Ready to Drink the Kool-Aid?

I am almost ready to drink the Brian Kelly Kool-Aid.  When Lou Holtz left and Bob Davie took over, you kind of knew that excitement was off the table.  Having Davie as your head coach was fine if you wanted to be content, but Irish fans want a frenzy.  Davie was a defensive minded coach with a sound football pedigree, but no head coaching experience.  Ty Willingham was closer to what I was looking for in terms of confidence, experience and attitude.  Willingham also had more offensive experience and had been a college head coach at Stanford.  I would have liked to have seen Ty stick around a little longer, but the powers that be wanted a faster return to glory.

Charlie Weiss came in and we were all hypnotized by his four Super Bowl Rings.  We figured he would turn the Irish into the New England Patriots and thought that if it weren’t for Weiss, Tom Brady would just be another quarterback.  When it came to offensive genius, Charlie was considered the gold standard, which was music to the ears of Notre Dame fans and alumni.  We thought having Charlie walk into recruits’ homes flashing Super Bowl rings players would result in immediate commitments. After finishing his first season at 5-2, the University drank the Kool-Aid, locking in Weiss with a new 10 year deal supposedly worth upwards of 40 million dollars.  That made me a little nervous, and what did not sit right with me is when I had the opportunity to meet Weiss at a golf event sponsored by Xerox, and he came across as cocky, not confident.  Looking back at the Weiss era, I think his biggest shortcoming is that he is not a head coach (he never was, even his high school coaching days)…he was and still is a great offensive coordinator.

From Grand Valley State to Central Michigan and into Cincinnati, I feel that Kelly has refined his ability to be a top level, top notch head coach.  Kelly, an Irish Catholic himself, seems to be much more personable than Weiss and while the Irish Nation loved Weiss, I don’t think it was a two way street.  Kelly is loved and he seems to love the fans back.  Each week Brain Kelly does pre- and post-game press conferences where I thought he was genuine, informative and honest, whereas Weiss was like a robot.

It’s not only the winning record, the big win over USC or the beating the Irish gave Miami in the Sun Bowl - it’s how he did it.  It was not an easy year and could have been worse.  After beating Purdue, the Irish suffered a close loss to Michigan, then Kelly was upstaged by Michigan State with an overtime fake field goal.   After the first 5 games, the Irish were 2-3, but Kelly rallied the troops to improve to 4-3.  With all that going on, Kelly’s team lost to Navy, had Declan Sullivan (a student assistant) die while operating a camera during a practice, and had his starting quarterback go out with a season ending injury.  Again, he rallied the team, mentored a freshman quarterback and won out the regular season, including a much needed win over USC and a bowl game win against the rival Miami Hurricanes.

I have enjoyed seeing how or more so who he is recruiting.  His recruiting matches his coaching…get players who belong on a football field in South Bend and put them where they need to be to win.  Kelly’s character wasn’t shown by what happened in his first season but how he responded to what happened.