Archive for the ‘Charlie Weis’ Category

Ethan Johnson has gotten a lot of playing time for a true freshman this year, but it wasn’t until Wednesday night that he really emerged.  Against Hawaii last night, Johnson recorded three of Notre Dame’s eight sacks and spent most of the night in the Hawaii backfield.

Johnson is going to be counted on to step into a starting role next year with the graduations of Pat Kuntz and Justin Brown so his big game is a very promising sign that he’ll be able to do just that.

It’s been a while since Notre Dame has had a legit pass rushing threat. Justin Tuck was the last defensive end to provide the Irish with a consistent pass rush.  If Wednesday nigth is any indication though, it looks as though Johnson might be capable of providing the Irish defense with that same pass rush.

Before we get too carried away though, Hawaii’s pass protection has been awful all season.  Hawaii had given up 49 sacks heading into the game giving them 57 sacs allowed on the season after Notre Dame’s eight sack effort.  Any time a defensive end gets you three sacks as a true freshman though it’s a very promising sign.

Now if we can just get a couple of Johnson’s defensive line classmates to emerge this off-season, we could have the makings of a very good young defense next year.

Per ESPN, ND offensive coordinator Mike Haywood will be the next head coach for Miami (Ohio).

Miami of Ohio will name Notre Dame offensive coordinator Mike Haywood as its head coach on Tuesday, sources familiar with the situation said.

The hiring of Haywood will bring the number of African-American football coaches in the Bowl Championship Subdivision to six of 119 programs. He will succeed Shane Montgomery, who resigned last month.

According to two sources close to Haywood, he has agreed to contract terms with the university.

Congrats to Mike Haywood for getting his chance to be a head coach.  More on this later.

Notre Dame won on the road for the first time this season, but another streak ended that probably could have been avoided.

Marice Crum Jr. sat idle on the sidelines for the first defensive play, breaking a streak of 43 consecutive starts dating to the first game of his red-shirt freshman year.  Since the 2005 game against Pittsburgh when Crum started at "Apache," he has been a versatile and stable figure of the Irish linebacker corps, starting on the inside and outside.

When he was named defensive captain of the 2008 squad, he became one of only 17 players in the history of Notre Dame football to be a two-time captain.

The Irish middle linebacker is the son of Maurice Crum, an All-American linebacker at Miami from 1987-90, who in his own right, led the Hurricanes in tackles for three straight seasons.

Like his father, Crum’s longevity is only surpassed by his production.  He led the Irish in tackles during the 2006 campaign.  With a solid second half against teams who will run more often than the first half of the Irish schedule, Crum has the opportunity to pass David Bruton and Kyle McCarthy for the Irish lead in tackles in 2008.   In just over three years for the Irish, Crum has 281 tackles.

When asked if he was disappointed about the streak ending, Crum said, "No, I’m okay. I’m a huge team guy. Whatever [it takes] for the team to win."

It didn’t seem clear that this was entirely planned.  After watching a replay of the game, it appears the Irish defensive coaching staff made a personnel call on the sidelines that sent in a package of players which did not include Crum.  The senior linebacker confirmed when he was asked if he knew he wouldn’t be starting.  "No, it was kind of a game time thing."

The coaching staff dialed up a NICKEL defensive personnel package for the first play of the game, and included four down linemen (Kuntz, Johnson, Fleming and Neal), two linebackers (Smith, H. and Smith, B.), and five defensive backs (Brown, Lambert, McNeil, McCarthy and Bruton).  Washington had initially huddled their offense on the sidelines which gave the Irish coaches a chance to see their oncoming offensive personnel and might have influenced the decision.  The first play resulted in an incompletion.  It is interesting to note on the second play, the Irish stayed in Nickel, with Sergio Brown coming off the field, Harrison Smith moving to the Nickel back and Crum taking the vacated linebacker position.  On that second play, Crum made the tackle on Ronnie Fouch (UW’s QB).

