Another must win contest for the Irish. Va.Tech is a good but not great team, they are having a better season than the Irish that is for sure. They are not a team that we can't beat, but we will have to have probably our best game of the year to beat them. They reportedly will have a pretty large group of fans in South Bend this Sat, unfortunately the weather is going to be cold, nasty and wet on Saturday. Most of the conversation on Irish boards this week has continued to be about Kelly and not the team. While there are no polls, I'd be surprised if the majority don't want Kelly gone after the USC game. Then about the same number of fans want Jack Swarbrick fired as well. Neither is likely to happen of course. Many are now hoping for the Irish to lose to Va.Tech and for USC to put one of those 38-0 whuppings that they gave to Weis and Willingham. Hope is that it will force Swarbricks hand on Kelly. Oh well, I think I've been here before. :? The team is apparently healthy, Josh Adams who we're now told battled leg injuries most of the season is now healthy. The only person who is in doubt is Daniel Cage who missed the last 2 games with concussion protocol. He'll be sorely missed vs Va.Tech. Even if he clears having not practiced in a couple of weeks I doubt if he gets many snaps. Leaves us pretty thin as he was the backup to Jarron Jones. Tori Hunter Jr, didn't play vs Army but as much as I like him I don't think we've missed him that much.
Well at least on the Academic Side the Irish are continuing to do well. All Student-Athletes GSR 1. (tie) Notre Dame, Stanford, 98 3. (tie) Duke, Northwestern, 97 5. Boston College, 95 6. (tie) Central Florida, Tulane, Vanderbilt, 93 8. (tie) Charlotte, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest, 92 Federal Rate 1. Stanford, 95 2. Northwestern, 91 3. Notre Dame, 90 4. Duke, 85 5. (tie) Rice, Vanderbilt, 83 7. Michigan, 80 8. (tie) Penn State, Virginia, Wake Forest, 78 http://www.und.com/genrel/111516aad.html Although I have to note that the other metric that is often quoted, the Irish while doing just fine could find that if they finish 5-7 and there are not enough 6-6 or better teams for all the bowl slots could still be left out as the order of selection is by APR and there are 4 or 5 teams who could be in this position who have better APR for the football teams. Personally, extra practice aside, if we finish 5-7 and get offered a bowl and aren't contractually obligated to take it, that we pass and stay home.
It is Sr. Day so here is a UND article on 5th year Sr. Scott Daly our long snapper. http://www.und.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/111616aab.html
My son's best friend is taking an official 'unofficial' visit this weekend to Notre Dame. His father has his own church here in town, so faith is very important to the kid. He's coming off a Junior season that finished with him having 206 tackles. 149 solo. He's one of the fastest sprinters in the state of Alabama, and I believe Carson has talked him into wrestling this year. He's already received a lot of offers from midmajors, but some teams like Florida State have already had him in on unofficial visits going back to his sophomore year. He visited Louisville this past weekend (he left as soon as he returned from his playoff game). You can see more of him here: http://www.maxpreps.com/athlete/joshua-marsh/1-0DVTg5EeS00gAmVebEWg/default.htm http://www.hudl.com/profile/5146819/josh-marsh He's a legit get for whoever lands him. He's currently getting letters and interest from just about everyone. He and his father are touring schools now so they can trim down the official visit list for next year. Let's hope the Irish do well. This is precisely the kind of kid that ND needs to land.
LB. He is listed at 6'2". His father is 6'3" and he is slightly taller than his father. He has the frame to add weight. He has a crossfit type body. Very lean, but with room to grow. He's probably more of an OLB that you'd want to put in space ala Jaylon Smith. The biggest thing is the type of kid he is. He takes off in the summer and does missionary work in Africa and Central America. I almost let Carson go last summer and might let him go this summer. Good grades, yes sir, no sir, high in faith, no problems and tremendous family support. If Kelly lets this kid slip low on the radar, or tries to slow play him chasing a camp warrior, it will tell me a lot about where Kelly is in terms of recruiting.
Sounds like he'll be a good find, I'm a little surprised that he's unranked at this point. It's not like he plays in a low level of HS ball, he plays in a top league so if he's good there I wonder why he's not at least a 3 star kid. Not that star ratings mean that much, I can't imagine an unrated player who is not a long snapper or kicker getting an offer from ND or most good Power 5 teams. makes me wonder though if he's spent his summers on mission trips and not doing the camp tours that is why he's not ranked. These days you pretty much have to go to camps to be seen by the guru's or they won't rate you.
I meant to comment earlier about Doc's post about the loonies that want Swarbrick fired. I think he's a great AD. It was only a few years ago that ND won the Capitol One Cup for men's sports. We have tremendous coaches in sports like men's and women's soccer, women's basketball lacrosse, fencing to name a few. He's done a great job in a difficult time in college sports. Anyone who wants him fired apparently has no memory of Kevin White.
