Here’s hoping everybody has great plans for Memorial Day weekend. Consider this a guess (or hope) that it’ll be a less dramatic weekend than last year, when the Irish’s 2013 season was thrown into permanent disarray.
With the Irish assistant coaching staff out recruiting, and the unofficial start of summer kicking off on this long weekend, let’s share a few stories that I found interesting.
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For those looking for a stadium update, check this out:
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Over at Irish Illustrated, Tim Prister sat down for a long chat with former Notre Dame offensive coordinator Chuck Martin, now the head coach at Miami (Ohio). One of the more honest, candid and entertaining guys in college football, Martin didn’t disappoint.
Prister posted chunks of his interview in three parts, and while they’re protected by a paywall, they’re worth every bit of the $9.99 a month to read.
Here’s just a few snippets to give you a feel:
On Andrew Hendrix, now the unquestioned starting quarterback at Miami:“The biggest thing with Andrew was he was close to being the guy at Notre Dame but never the guy. The confidence that comes with getting over the hump and becoming the guy…Not that he wasn’t confident, but he never got the confidence of really, truly being the guy at Notre Dame.
“Here, his game has really elevated. He’s having tons of success and he’s clearly the guy. There’s something to be said of when you have that comfort of being the guy, then you play better. When you’re always battling to get to the top of the depth chart, it’s hard with the stress of always falling a bit short. He is an unbelievable kid.”
And on Martin’s unequivocal love for Notre Dame:
“Brian Kelly could have gotten the Texas job and I wasn’t going to Texas. Brian Kelly could have gotten the Alabama job and I wasn’t going to Alabama. I wasn’t going to be an assistant coach, but any chance to coach at Notre Dame, I wasn’t going to pass it up.
“It’s Notre Dame. I’m Irish-Catholic from the south side of Chicago. It’s my school. It’s a place I believe in more than any place in the world. How they do their business. The quintessential student-athlete. To me, it wasn’t even a decision.
“When Brian asked, it was not a long conversation. We didn’t talk salary. I didn’t even know what position I was coaching. He said, ‘I’m bringing my coordinators from Cincinnati,’ and I said, ‘Okay, gotcha.’”
And on his desire to take over at Notre Dame when Kelly is finished:
“That would probably be the only goal I have in coaching. Other than that, I’ve never really chased jobs. I’m happy where I am today and during my previous stops in coaching. I always like where I’m at. I’ve never really had a bad job. I love where I’m at now. I don’t concern myself with jobs other than the one I have.
“But if you ask me if there’s one job I’d like to have, it would be Notre Dame.”
As someone who got to know Martin fairly well over the past four years, I can’t give a bigger recommendation to this interview. Part one, part two and part three all deliver the goods. There’s much better stuff from Martin in the articles, so head over and pony up.
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As college coaching staffs spend parts of May evaluating prospects, the heart of “recruiting season” begins to take off in June. Colleges will hold their camps, with Notre Dame’s “Irish Invasion” trying to establish itself on the prospect map, hoping to get on par with top-flight camps at schools like Florida and Ohio State.
In advance of other industry events like the Rivals Five-Star Challenge and Nike’s The Opening, Rivals updated their recruiting rankings, and quarterback Blake Barnett has moved up the most. Barnett’s now the No. 55 player in the country, and classified as a “dual-threat” quarterback, with the 6-foot-4, 193-pounder having the quicks to be a wide receiver if he wasn’t such a promising signal caller.
Joining Barnett in the Rivals250 are offensive linemen Jerry Tillery (#132) and Tristen Hoge (#159), and safety Prentice McKinney (#250), who came out of nowhere to make the list.
Right now Rivals has the Irish recruiting class ranked No. 15 in the country, though it’s the second-highest school with less than 10 commitments, trailing just USC.