Crum had almost seen this streak end on a number of other occasions because he was questionable due to injury.  Crum was plagued early in his career with back problems and was banged up several other times, but never missed a start before Saturday.  His most memorable performance came against the UCLA Bruins in 2007.  A game he was questionable to see action because of injury and illness, he ended the contest with 7 tackles, 2 interceptions, 2 forces fumbles and 2 fumble recoveries, with the final one being returned for a touchdown.  The stellar performance lifted the Irish to a 20-6 win over UCLA, their first of the season.

jeff@uhnd.com

A review of the UHND Road Trip; An emotional football weekend that won’t be duplicated at home in 2008

At the end of our 2007 Boston College trip, Frank, Brian, Kyle and I concluded that next game we would all attend as part of our yearly “guys trip” was going to be Michigan in 2009. Little did we know the elements of nature and event planning would culminate in the perfect storm that descended on South Bend, Indiana, over the Michigan game weekend.

The excitement and emotion that swelled over the course of the Michigan weekend will not be matched at a Notre Dame home game the rest of this season. Sure the home schedule is weak the rest of the way, but consider all of the happenings which made the 2008 Michigan game arguably the best home game to have attended since the 2005 USC game.

• IRISH LEGENDS AUTOGRAPH SHOW

Legendary Irish players including such names as Lattner, Casper, Ferguson, Pinkett, Mayes, Rice, Bolcar, Pritchett, Stonebreaker, Ismail and about a dozen other starters from the 1988 National Championship team descended upon the College Football Hall of Fame for eight hours interacting with fans, signing autographs and reliving memories from glory’s past. Their arrival times were staggered throughout the day but almost every player stayed well beyond their commitment to see which familiar face would walk in next. Any die hard Notre Dame football fan would have been paralyzed in awe at seeing the boyish reactions of guys like Pritchett and Stams when they saw and then embraced as the third amigo walked into the room.

Then to sit back and watch members of Notre Dame’s then defensive backfield recalling big plays from the 1988 season. Corny Southall, and George Streeter listened intently as Pat Terrell thought back to the Miami game and the two huge plays he made against Steve Walsh. D’Juan Francisco made sure the guys knew he was the first Irish defender to pick off Walsh that day. And then Sean Penn look-a-like and certainly the most fit forty-something showed up and reminded the guys not to forget his pick-six in Los Angeles. Most everybody agreed Stan Smagala looked like he could still play today.

I had the chance to ask Scott Kowalkowski about the antics Todd Marinovich pulled against him in the 1989 Southern Cal game. His eyes lit up and seemed to thoroughly enjoy talking about the night the Irish beat the Trojans, Marinovich took a cheap shot and Kowalkowski ultimately had the last laugh putting him flat on his back. And then there’s the Rocket. We had the chance to interview the Rocket for the podcast a little over a week prior, but we spent about 20 minutes chatting with him and it is hard to find anybody more enthusiastic in discussing the Irish than the Rocket is. For a fan, it was a special way to spend the even of a rivalry game. But things were just getting started.

• PEP RALLY

I think it is safe to say, over the past 10-15 years, the Notre Dame home pep rally’s haven’t been anything to plan your Friday’s nights in South Bend around.  The initial downfall might have been the decision to move it from the Stepan Center to the JACC, but they may have not had a choice due to fan participation relative to capacity. In any event, more and more people have chosen to spend their vacation time in Chicago, then driving in early Saturday mornings for the game.  Some would rather hit up the local bars like The Linebacker or Corby’s, before ultimately heading to the new Friday night vogue; the Midnight Drummer’s Circle. In fact, I all but protested attending the pep rally with my group.  But I succumbed to peer pressure and I’m glad I did for this night only.  First, it was former Irish captain Ned Bolcar who fired up the crowd and then the team.  He got up and represented the 1988 National Championship team who sat aside the current Irish team.  Ned seemed to get lost in the moment and forgot entirely where he was which made it as surreal as possible.  He seemed to have forgotten there was a crowd there and turned to the team and challenged them to be as great as they could be.  He challenged each player to play for the guy sitting next to them, instead of for self. He was fantastic and you couldn’t help but feel he took personally, what had been a lack of emotion, by recent Irish football teams.   Then there was Lou Holtz.  I won’t try to sum up what Lou said.  You can watch it here:

• LOU’S STATUE

Speaking of Lou, he joined the fraternity of Irish great football coaches with busts on the ND campus when his statue was unveiled inside the stadium the morning of the game.  It is well deserved and just another not-so-common event that made gameday morning so special.