Gip, Agreed. T, There's a couple of reasons for it. One of them is that our HC really tries his best to keep kids from going to these summer camps and 'wasting' money. All of the big time HCs or their regional recruiting guys will pay him a visit during the season and he'll tell them who can play at the next level. It's old school. It's out-dated, but it is what it is. As you mentioned, that wouldn't matter with Marsh since he's spending his summers on different continents doing missionary work. He's not an old school interior 4-3 middle, but with today's offenses, you need LBs that can play in space. He projects out as an OLB or ILB depending on the conference he winds up playing in. As for the star system, it's really a joke and it's made recruiters more lazy. The team that eliminated my son's squad won again tonight . They pasted a team that was previously considered unstoppable on offense. They are led by a no star kid named Baniko Harley. He's their dual threat QB and no one has an answer for him. He has no offers. We have kids like this every year who will suddenly gain all this attention after their senior football season and wind up signing with someone. They'll slap a 3 star on the kid after the fact and act like they knew about him all along. For the first time since 7th grade, the Harley kid had to play DB tonight. He had an INT and a key pass breakup. He reminds me to Clay Chalkville's Tyrrell Pigrome who wound up as an unheralded recruit going to Maryland, but has already seen time as a true freshman, except that Harley is faster. The TB on my son's team this year rushed for over 2,000 yards this season and became only the 8th Alabama RB in 6A to do that. I believe he wound up tied on the season rushing list with TJ Yeldon. He receives almost no recruiting attention because he's an elite baseball recruit. However, if things don't go the way he wants in baseball, this past season has really lit a fire under him for football. His 1st cousin is that stud safety out of Florence who is committed to going to Michigan (I sat next to him last game), and as they said, don't be shocked if he winds up taking an offer that would allow him to play both. I fear Harbaugh scooping him up as well. We have guys out here who are 4 star on potential alone. We have some other guys who have zero stars who will wind up somewhere and 3 years from now people will wonder how in the world that guy wound up at (insert program here). Of course, some just wind up taking late offers to Auburn or Alabama as well.
Corey, I would be very surprised if the Red Elephant Club hasn't submitted every legitimate prospect in Alabama to the recruiting crew in Tuscaloosa
Another painful loss for the Irish. Just had nothing on offense in the 2nd half other than the big run by Josh Adams. 3 and out. I will say that apparently it's ok to target ND players and the refs don't care. All the way back to the Texas game refs in the booth have sat on their hands when Irish players have been clearly targeted. I can't imagine us beating USC next week so 4-8 and home for the Holidays. Been a very frustrating season.
KP, and illegitimate everyone submits their kid, cousin, nephew etc. I'm not sure if Saban has been on the Decatur campus this year, but I do know the Gus bus has made an appearance. The thing with Alabama is that they obviously have their choice of most of the best in Alabama, but they have moved on to recruiting nationally. They are chasing needs not bodies and have been for some time. They're simply the elite of the game. T, This is beyond disheartening. I actually watched this turkey (no pun intended) from gun to tape and I had the feeling the entire time that they were going to find a way to lose it.
Corey, You are absolutely correct. My point was the Alabama recruiting staff is aware of all of the real recruiting prospects in the state. Alabama does recruit nationally now but the in-state network is alive and well and it is pretty good at vetting the best candidates.
Sadly, I did also. You could see the trend of the past several games come to fruition. Lights out 1st quarter. Opponent begins to creep back second quarter. Opponent dominates second half. In the past, I've been the last one here to jump off the bandwagon when the coaching situation looked grim. FWIW, I am deeply disturbed by what I've seen this year. I guess we'll have at least one more season to see if this was an anomaly or a predictor of the direction of the program under Kelly. Ugh!
Kelly's time is up. Yesterday he just looked cold and detached. He has lost this team. After USC pounds us into oblivion the U needs to clean house and start over. Observations? Oline is grossly over rated starting with McGlinchey. Mustipher is horrendous and #71 at RT is unspeakably slow. Kizer should leave because he has maxed out in this scenario. Get a new D-Coordinator with a whole new defensive scheme.
So I'm not sure if this will work but I thought I'd post a pic of a happier time in ND football. This was taken outside of Spartan Stadium before that memorable 10-10 tie 50 years ago this weekend. I and the others ran 5 miles each that night carrying a football from ND Stadium to the game. They don't do stupid things like that anymore, they just riot.
KP, Oh they still whiff on a few because they wind up coming in too late. Nico Collins comes to mind, although there's still room for Cristobal to work a little magic. I do agree with you though, there's a good network of scouts who do the legwork for them. I've noticed Auburn is still chasing bodies to an extent, but they still have a way to go before they are at elite status. Sid, We need to drink more.
Corey, One of the things that Saban's team does so well is evaluate talent and attitude. He adjusts the lineup continuosly until he gets the best combination. Of course it helps to have a large pool of talent to tinker with.
Thanks for the help Terry. You might find this interesting, the guy second from the right in the back row was the poster on ND Nation named Bergen. Denny Nigro was a plastic surgeon in the LA area. He and I organized the relay. One of our guys was Danny Saracino who became notorious on ND boards because he was the head of admissions at ND for years. Fourth from the right is Bill Hurd a top sprinter who also played later for the football team. He became an eye surgeon in Arizona. Lots of success stories from that night.