Notre Dame and Michigan will battle on Saturday in a game featuring teams that desperately want to regain national prominence, especially at the other’s expense. The Wolverines, who are in their third year under Rich Rodriguez, made a strong statement by defeating UConn last week after two forgettable seasons had created significant unrest in Ann…
Notre Dame was far from dominant on Saturday, but the Irish stopped Purdue when it counted for a 23-12 victory in the season opener for both teams. Brian Kelly’s squad showed considerable improvement in the running game, and the performance of both the defense and special teams was very encouraging. Quarterback Dayne Crist looked sharp…
For the third time in the past decade, a new football head coach will lead the Fighting Irish into battle. While the players and coaches have changed, the lofty expectations and glowing reports from “insiders” remain a constant. I’m reminded that Tyrone Willingham and Charlie Weis created an instant buzz with promising first seasons, but…
The last four coaching searches by Notre Dame have resulted in failure (one of them before the coach hired ever coached a game). That adds up to only one successful coach in the last 29 years – one successful hire out of the last 6 attempts going back to Gerry Faust. Notre Dame’s brand and…
The Charlie Weis era came to a close at Stanford on Saturday evening in a manner that highlighted his shortcomings as a head coach. The Notre Dame defense, which Weis could never elevate to a respectable level of performance in his five year tenure, was instructed to allow the Cardinal to score the winning touchdown…