• TAILGATING

It had poured nonstop from last Friday night throughout the morning until about 10am.  And then the clouds broke, the temperatures rose to a comfortable 78 degrees and the tailgating began. It couldn’t have been a better start to pregame, allowing fans to cook and enjoy cocktails prior to kickoff and stroll through campus to watch the band march their way from under the Dome to the stadium.

• WEATHER & GAME

Under a blue-gray, dry September sky, the Irish jumped out to a 21-0 lead within ten minutes to start the game. It was an incredible start an already incredible weekend and you just knew nothing was going to ruin this day…even the weather. With just under five minutes to go in the 2nd quarter, the sprinkles started to fall. And shortly thereafter, those sprinkles turned into a steady and eventually heavy rain that appropriately ended right around the same time as the game.

The pouring showers combined with the warm temperatures, created an incredible atmosphere of fun and spirit that put a charge into the already raucous crowd and a fire into a team that was destined to completely dominate an afternoon that was a crescendo of perfection for Notre Dame legends and fans who descended on Notre Dame Stadium that day.  Fred Leahy, son of Frank, told me at dinner he has been to scores of Notre Dame home games.  Included among those were such recent, epic battles against Miami ’88, Florida State ’93, and USC ’05.  And he said Michigan ’08 was the fourth loudest he has ever heard Notre Dame Stadium.

With an uneventful slate of Irish opponents, the chill of fall and early winter an no collection of former Irish greats like the ones we saw the second week of September, fans will be hard pressed to have the type of enthusiasm and like it or not, the Fighting Irish football team will have a hard time matching the emotion they had on September 13, 2008.

Today’s Chicago Tribune has an excellent article of an interview with Notre Dame AD Kevin White in which White comes to the defense of third year head coach Charlie Weis.   It is a very interesting reading and I recommend you take a look if you have the time.  Here is one passage in particular that I found thought provoking:

Did you think you got more of a finished product when you hired Weis?

That would be an easy cop-out for me, to say, “I didn’t quite know what I bought, and I got something a little bit different.” I can’t say that. … The guy we hired is the guy we have. I think we knew just who was coming here.

Did we think there would be, to use your expression, a learning curve from the NFL after 15 seasons? Absolutely there would be a learning curve. But we continue to be in this thing for the long term.

And that’s OK? To be on a learning curve at Notre Dame?

We thought he was the very best person suited for this position. I don’t care who came in here. There isn’t anybody who would come in here and not have a learning curve.

We knew there would be a transitional period for him. In his first two years, I think most people were really pleased that he had made a very successful transition. And then we got into the “seam.” I don’t care who found themselves in what I characterized in our “seam”—anybody would have struggled.

His record is about the same as his predecessor’s. Why is Weis not in danger?

The moment we were managing in 2004 was singular. And you make the very best calls you can make when you’re in a process, and you’re at a particular place within a process. Now we’re in a bit of a different process, and we’re in a bit of a different moment.

Really the only thing I want to speak to in particular is the recruiting. … Charlie has been an outstanding recruiter. If you look at the freshman and sophomore classes, and the prospect of a very strong class in 2008, there’s enough—at least for me—evidence that we will move through the “seam” and come out the other side and have a pretty darn good football program.

What I find particularly interesting is that White specifically mentions recruiting as the main difference between Weis and the “predecessor.”  Recruiting is indeed the biggest difference between the two and is the main reason there is some light at the end of the tunnel in this horrible season.  In 2004, there was no light at the end of the tunnel.  We had a terrible recruiting year in 2003 and 2004 was shaping up to be just as bad.  Those recruiting efforts combined with two back to back disappointing seasons were reason to believe that 2005 would have been no different under the previous regime.

Considering Weis took us to back to back BCS bowls and is recruiting his arse off right now, there is reason to believe that 2007 will be a blip on the radar and not the norm as it appeared would be the case under Ty.

The following are some of the better discussions from Sunday’s press conference with Charlie Weis. The entire transcript can be read at UND.com.

On Duval Kamara’s physical advantage

The one thing that he does do which I’m very encouraged about, besides making some big plays, he plays to his body size. There are some guys that are his height that don’t and play small. He’s learning to use his body and that’s a big advantage going forward.

