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Notre Dame Spring

Discussion in 'Sports Board' started by Tim Gentry, Mar 3, 2014.

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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Golson is a counselor at the Elite 11 camp, getting some good reviews.

http://bleacherreport.com/tb/ddsla?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=notre-dame-football

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 7, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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Sid it is enjoyable to see Irish teams have success in a lot of area's. I hope they can get baseball fixed sometime soon, if Aoki isn't the guy I hope that Swarbrick can go out and find the guy and pay what is necessary to get that guy.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 7, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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Agreed, Terry. Baseball needs to be fixed.

Sid, Jul 7, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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Irish recruit C. J. Sanders shining at the Opening in Oregon. He's made the SPARQ finals. I have no clue what these numbers mean but they are supposedly impressive. One thing I do know is that as soon as he suits up for the Irish, he will fast on our new turf!! We need speed.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 8, 2014

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IrishCorey Well-Known Member

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you can twist a lot of numbers in a lot of silly ways, but it's hard to overlook a 4.32 40.

IrishCorey, Jul 8, 2014

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Scott88 Well-Known Member

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Check out the primary LB target for the Aggies, Malik Jefferson.
At 6'3 - 215 he's got sick speed...

Scott88, Jul 8, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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Those are sick numbers for a LB. I wonder what John Houston's numbers are like.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 8, 2014

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JO'Co Well-Known Member

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:idea:

re: C.J. Sanders

"Sanders ran a 4.32 40-yard dash in the prelims, just two-hundredths of a second slower than the top time. (His time would’ve been the fastest at last year’s SPARQ testing.) He also put together a ridiculous 3.80 20-yard shuttle time, the best in the entire camp. Throw in a 38.6″ vertical leap and you’ve got yourself a freak athlete.

While the timing system isn’t quite apples to apples with the NFL Combine, Sanders shuttle time would stand as the fastest at the NFL level dating back as far back as the NFL’s website records, when Jason Allen and Brandin Cooks both clocked 3.81 in 2006.

Sanders wasn’t the only Irish prospect who looked impressive. While linemen Jerry Tillery and Tristian Hoge held their own for big men, cornerback Shaun Crawford also put up elite numbers.

Measuring in at 5-foot-8.5 and 170-pounds, Crawford clocked a 4.48 40-yard dash, while leaping 38.8 inches in the vertical. That should more than make up for a lack of height, and Crawford also ran a sub-four second shuttle, making him one of the quickest guys at camp."

This guy can sky and fly...

JO'Co, Jul 9, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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Time lapse progress of field turf installation:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/NiiWamgDhdE" frameborder="0"></iframe>

Sid, Jul 10, 2014

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Scott88 Well-Known Member

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Cool vid...

Funny how for the longest time it looks like they are just pushing dirt from one pile to the another, as if they just don't know what to do with it.

Scott88, Jul 10, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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Scott, I agree with how it appears. It looks funny. I speculate they are digging deeper for the foundation than I thought they would. I was up there a couple of weeks ago to see a granddaughter in the basketball camp. I peeked inside the gate and was amazed by what I saw, no green grass....just a big dirt hole and heavy equlpment, as it appears in the video.

Sid, Jul 10, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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One ND Architecture grads wish on how the stadium renovation would turn out.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 10, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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ND Administration Vision:

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 10, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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New Field Turf ...check
New Stadium Renovation plans...check
New Hot Sideline Reporter who doesn't tower over Kelly...check.

Kathyrn Tappen. Should be familiar to Joel, she did the Red Sox stuff for quite awhile.

http://www.und.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/071014aaa.html

I'm sorry to see Alex Flanagan leave, she did a great job.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 10, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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However the stadium addition turns out, it WILL be an interesting project. I like the architecture student's version.

Speaking of architecture, here's a nice story about Ricky Watters, who originally wanted to be an architect and who came back 20 years later to get his degree:

Ricky Watters finishing what he started

July, 9, 2014

By Matt Fortuna | ESPN.com

Ricky Watters is back on the Notre Dame campus, working to finish his degree in architecture.Brad Malkovsky was launching icebreakers on the first day of his summer theology class when a chiseled student sitting in the front row caught the associate professor off guard with his introduction. The student said he had not been in a classroom in more than 20 years. He said he was in his 40s. He said he had a wife and two kids.

"I thought he was a 25-year-old," Malkovsky laughed. "I'm thinking to myself, 'If this guy's in his 40s and he's back at Notre Dame -- and he certainly looks like an athlete -- I'll bet I can Google it and find out what's going on.' And I Googled it and it turned out, ‘Oh, I used watched to watch this guy 20 years ago.'"

"This guy" was Ricky Watters, who played 11 seasons for three NFL teams, was named to five Pro Bowls, rushed for more than 10,000 yards and won a Super Bowl with the 49ers in 1994. Now he's back in class, more than two decades after a four-year career at Notre Dame, during which the school won its last national title in 1988 and finished the season ranked No. 2 the next year.

"We talk about reincarnation and some of those things that they believe in other religions and stuff," Watters said. "And [Malkovsky] is like, 'Man, did you reincarnate right in front of me? What's going on here?'"

Not quite, but Watters' second act at Notre Dame is proving to be, in his mind, as memorable as the first.

He uprooted his family from their Orlando, Florida, home for the summer, moving into an apartment complex right off campus. His two boys, 13 and 7, have enjoyed their father's old stomping grounds, getting round after round in on the nearby golf course and enjoying the premature college life.

Watters exhausted his eligibility during a four-year college career that saw him rush for 1,821 yards and 21 touchdowns. But he never obtained the architecture degree -- which often takes five years to complete -- that he started.

