Beano predicts that Notre Dame will win 10 games this year if we beat either of the Michigan teams this year, but got on his soapbox about Weis comments about “thugs and hoodlums” from an alumni outing in Gettysburgh this off-season. Really Beano? That happened months ago and you just decided now to comment on it? Beano always talks up the Irish and is notoriously a Notre Dame homer, but he seemed down right angry, or at least tried to appear angry, when talking about Weis’s comments.
Anyway, here’s the video of Uncle Beano jumping on his soapbox from ESPN Motion.
Robert Smith of ESPN said yesterday he would not be surprised to see the Irish win 9 games this year, but predicted an 8-4 season with losses to Michigan, Michigan State, Pitt, and USC. I think his prediction is pretty fair. We’ll have trouble with the Michigans and Pitt and we’re probably not ready to seriously compete with USC just yet this year. Surprisingly, Smith doesn’t seem to think ND will have much trouble with Washington even though Huskie fans seem to think its a sure win for them - some on the UHND forums seem to think that the Irish will struggle with mighty Washington as well.
People often throw the term “Notre Dame man” around a bit loosely. But trust me when I tell you that in my 30 years of involvement with Notre Dame, as a student-athlete to a journalist that has covered Notre Dame for more than a quarter of a century, Joe Yonto ranks among the top five most impressive men I’ve known with an affiliation to the school. I would make that statement regardless whether he defended me during the transitional years of my career or not.
Yonto was a peerless defensive coach. In addition to masterminding national championship defenses in 1966 and 1973, Yonto led the 1980 defense through five straight games without giving up a touchdown, culminating in a 7-0 shutout of number-four Alabama in Birmingham. With that resume, Yonto would be in huge demand for head coaching vacancies today - but he has no regrets.
“My goal in life was to make it to Notre Dame,” he says. “There was no sense in going anywhere else. I was there for 31 years (as a coach and special assistant to the athletic director) and they treated me great.
“Our understanding from the ACC is that their member schools are not permitted to participate unless they can retain the television rights, and that’s not really what the format is,” John Heisler, Notre Dame’s senior associate athletic director for media and broadcast relations, said Thursday. “Our intention was for us to retain the television rights, and in effect, they’re already part of our NBC agreement.”
So there you have it. A game which the both schools’ fan bases would be nuts for and would be a money making machine is not likely because of the TV rights to the game.
It’s cool though, we’ll probably get some other big time program like we have with the announced Washington State and Arizona State games or maybe it will be a really big time opponent like the possible Baylor game in the Super Dome.
Hopefully the first act of the new Athletic Director (which we learned Friday wouldn’t be Steve Orisini) will be to do something with the mess White created with the schedule so that we have some flexibility to schedule games against the Miami’s, Alabama’s, and Oklahoma’s of the college football world.
I haven’t been as big of an opponent towards White’s scheduling practices as some of the other ND bloggers out there, but it is getting very disheartening to read comments about not being able to schedule games with storied programs like Alabama and Miami. It’s also going to make Notre Dame look pretty bad if it keeps happening.
Here’s a YouTube clip of Rocket Ismail returning a kickoff for a touchdown against Miami in 1990 since apparently we won’t get to see these two schools play in the near future.
There hasn’t been a whole lot of news on the AD search front, but Friday we got some news most people were not hoping for. Steve Orsini, a captain of the 1977 Notre Dame National Championship team, will be staying at SMU and will not be the next athletic director for the Irish.
From the SMU press release:
“I am pleased to announced that Steve Orsini will remain at SMU as Director of Athletics,” SMU president Dr. R. Gerald Turner said in a statement. “I met with Steve today and reiterated my desire for him to stay. I am delighted that he has decided to continue to lead our athletic programs. Steve has created a sense of excitement here, and I anticipate many more achievements under his leadership.”
An ESPN article said that Orsini “turned down” a Notre Dame offer, but there hasn’t been anything reported that he was indeed offered the position. Still, he was widely considered to be the top candidate to fulfill the vacated athletic director role for the Irish.
Wide receiver D.J. Hord has decided to leave the Notre Dame football team and will transfer to a Division I-AA school.
“I’d like to thank D.J. for all he has given to this team in his three years and wish him well in his future endeavors,” Notre Dame head coach Charlie Weis said.
Cornerback Darrin Walls will not be enrolled at Notre Dame during the fall semester for personal reasons and will return home at the end of this summer school term.
“We won’t have Darrin with us this season but I hope to have him return for the spring semester. Fortunately, cornerback is a position of strength on our team and this will provide opportunities for increased playing time for our corners,” Irish head coach Charlie Weis said.
