Things weren’t exactly quiet in the world of college football over the weekend. While the comments here make it seem highly unlikely many of you missed the important details, if you did step away from your computer to breath, here are a few things you missed.
* The Irish welcomed Nate Montana back to campus and the football team. Montana spent last semester at Pasadena City College, getting actual game experience as a quarterback instead of providing depth on the Irish roster. The season didn’t go all that hot for Montana -- he only completed 35 percent of his passes -- but he got some valuable experience, and will return to campus ready to learn Brian Kelly’s new offense and most likely will get a ton of snaps with quarterback Dayne Crist out.
* Speaking of quarterbacks, as I mentioned earlier this weekend, Notre Dame commit Andrew Hendrix spent his weekend in Gainesville visiting the Florida Gators. According to Ryan Moss of GatorCountry.com (via IrishSportsDaily.com), here are a few of the choice quotes.
“I had a blast. There were a lot of highlights from the trip, but I would say that touring the stadium was pretty special.”
“I spent a lot of time with Coach Loeffler. He was there with me every step of the visit and same with Coach Addazio he was around a lot. Coach Loeffler is a great guy who definitely knows what he is talking about and he is very personable. I’ve been privileged to get to know him over the past few months I also really like Coach Addazio. He is a tough guy but he is also a really fun guy.”
“I did get an opportunity to have dinner with Coach Meyer and his wife, which was a cool experience.”
I’m sure Irish fans will wipe more than a few drips of sweat from their brow, but that’s the recruiting world that we now live in. A kid like Hendrix is probably more confused than anything, (which could explain the complimentary Loeffler comments... Ziing!) and the staff at Florida obviously knows the game when it comes to recruiting Notre Dame commits. It’s tough to look at either depth chart and think that Florida is the better place, but best of luck to Hendrix, wherever he decides to attend college.
* Speaking of quarterbacks, a few weeks ago, I heard some rumors that Kelly and his staff were looking to bring in another quarterback to the class, perhaps as a reaction to the “few months” of conversations between Hendrix and the Gators’ staff. The rumors pointed to Dayne Crist’s backup from his days at Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, Bret Visciglia. Visciglia was an All-Conference and All-State junior college player and has received interest from both Tennessee and UCLA, and rumors had Notre Dame’s staff poking around as well.
Thanks to the magic of the internet, I found Visciglia and got to the bottom of it. Here’s what he had to say.
No word on whether or not Visciglia would be a scholarship player or not, but he’d be a great addition to the depth chart, adding some collegiate experience behind Crist and in front of early enrollee Tommy Rees. Personally, I’d much rather have a quarterback that wants to be a part of the program than worry about guys that may or may not be coming. Notre Dame rarely entertains junior college transfers, but if Visciglia can prove he’s academically fit and up to speed, Irish fans should welcome him with open arms.
* According to Scott Wolf of the LA Daily News, Pete Carroll officially resigned from his job as head coach of the USC Trojans Sunday night. It’s sad news for college football fans that they’re losing one of the games most energetic and elite coaches, and even more sad for Notre Dame fans when you consider that Bob Davie was the only coach at Notre Dame to defeat Pete Carroll.
Carroll’s premiere wide receiver recruit, Kyle Prater, walked away from his commitment to enroll this Monday for the second semester at Southern Cal and has reopened recruiting. Many consider the front-runners for the Illinois native to be the Irish and his home state Illini. Brian Kelly and staff may want to point out the career trajectory of Regis Benn when talking to Prater, which should scare him away from four years with Ron Zook. Prater isn’t a need in this recruiting class, but he certainly looked the part of elite recruit at the Army All-American game.
* Speaking of the Army game, Notre Dame recruits Blake Leuders and Christian Lombard played nice games, with Leuders making some athletic tackles on defense from his edge spot, a change for the high school middle linebacker. New commitment Austin Collinsworth wasn’t able to play after getting a cast put on a hand injury, but he was also in attendance.
The recruit everybody wants to know about, Seantrel Henderson, now likely eliminates USC from his college choices. It seems like this one could be an Ohio State - Notre Dame battle now, with the Buckeyes likely in the lead, due to the family’s familiarity with the coaching staff. Henderson would be the first Cretin-Derham Hall football recruit to go to Ohio State, so I’m not counting the Irish out yet, especially with the shake up in South-Central Los Angeles confusing the situation.