The biggest lack of improvement from the 2007 Irish

I think we’ve been fairly inconsistent catching the football. I think any layman could see the last couple of weeks that we’ve dropped a whole bunch of balls and we’ve dropped — I put down four yesterday, and I might be generous. Last week we dropped at least a half dozen, and they are spread out; it isn’t just like one person dropped every ball. And I think that’s cost us — it cost us some consistency in the passing game.

Tom Zbikowski playing quarterback

Let me tell you something, he was begging me to throw. And I said look, when we go out there, we’re running the football doesn’t make any difference what we do so don’t you even think about throwing it. He will actually tell you he’s got the best arm on the team. Just ask him. I’m sure he’ll tell you that.

Mistakes he’s made this year and how he intends to address them

Well, I think that I’ve probably made several mistakes this year and in my system. You know, the ones who know my system the best are New England, and I think that those guys would have no problem telling me what things I did right and what things I did wrong.

The future of the ND rushing attack

Going into the off season, the combination of James and Robert and Armando, you know, will give you a lot of reasons for — a huge reason to be optimistic in the running game.

Offseason plans for Clausen

I think the off season strength and conditioning program, and especially size and strength and bulk, are going to be as critical a factor as he could possibly have. This is probably going to be his biggest concern in the off season is going from, you know, 195 to 210. I think that that’s the direction we want to head. He says he wants to get to 215. I said that would take too many In N Out Burgers when he’s back in California.

The mood after a senior day win

I think it was pretty emotional for a lot of these guys, because you sit there and tell them about playing their last game at home, and it isn’t until they walk off the field that they actually realize that just happened.

Who is the starting quarterback against Stanford

It’s still Jimmy by a nose over Zibby.

His plans for Thanksgiving

Eat like a pig and lay on the couch and watch football, like the rest of America.

Clausen’s mental toughness

Here is the first thing that I was looking for yesterday. It was a little chilly yesterday, right, 45 degrees, a little drizzle, snow flurries and here is a kid from California, and you say, okay, is he going to shrivel up; is he going to be looking for a parka every time he turned around. I mean, there was absolutely no evidence.

Leadership comes from the field

It was 1991 and it was right after the Giants had won the Super Bowl my rookie year there where I was fairly insignificant as a coach but I was on the staff. And there was a little quarterback controversy and Jeff Hostetler ended up being the starter and the team started floundering during the year. And I went to Phil Simms and said, “Phil, why aren’t you taking more of a leadership responsibility?”

And he said, “Charlie, let me teach you something. You can’t lead when you’re not playing.” That was the first time I ever heard anyone who I had great admiration for kind of teach me, like you kind of have to be out there doing something.

Now, Sam (Young) has been a starter now for two years in a row. He’s been out there for two years, so he is one guy that can say he’s been out there for almost every play, and you can see where he could feel that obligation to help take over some of that reign and hopefully that manifests itself.

A day after announcing they would not release Demetrius Jones from his scholarship, the University announced that it would not only release Jones, but is also helping him find a school that suits him academically and athletically that is also not on any future Notre Dame schedule.

According to the AP:

“We are helping Demetrius compile a list of prospective schools that are not on our immediate future football schedules. We will grant him a release to those schools, and we will assist him in settling at another institution as best we can,” White said.

That list will not include Northern Illinois, however, said John Heisler, Notre Dame’s senior associate athletic director. Jones still could play for the Huskies next season, but he would have to pay his own way this year.

White or Heisler did not say why they changed their minds about releasing Jones, but it’s very likely that it was to at least prove a point initially that they were not happy with the way the entire situation was handled.  Many felt it was not a wise decision, but I felt they were just standing up for the University and setting a precedent to avoid future hasty departures.

The about face by the University comes after Charlie Weis and Jones spoke over the phone and should help with any problems recruiting in the Chicago Public League that some felt would occur.

After speaking with Weis, Jones also had plenty of good things to say about his former coach according to the Chicago Tribune:

“He made an impact on my life, how to be a family man, lots of things,” Jones said. “Everybody may not like him but he takes care of his business and he takes care of it every day. He doesn’t change for anybody. He doesn’t even let something like being 0-3 rattle his character or personality.

“When we talked [this week], we had a healthy conversation. He was talking to me like a father, not just a coach. I admitted to him that if I’d come to him before the Michigan game, he would’ve talked me out of [leaving].People didn’t acknowledge that coach Weis and I had a great relationship. We’ve been through some rough times and some good times but we’re linked to each other.