There has been some chatter about Walls’ status this season for a couple weeks now and it is very unfortunate that we will not have him this season as he was poised for a breakout year after spending 2007 as a full time starter at corner. I’ll have more on the impact of both departures later.
Sporting News’s Matt Hayes published a list of college football players who are ready to breakout this year and Notre Dame wide receiver Duval Kamara was on his list. TSN columnist had this to say of Notre Dame’s sophomore wideout:
WR Duval Kamara, 6-5, 222, So., Notre Dame. Scout’s take: “Saw them twice last year, and he’s the only guy on offense who looked comfortable. He knows how to get off the jam (at the line of scrimmage), knows how to use his hands to separate. He’s got good speed. Once he figures out how to use his big frame to shield himself, he’ll be a terror. No one in college football will be able to match up with him — no one.”
While he probably shouldn’t have admitted that his analysis of Kamara was based on only seeing him play twice, it’s still nice to see Kamara getting some pub this pre-season.
After a very impressive freshman season (considering the offense in general), Kamara could be poised for a pretty big year if the Notre Dame offensive line holds up. I was a little concerned with the number of drops from Kamara in the Blue Gold game, but at this point it really won’t matter unless the o-line improves enough to give Jimmy Clausen enough time to get Kamara the ball.
Kamara has all of the tools to be a bigger, stronger version of Maurice Stovall. It took Stovall till his senior year to fully realize how to utilize his size to the best of his ability, but that was partly due to the inept coaching he received prior to the arrival of Charlie Weis and wide receivers coach Ron Ianello. Hopefully Kamara’s learning curve is not as steep and the New Jersey native starts dominating defensive secondaries this season.
(And yes I am aware I just gave Sporting News crap for the headline about hating Charlie Weis last week)
Hocutt said UM won’t play FIU but wants to book marquee opponents and would be interested in speaking with Notre Dame when it hires an athletic director about one of its new annual prime-time neutral site NBC games.
As a younger Notre Dame fan who grew up with the Notre Dame teams of the late 80’s which had several epic matchups with Miami, the thought of Notre Dame facing off against the Hurricanes in a neutral site game is absolutely awesome.
Would a game against Miami in the neutral site game finally stop some of the ongoing complaining about the scheduling of these games? Hopefully.
Considering Miami’s recent incidents such as their in-game brawl with Florida International maybe those old Catholics vs. Convicts shirts could find some more use.
Here’s a GREAT clip of Rocket Ismail talking about the pre-game fight with Miami in 1988 from Aaron Taylor’s Legends of South Bend.
When Matt Carufel transferred from Notre Dame last year, he didn’t always have the nicest things to say about the Irish or Charlie Weis. It seems he just didn’t feel he fit in at Notre Dame. Never mind that his transfer coincided with the exact timing of him losing his starting spot to Eric Olsen. Nah, that could never have have anything to do with it right?
Notre Dame started 1-9 in 2007, but Carufel said his decision to leave school had nothing to do with wins and losses. He was homesick when he lost his starting job after the first three games last year.
“I didn’t like it from the get-go,” said Carufel, who left Notre Dame last October. “I missed my home and parents. I missed Minnesota, but I also wanted to have coaches that I felt cared about me and my situation. It wasn’t the right place for me, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t right for someone else.”
Right, so he didn’t like it from the get-go, but decided to come back for a second year and then left right after losing his starting spot? At least Demetrius Jones was honest about why he left and didn’t take pot shots at the University.
Jimmy Clausen was added to the Maxwell Watch List along with 74 other NCAA signal callers this week.
Clausen was one of 26 quarterbacks to make the list and one of only three sophomore signal-callers honored (a total of 12 sophomores made the list). The 6-3, 212-pounder started nine of the 10 games he appeared in last year and made his mark on Notre Dame’s freshman passing records. Clausen started the second game of the 2007 season, the earliest any Notre Dame quarterback had started at that position since freshmen regained eligibility in 1972. He completed 138 of 245 passes for 1,254 yards with seven touchdowns and six interceptions in his rookie season. Clausen ranks second on Notre Dame’s freshman quarterback single-season lists for completions, attempts, yards and completion percentage.
It’s nice to see that Jimmy is one of only three sophomores on the list.
Will Clausen make it past the watch list and be a quarter or semifinalists for the award? I for one wouldn’t be surprised if he stayed on the watch list for a little while.
C-Dog said:
bleednd82, I agree in general about Greg Little. But has something happened with him? JC, Ty will coach out the season. He will be fired if he loses 3 more games. I... About: UHND Opponent Poll - Week 5
C-Dog said:
Guys, I am more optimistic after Purdue, but no opponent can be taken for granted by this ND team. The Lads have much work ahead of them requiring focus, preparation... About: UHND Opponent Poll - Week 5
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Jimmy Clausen was added to the 
