5-7 mark. “I think those scenarios I would address at the end of the year.’ …”
“Virginia Tech has a very good football team. Justin Fuente, head football coach and Bud Foster, the defensive coordinator, put together a very good year, some really good wins; North Carolina I really thought probably as complete a game as they played all year. Turned the ball over a few times, but a really good football team. Defensively it’s what you expect from Bud Foster’s team, they keep the pressure on you.
Experience in the back end of their defense I think is the key to their defense, returning starters across the board can play man, can mix it up, play some zone coverages. They’ve lost some guys up front, but Eron and Edmunds, extremely productive tackles. What you see with Virginia Tech is negative plays. And most offenses get into long yardage and Virginia Tech is one of the best in the country on third down. ….”
Brian Kelly meets with reporters after Notre Dame’s 44-6 victory over Army in San Antonio.
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: “…. ‘I talk mostly about Notre Dame, and where does he want to be as it relates to the Notre Dame quarterbacks?’ Kelly said. ‘Most quarterbacks are judged by not their numbers, but by their wins. And we’re all, right now, 3-6.’ ….”
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: Brian Kelly talks with Jack Nolan and Notre Dame players, and covers the latest in Notre Dame football as the Irish prepared for West Point.
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: “… Junior linebacker Greer Martini is a player that is suited to play against the triple option. He thrived in last week’s game against Navy, and should again play a major role this week against Army. ….”
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: “… 5 Brian Kelly – Notre Dame: The Irish will have a hard time finishing this season with four wins. Kelly might have received a vote of confidence from his athletic director, but coaches in good standing don’t need that. It’s awfully hard to justify three wins…
“… immersed in … the worst of his 27 seasons as a … head coach, it would be easy for … Brian Kelly to make wholesale changes within his program. He did so last month by firing … Brian VanGorder, but from a personnel standpoint, Kelly has decided to stay the course even after losing for the sixth time in nine games …. ‘If you look at the six games that we’ve played,’ Kelly said, ‘what needs to change is a little bit better play calling here, maybe a little bit better execution there, and the players just maturing.’ … To Kelly’s point regarding the ‘maturing’ of his team, the Notre Dame depth chart listed 39 players out of 59 that were either in their first or second season of being on the field. …”
[featured image is file photo]
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL:
“The vision Brian Kelly is selling to recruits of how Notre Dame’s defense will evolve … ‘Quite frankly, we’re going to be in both (3-4 and 4-3 fronts), because I’m not going anywhere,’ he said. ‘So it’s going to be a three-down, four-down defense, and they’re going to have to be somebody that can do both.’ They are the eight defensive recruits already committed in the 2017 class, the four defenders in the 2018 group, and … prospects Kelly and his staff are still chasing [for 2017]. The nuances and even some of the basic tenets of the next scheme … attacking vs. read/react, how much man vs. zone — will and should likely have to wait until Kelly makes perhaps the most momentous hire of his head coaching career, deposed defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder’s permanent replacement. Interim Greg Hudson … remains in the running.”
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: “When Army battles Notre Dame on Saturday, Black Knights head coach Jeff Monken will be looking across the field at a head coach he knew a long time ago. And it can’t help but trigger a trip down Memory Lane.”
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: The Fort Wayne News-Sentinel’s Tom Davis comments:
“Notre Dame is a bad football team. That is the problem. Poor coaching, poor coaching decisions, and poor execution by its players (which is certainly related to the poor coaching) are merely the symptoms. ‘I love the way we compete and play hard,’ Kelly said. ‘We’ve lost six close games that easily could have went our way.’ It is true that Notre Dame has had many opportunities to win games this year in the final minutes. But good teams – well-coached teams – find ways to win games, while poorly coached teams do the opposite. We now have enough data gathered since Labor Day to show that Notre Dame isn’t just a young team that is enduring hard luck, it is a bad team led by a coach that is doing a bad job this year.
#NOTREDAME #FOOTBALL: Brian Kelly met with reporters early in the week as Notre Dame prepared to take on Army.
Brian Kelly spoke with reporters after practice on Thursday, heading into Notre Dame’s game with Navy in Jacksonville on Saturday.
“… Obviously, Ken Niumatalolo and what he’s done at Navy has been well documented. This year they’re already beating a top five team in Houston, a team that we know quite well in terms of playing them over my past six years here. A ton of respect for what they do offensively, defensively, and special teams. So it will be a great challenge for our football team.