Final 5 for #Rivals100 LB Hilliard http://t.co/GbSBCFRpgc #NotreDame, #Iowa, #Buckeyes, #Wolverines, #Bama
— Mike Farrell (@mfarrellsports) May 23, 2014
Notre Dame is also after some of the top prospects on this list, still chasing blue-chippers DT Kahlil McKenzie, WR George Campbell, RB Soso Jamabo, LB Justin Hilliard, DE Jashon Cornell, WR Miles Boykin, WR Cordell Broadus, WR Equanimeous St. Brown, RB Malik Lovette, WR K.J. Hill and plenty more.
(Quick reminder: These rankings are as subjective as they come right now, especially before any of these players have a chance to get out to camps this summer. Deep breaths. Lot of time left.)
For another look at Irish recruiting, check out the conversation I had with Steve Wiltfong, 247’s director of recruiting about the evolution of Notre Dame’s recruiting efforts.
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Interestingly enough, the podcast Brian Kelly did with Bruce Feldman is picking up traction. While we pointed out some other segments that were interesting to us, Kelly’s talk of the difficulties getting traditional opponents like Michigan and Michigan State back on the schedule has some college football pundits accusing Kelly of complaining.
Here’s the section that’s got so many people up in arms:“All I can do is voice my ... you know, as a football coach, especially one that’s been in the Midwest, I love the ability to play Michigan and Michigan State and the tradition of it. But the reality of it is, you know, for our athletic department to enter into the agreement with the ACC, we have to give up a little bit from a football perspective relative to scheduling. To make our athletic department whole relative to soccer and lacrosse and basketball, that ACC agreement was absolutely crucial for our athletic teams.
“Football had to give up a little bit relative to flexibility and scheduling by taking on a commitment with the ACC. Therefore it’s put us in a very difficult situation scheduling and unfortunately, it’s taken some of those schools like a Michigan or Michigan State off our schedule. Because we’re gonna keep Navy. We’re gonna keep Stanford, and we’re gonna keep USC. Those three schools are not coming off and those are etched in stone. So now, add your ACC schools with those three schools and you’re really limited to where you can go.”
Talk about a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation for Kelly. If he downplays the rivalry with Michigan, he takes a week of crap for not calling the game with the Wolverines a rivalry. If he says that the team isn’t trying to get Michigan back on the schedule, he’s ducking Michigan, especially with Wolverines AD Dave Brandon still milking the cancellation letter he received from Jack Swarbrick.
From the perspective of Notre Dame’s football coach, Kelly has a point, but as the USA Today’s Dan Wolken points out, he also has an advantage.
I am pretty surprised Kelly is passing the ACC thing off as completely an “other sports” decision. There was a huge football element too.
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) May 22, 2014
Notre Dame did not have to quasi-join a conference. It could’ve stayed Indy and put its other sports in the new Big East.
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) May 22, 2014
And sacrificing Michigan/Mich St to pick up FSU, Clemson and the Carolina schools was a calculated decision rooted largely in recruiting.
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) May 22, 2014
But from the perspective of Notre Dame athletics as a whole, the move to the ACC is such an unqualified upgrade from the conference that used to be the Big East that Swarbrick’s decisive move is looking better and better each day.
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Lastly, because so many people have sent me this article, I thought it was important to comment on it. The Big Ten Network’s Tom Dienhart thinks the Big Ten should stop scheduling football games with Notre Dame.
Yep. That’s what he actually thinks.
It doesn’t take much googling to figure out Dienhart’s opinion of Notre Dame football, but for a conference that openly brags about its revenue stream while the quality of play -- and attendance at football games -- continues to decay, removing an opponent that actually fills seats isn’t the wisest move in the world.
Dienhart suggests the Big Ten play a 10-game conference schedule and remove Notre Dame from every schedule. The move to nine games was painful enough for schools that routinely feast on non-conference opponents from the MAC or I-AA, but 10 games? (How would Northwestern get to eight wins every year?)
What next, adding a team from New Jersey because they’ll get cable TV subscriptions in New York City?
Anyway, read the article and judge it for yourself. I grew up a Big Ten fan and still enjoy watching the conference, but this feels more than a little off base.
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Hope everyone has a great weekend with friends and family. (And that no big news breaks out of South Bend, I’ll be without my computer.)