“I represent him. No matter what happens down the line, my career started at Notre Dame and that was because of coach Weis. I was a soldier in ‘Charlie’s army’ and I enjoyed every minute of it.”

When others suggested Jones should switch positions with Jimmy Clausen coming to Notre Dame, “the only one going to bat for me, saying ‘Demetrius is a quarterback,’ was coach Weis,” Jones recalled. “Coach Weis told me this would be the hardest decision I would make. I feel like I’m blessed to have a second chance to do something so important.”

So for now it looks like there is a happy ending to this situation and Jones will even be at the Michigan State game this weekend to cheer on his former teammates.  To his credit, he may not have handled his initial departure properly, but everything Jones has done since then has been done properly and with class.  He’s been nothing but complimentary of the University and Weis and Notre Dame fans should wish him well wherever he ends up.

• On his dealings with Romeo Crennel with regards to the quarterback race in Cleveland: “I don’t want to be involved in anything that’s going on with the quarterback situation. The timing isn’t right.” “Even though we’re very close friends, that conversation could go somewhere I don’t want it to go so I’ll just try to stay out of that one.”
• On Brady Quinn’s performance Saturday night: “If you look at every pre-season game, there’s always a few guys that are just better than everyone else out there when they’re playing and he was one of them.”
• On the quarterback race: “We have three guys and that will be the case until Georgia Tech.”
• On where they stand with dividing up the reps in practice at quarterback: “We’re right on track.”
• Weis had the players practice outside in the rain yesterday to get them used to playing in bad weather since they have been indoors whenever its rain this summer.
• The first half of every practice this week will still be focused on individual drills and first team offense vs. first team defense, but the other half will be show teams.
• On the development of Will Yeatmen and Konrad Reland : “I feel a lot more confident at this time about our backup tight end situation than I felt last year at this time because you had two young pups at the time last year. Now they’re a lot more seasoned. They know what to do. They both have different strengths and weaknesses, but they both have shown they can play on the field.”
• On the differences between Will Yeatmen and Konrad Reland:“Will’s a lot bigger. He’s a big muchacho.” “They’re different in their body types and they’re different in how they play, but they both are capable of playing any of the tight end spots that we’ve put out there. They’re smart, and that’s the one thing they have going for them.”
• On settling in on a wide receiver rotation: “I think that there’s a lot of guys in the mix. The good thing about the skill positions, just like the tight ends, is that at wide receiver, running back, and tight end – all of them – we have more players than we’ve had before. You have to keep them involved in the game plan because if you don’t have them involved in the game plan, not that you lose their interest, but their psyche drops some because they don’t think they’re involved in the mix.”
• On the competition at place kicker: “We are coming closer and the thing is, it looks to me like there’s a possibly that you might have a different place kicker then you might have a field goal kicker. Just like at every other position, if they’re too close to call you try to give them one job instead of two. That’s a possibility that might play out like that as well.”
• On the development of Justin Brown: “He’s probably, of the entire team, the most pleasant surprise on the entire team during this training camp. It isn’t just his strength gains, it’s been his motor. That’s what’ really impressed me the most. He’s always shown flashes, you know, he’s always shown flashes since I’ve been here, but I’ve never seen him play with the motor he’s playing with now. It’s been very encouraging.”
• On the development of David Bruton: “We put him with the first group, but you still don’t know what’s going to happen once he gets out there and he looks like a man amongst boys out there. It’s nice to see that tall rangy kid who’s now close to 210 that can run like a deer and hitting people and covering ground.”
• On the development of Luke Schmidt: “He gives us some versatility because not only can he play fullback from the backfield, but he can play fullback from close to the line of scrimmage as well.”
• On the development of John Carlson as a leader this year: “Not only is he a leader by example because on offense it was clear in the winter and in the spring that the two guys, well you could include Sully in there as well, so the three guys that really stood out during everything we did were Travis, John, and Sully. “ “In John’s probably the most pleasant surprise is how he’s become so much more vocal.
• On how he has changed his coaching style with a very inexperienced team this year: “I’ve had to show easily the most patience that I’ve had to show since I’ve been here because you’re playing with some many guys that are stepping on the field for the first time in a true meaningful role. There’s some things that you want to say and you find yourself biting your lip. You pick and choose when to ride them and it’s not as often as you normally do.”
• Weis addressed the status of Derrell Hand who has been suspended indefinitely all training camp: “He’s going through some things here soon in the next couple of days that will help clarify his status. Once that happens, I’ll have a better idea of where we’re going. I said at the time there were two things he had to do. He took care of one part of it and now he’s dealing with the other part of it and once that’s cleared up, then I can act accordingly.”