They just keep — they keep rolling offensively. They lose their starting quarterback. Will Worth comes in and picks up where they left off. You think they lose Keenan Reynolds and there’s going to be a dropoff, but the production has been unbelievable. I think it’s 500 yards per over the last few games, and 40-something plus, and they’re throwing it even better than they’ve ever thrown it with a multiple offensive formational set. So it’s a challenge for us and one that, you know, obviously will test us. …”
Brian Kelly met with reporters on Tuesday, to preview Notre Dame’s upcoming game against Navy in Jacksonville.
COACH KELLY: Obviously playing a very talented team in Miami. Outstanding athleticism. Mark Richt, I think we all know the respect for Mark and what he’s accomplished in his career. … another challenge that we’re going to have to face in terms of an offense that has some very productive players. Kaaya leads Miami in a lot of categories. But I think he’s established himself more as a very consistent player for them on offense. … Coley … the top pass catcher in Miami of all time. … Very talented corps of running backs, and definitely playing a lot of young players. … Coach D is well-respected in the fraternity as an outstanding coach that gets his players to play really hard, and play hard for four quarters. … a very athletic team, one that we’re very familiar with. Another exciting challenge for our guys to get better. We made some progress. We just haven’t been able to close out games, which has been obviously the story this year. We’re going to. It’s just a matter of time. We’re all frustrated. But the attitude’s been great. Our kids have worked hard. They want to win. We’ll find a way to win one of these games and we’ll keep battling till we get one, and hopefully it’s this weekend. …
… Brian Kelly [on Thursday said] … ‘They’re ready. They just have to break through. They’re doing all the things I’m asking them to do, they just have to go win. It’s going to happen. I would’ve liked that it happened a few weeks ago, and they would’ve as well, but they’re ready to win. … I believe this group is gonna win for a long time. There’s a lot of young players that are growing and learning.’ Kelly said this is Notre Dame’s least experienced football team since 1972. He compared this ND team to his 1999 Grand Valley State team which went 5-5 and then went 48-6 in the next four years, with two national titles.
… every Notre Dame coach has a shelf life. The best and brightest … depart before being pushed. Where does that leave Brian Kelly, coach of the nation’s most underperforming team? It’s doubtful the school would fire him a year after a 10-win season and nine months after he signed an extension through 2021. But perhaps Kelly will realize that it’s just … time. … Given the remaining slate of Stanford, Miami, Navy, Army, Virginia Tech and USC, the Irish will be fortunate to finish 5-7. Will that mark the end of Kelly’s time in South Bend? His departure could be the ‘right thing’ for the program, but he’s not thinking that way. ‘I’m doing everything to build the winning identity for this team for right now and for ’17, ’18 and ’19,’ he said. ‘We want to stop the slide. That means start winning again.’
Notre Dame players on Wednesday disagreed with the notion their head coach was blaming players or throwing them under the bus in a way that was unfair or negatively impacted the locker room. ‘Blame is definitely not the word,’ quarterback DeShone Kizer said. ‘In this game there are 11 guys who are required to do their job … in order for us to go out there and to give a better result than we have in these last six games, you have to challenge guys. And when you guys (the media) sit up here and ask (Kelly) about specifics on guys, he’s going to let you know exactly what happened and in order for us to not up come out successful.’
“… After the game, head coach Brian Kelly was highly critical of his junior center. ‘I’m just extremely disappointed in the offensive execution and lack of ability to manage the snapping of the football,’ Kelly said, ‘which was atrocious.'”
#HurricaneMatthew — which made landfall in South Carolina about 200 miles south of Raleigh — brought torrential, driving rain and winds gusting up to about 50 miles per hour to central North Carolina on Saturday. … as of 8 p.m. E.T., 4.84 inches of rain had fallen in the Raleigh area …. But in spite of those miserable, wretched conditions, DeShone Kizer attempted 26 passes. He completed nine of them for 54 yards with an interception, and #NotreDame lost, 10-3, to N.C. State at Carter-Finley Stadium. … a dour Kelly said he was second-guessing some of the decisions he made … but said he didn’t regret throwing the ball so much in such brutal conditions. … Kelly said he ‘kind of’ considered using Malik Zaire in a run-oriented package, though noted Kizer rushed 15 times …. ‘We don’t have any excuses,’ Kelly said. ‘We were atrocious offensively.’
“The Notre Dame Fighting Irish have dropped three of their last four games following Saturday’s 10-3 loss to North Carolina State, and head coach Brian Kelly had mixed feelings regarding his team’s performance. Speaking to reporters following a loss that came in a steady downpour facilitated by Hurricane Matthew, Kelly lamented his team’s inability to make positive gains against N.C. State’s 35th-ranked scoring defense
Brian Kelly met with reporters on Thursday heading into Notre Dame’s road game at North Carolina State.