It’s an itch that hasn't really left since he was drafted in 1991.

Ricky Watters rushed for 10,643 yards in 10 seasons in the NFL.Watters considers himself an artistic person, and his parents encouraged him to pursue something involving his childhood passion of drawing, so he sought schools that offered architecture degrees while coming out of Bishop McDevitt High in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

"The reality of it set in at a high football school like Notre Dame," Watters said. "It's obviously about academics, but it's also playing big-time football, and the demands that are placed on you doing that and the demands that are placed on you trying to do architecture, they just don't fit, not if you plan on getting any sleep or eating or surviving.

“So I think it was a noble thing to want to do, but if I had to do it all over I probably would've taken business or something like that. Once I realized that football is such a business even, it could've helped me."

With his football career over, though, Watters has reverted back to his original passion. He said he'll finish with a graphic design degree, because he was able to transfer over so many of his credits.

His final three classes, which run for six weeks through the end of July, are in liberal studies, theology and, perhaps toughest of all, ceramics, a four-night-a-week, 150-minute-a-session course. The other two, which meet two and three times per week, respectively, are hardly cakewalks, with the reading assignments for Watters' liberal studies class carving out a good chunk of the remaining time in his week.

"I remember so vividly times that people would announce me as a Notre Dame graduate; everyone even thinks that I'm a Notre Dame graduate," Watters said. "I know I'm not, and I have that feeling every time someone would say that. So I said, 'You know what, that's also a big part of it.'

"It's for your soul, just to feel complete and to feel like you finished it. You did what you set out to do. Both my parents, they've passed away now, and I know they're looking down on me, and when they see me get that degree it's going to be a happy time for them, too."

Of course, in Watters' return, he hasn't been completely negligent of the program where he began to make a national name for himself. Fighting Irish running backs coach Tony Alford invited Watters to speak to his position group, with Watters stressing to the players the importance of immersing themselves with the rest of the student body and recognizing the power of their platform. And Watters has familiar company in Malkovsky's theology class, with offensive lineman Steve Elmer among the handful of players he can call classmates.

"I'm now sitting up front, they're in the back," Watters laughed. "I remember being in the back."

Watters' renaissance in the classroom also comes at a time when increased benefits for college athletes is a hot topic amid the backdrop of several high-profile lawsuits. While the former NFL running back said the finances behind his return to Notre Dame are still being sorted out, he did allow that he believes more should be done to help current athletes obtain their degrees one way or another.

"I think definitely if someone wants to finish, let them have that right and that chance to finish, because it is important, No. 1, to the person," Watters said. "But it should be important to the university, and I love the fact that our university at Notre Dame, they care about that, they care about their guys graduating. Everyone graduates. Everyone has a chance to graduate if they want it, but you have to want it. You have to be willing to do what it takes. They're not going to just give it to you. It's definitely not a situation like that.

"I have to do the work, I had to come here, I had to bring my family -- any way you look at it, I'm paying something. I'm definitely going to have to pay just to come here, but that is part of the sacrifice that you make to finish what you started, and I'm just so close that I think it would be a shame not to finish, and I know there are other guys that are working right now trying to figure out how they can get back and finish, and I think that they should."
Click to expand...

Sid, Jul 10, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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I saw that story about Watters, I'm glad ihe's doing it. Hopefully it will make a difference in his life.

One of the things that is starting gain some traction is the "lifetime" scholarship for these kids. When they leave school early they no longer get a free ride if they don't make it. I'm trying to think of a kid who left early and didn't even get drafted, it was a Holtz kid (Braxton Banks, maybe). But he wanted to come back and finish his degree but couldn't afford it. Under the new proposed rules kids like him could come back and the NCAA will allow the school to give him a free ride. Of course they wouldn't be eligible but they also wouldn't count against the scholarship limit if they do come back and get scholarship support.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 10, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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I'm in favor of it.

Sid, Jul 10, 2014

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Tim Gentry Well-Known Member

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ND

<r>I'm in favor of Kathyrn Tappen. <E>8)</E></r>

Tim Gentry, Jul 11, 2014

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Terry O'Keefe Well-Known Member Administrator

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<script height="381px" width="672px" src="http://player.ooyala.com/iframe.js#pbid=5e83fc845d86487e88b6953600eaff54&ec=w5MTR1bjoB6LXeMWQyFZENa4-HXq3mkT"></script>

Part 1 of a series on Pat Connaughton.

Terry O'Keefe, Jul 14, 2014

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Sid Well-Known Member

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I'm not a big follower of recruiting, but I came across this article in the Indy Star about a local kid whose top 2 at this time are Notre Dame and Michigan. Of course, with 20 offers, including 5 SEC programs, that can change.

http://www.indystar.com/story/sport...tre-dame-michigan-atop-college-list/12670529/

The hotly recruited inside linebacker has 4.2 grade point average on 4.0 scale.

"He takes Advanced Placement classes," Kirschner (Ben Davis HS head coach) said. "Some of it doesn't come easily to him, but he works really hard at it. He's a good student."

Bilal's football and academic abilities attracted more than 20 scholarship offers, including five Southeastern Conference offers (Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, Texas A&M and Vanderbilt) and one from Pac-12 power Oregon.
Click to expand...

Bilal said his top two choices now are Notre Dame and Michigan. He likes the fact both schools have strong traditions academically as well as on the football field.

Bilal, a four-star recruit, is rated as the No. 2 player in the class of 2015 in Indiana by 247Sports and the No. 3 player in the state by Rivals.com. He is rated as the No. 3 inside linebacker nationally in his class by 247Sports.
Click to expand...

Sid, Jul 15, 2014

#280

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