Weis was in a pretty good mood when he addressed the media Saturday after practice which should be seen as a pretty good sign for Notre Dame fans.

• This kickers have taken terms in practice having the best day.  “Nate was disappoint in his feidlgs because after the first kick he missed the next two and then drills one right now the middle.  So he was disappointed there whereas on the kicksoffs, he kicked off the best today.  Brandon, whose been kicking off the best, was the best kicking field goals today.  Ryan was kind of behind both of those guys today.”
• Speaking of the kickers, I left out of my last blog that Whitaker was 3 for 5 (missed  30 and 33 yarders) , Walker was 3 for 5 (missed 35 and 45 yarders) , and Burkhart was 0-4 (and did not get a final attempt).  Looks like it could be another year of question marks at kicker for Notre Dame.
• On the quarterbacks first week of practice – “We’ve had different quarterbacks doing different things on different days.”  “They’ve been ok. They haven’t been great, they haven’t been terrible, they’ve been ok.”
• “We have through Monday before we completed that initial process.  We still have Saturday night installation, Sunday installation, and Monday morning installation. For that matter we also have installation on Monday afternoon.  It’s going to have to be another three days before we’ve gotten enough in where now we can start tuning it up and deciding what we’re gonna try to run.”
• On what he has learned about his team after a week of practice: “I think that we’ll be good enough to win, that’s what I’ve learned.”
• Weis again made mention that he is very pleased with the wide receivers so far: “I’ve been saying all along, everyone’s saying this is a weakness.  I really like the wide receiver position.  I really like them.”
• DJ Hord caught the ball very well on Saturday and Weis was asked if he has been doing that all week: “More towards the end of the week than the beginning of the week.  We’ve put some pressure on guys like DJ, and Richard, and Barry and those guys who have been here because you have these two young guys that you haven’t even seen practice yet.  So if you’re trying to get people reps and you want to see the two young guys, you say ‘Hey, we don’t have time to wait around here.  Either you’re in the mix or the ship has sailed.’ ”
• On some of the older guys at receiver feeling the pressure from the freshmen: “They’re feeling the pressure not just from the top down, but from the bottom up.”
• On the quality of the  running backs: “We’ve got a lot of running backs that can play.”
• “There’s five halfbacks you can put on the field and you could win with any of the five of them.  Now, obviously you can’t play all five running backs; but I think it’s a little too early to etch in stone that Travis is going to get every snap, or hey that Armando Allen is fast let’s give him every snap, or everywhere in between.  That Robert Hughes is 237, let’s give him every snap.  I haven’t even mentioned James and Junior.  I’d say the running back position is the one position where right now im not worrying about too much.”
• On whether or not freshman will be playing this year: “There will be freshman on the field in the first game and it won’t be in mop up time, that I can  tell ya.  And it won’t be one, it’ll be multiples.”
• On why the defense ran a lap in the middle of the practice: “We had ten men on the field, I’d prefer we have eleven.”
• Weis feels as though he has enough depth at the corner position to be able to match up against any personnel package that gets thrown at them: “The first year here I wouldn’t play more than two or three guys at corner.  You’d go into games wanting to play nickel and dime and trying to get into packages where you’re trying to matchup and you really in good faith couldn’t do it because you felt like you were putting lesser players out there when you did it.”
• When asked about who has stood out once the pads have come on there were only two names Charlie mentioned individually: “Toryan(Smith) and Joe (Brockington) at inside linebacker.”
• Weis wants to create position flexibility at the inside linebacker position in case Maurice Crum were to get hurt.  Weis prefers having a veteran guy running the show in terms of calling the defensive plays at the position so they want Smith and Brockington to learn both inside positions.  My take here is that Smtih is going to start and Weis wants Brockington to be able to backup both Smith and Crum so that if Crum went down Smith wouldn’t have to worry about calling he defenses.
• On what he knows about his team that he didn’t know before this week: “We’ve got a lot more players that can play.  A lot more players that can play in a game.”
• “Corwin and I are so much on the same page, as far as our upbringing that when we talk, it’s like we’ve been talking for two decades”
• On the development of Kerry Neal and Brian Smith: “When we brought those guys in there and put them at the outside linebackers, we saw guys that were 240ish, strong as oxes, with a lot of athleticism.  In this defense, one of the things you need are those guys that can stand up at the point when they are running right at you, rush the passer, and stll have the athletic ability to get into coverage.  Both of those have the athleticism to do that.”
• On the difference between Neal and Brian Smith: “Kerry was always with his hand on the ground and Brian was inside and outside as a linebacker when he was in high.  Both of those guys are definitely on the depth chart.”
• When asked about Jimmy Clausen’s ability to throw the ball deep, something he did not do in Saturday’s practice: “Can he throw the ball deep?  I think we’ll have to wait until September 1 to find that out.”  Clausen was the only quarterback to not throw the ball downfield Saturday.
• Weis discussed how he and Ron Powlus have been coaching the quarterbacks mentioning that he takes whoever is running the offense at the time one on one while Powlus has the rest of the group.
• On why he had the freshman singing the alma mater after practice: “It was one of those games where at the end of the game we were singing the alma mater and some of the guys were standing there either not singing or not paying attention.  I just felt like that’s not what Notre Dame is about.”

• Saturday’s practice will be open to the media and Weis said he wouldn’t be holding anything back and that it would be a normal practice. Something tells me what is seen Saturday won’t necessarily be a “normal” practice though.
• On the installation of the defense – “Each day we’re adding another facet. The first day was more of your base defenses – the 3 or 4 main coverages that go in. The second day we went to multiple wide receivers and therefore put in nickel as well.” “Today we’re putting in multiple tight end groupings so therefore your defense is more load up front as you’re trying to stop the run.”
• To recap the installation of the offense – Tuesday was multiple receiver sets, today was multiple tight end groupings, Thursday will be 3rd down offense, and Friday will be red-zone offense.
• Pat Kuntz weighed in at 287 this morning despite being listed at 272 on the official roster.
• Scott Smith is playing inside and outside linebacker positions. “He’s strong enough and physical enough to play on the point on the edge, but he also shows enough awareness in pass coverage where you can play him inside and not get exposed there.”
• “Potentially, we have the chance to do a lot of good things here.”
• On the size of the potential middle linebackers. “At the MIKE linebacker, the one where there almost always is an uncovered guard, you have to be stout. You look at all those teams that play 3-4 defenses in the NFL, and almost all of them have a middle linebacker that is one of those run right through you type of guys. I think we have a few candidates who do that pretty well.”
• On eliminating the big plays in the secondary: “I think the players that we’re playing with now are very, very competitive. There’s a lot of competition to get on the field right now and sometimes inherently that takes care of the problem because if guys get beat, you put someone else in. The problem is when you don’t have another alternative - when you just have a couple guys and you’re living and dying with what they d – but right now we have a lot of competition out there and I think that that sometimes answers that question.”
• On the depth in the secondary: “We have depth at the position where at one time we were very shy.” “We haven’t had it since we’ve been here. We have depth which, it just hasn’t existed.”
• On the improvement of David Brution from the end of last season to the spring and into fall camp: “David’s gotten a lot bigger and has not lost any of his speed and I think that that’s allowed him to play the game even more aggressively.”
• Weis approached Darrin Bragg about coming back to the team for fall camp after he was off of the team for the spring. “I didn’t want him to go into his senior year leaving Notre Dame with a bad taste in his mouth and me with a bad taste in my mouth about what’s happened here. I wanted to give him a chance to be a part of this program.”
• Weis also wanted Bragg back on the team in order to help with the depth at the quarterback position with the departure of Zach Frazer.
• Weis still intends on giving out scholarships to some walk-ons this year despite Notre Dame getting close to the 85 scholarship limit.
• Charlie was on the phone with Brady Quinn when Quinn got the call that a deal had been reached. “We were on the phone when his agent called him up to tell him the deal was done. So he cut me off. Then he called and I didn’t answer so he texted me to tell me it was done and I then called him back.”
• John Sullivan is in charge of making the MIKE calls at the line until further notice to take some of the burden off of the quarterbacks for now.