It's once again time to check in on developments at South Bend. Notre Dame was finally eliminated from bowl consideration — BCS or otherwise — when USC thumped the Fighting Irish, 38-0. That score looked familiar to Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News, and research proved him right! Notre Dame lost last month to Michigan, 38-0.That got Wilner thinking, so he decided to compare Crewcut Charlie Weis' record through 33 games against Tyrone Willingham, the man he replaced. They each logged 20-13 records and were both 0-3 against USC.
Then it gets really interesting. Record vs. Michigan: Willingham (2-1) and Weis (1-2). Point Differential vs. Michigan: Willingham (-28) and Weis (-57). Record vs. ranked opponents: Willingham (7-8) and Weis (4-8).
But have the Fighting Irish been good cinema? Sports By Brooks confirms our worst fears: Notre Dame telecasts are at the lowest point of the team's 17-year relationship with NBC.
No wonder Weis has regained the top spot in this week's Coaches Hot Seat rankings.
13 comments:
Let me say this, as someone who really does not like ND, as much fun as it is to bash Weis, the ND athletic administration should be getting roasted. No one put a gun to their head to give Weis a 10 year extension. Especially after only 2 years on the job.
If Weis loses to Navy, then he MUST be fired, period.
Weis has been using distraction ever since the third game this season, pointing to next season..........his words are hollow at this point since I recall his words from the beginning of the season and when he first got the job three years ago..... it is time for him to go.
Well, he's doing something right because he's got the No. 1 recruting class thus far.
I will agree that Charlie Weis has done a horrible job of preparing this "young, inexperienced" team for Saturdays this fall, but the guy and his staff are still recruiting their asses off. In fact they have the #1 recruiting class coming in next year if the verbals hold true come signing day.
If the recruits weren't coming in a lot more people, hell, everybody would be calling for his head at Notre Dame. But the point is the major downfall with Willingham was his inability, or some call laziness, to recruit and go out and get stud recruits. The Irish have no studs in their current junior or senior class and thus a lot of freshmen and sophomores are starting when they really shouldn't if you have some decent talent or depth.
But I will agree that Weis has done a horrible job of preparing this team in regards to how he handled the quarterback competition and his ability to get kids ready to fight and show some passion out on the field.
Hopefully he will learn from his mistakes fast and lay off the baker's dozen every once in a while at Dunkin Donuts.
Man I am sick of these Willingham comparison's. I went to ASU and am not an ND fan but my family went to ND so i know enough about the program. Charlie has recruitted three classes, two ranked 8th nationally and the one coming in is ranked first so things will be different in the years to come. As for Willingham, he was told by the ND administration before he was fired, since they couldn't put points on the board, overall your staff and you can stay. He refused and subsequently fired. End of story, just that simple. Willingham could have stayed, but his ego got in the way. If you really follow Willingham, he is as arrogant as they come. Weis has an insane arrogane to him as well, say what you will about the guy, but he faces his critics in good times and in bad.
I thought Willingham was fired mainly because Notre Dame thought they could easily get Urban Meyer.
Here's a fun fact:
If Charlie’s offense were to produce 0, ZERO, points for the entirety of the 2007 season, his scoring average would be 22. That would be just .23 points worse than Ty’s 3 year scoring average.
Now, granted, I didn't expect Weis to test that fact with actual results, but...
Here's another fact: Weis 2 BCS games and their corresponding payouts. Willingham: 0.
As far as most ND fans are concerned, the comparisons between Ty and Weis are now moot. Now Weis needs to live up to the greats.
Weird.
domer.mq:
So, let's see if I have this straight.
Weis got to two BCS games using Ty's players. One could question the quality of opposition they faced en route to their BCS shellacking, but results are results.
If he won with Ty's players before, explain to me why he can't win with half Ty's players (who all have three years under Weis!) and half of his own hand-picked recruits?
Cy:
Maybe because the first year half the players were still Davie recruits. How come Ty gets credit for his one even remotely ok season (really, start of a season), when that was COMPLETELY predicated on Bob Davie having good defensive recruits.
As Ty insinuated, there is a whole enormous race issue involved. It's just that he wasn't fired because he was black, he is still exalted because of it. Ty is a terrible coach, and yes, very lazy recruiter. ND is suffering now, and Weis screwed up many times this season (realistically though, maybe it cost what, a game? This team is too young to be any good), but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I'll take this over the feeling the last two years of Lionel's tenure.
Who cares how many Freshman and Sophmores are playing for ND right now? That just shows how terrible of a coaching job this guy is doing.
Ohio State has a lot of young guys playing and usually does and Tressle and company are doing fine. Here's the count of starters for the Gators that are Freshman or Sophomores: two corners, one safety, one defensive end, three linebackers, one QB, one WR, and one offensive lineman. 65% of the team are Fresh/Soph.
Weiss is an arrogant prick who is finding it much more difficult to coach in college then he thought it would be and without the help of Bellicheck and Tom Terrific. Simply put, the guy isn't that good a coach.
Where is his "decided schematic advantage" now?
By the way, as bad a recruiter as Willingham might be he was the one who recruited Brady, Smardzia et al., who Weiss coached to a BCS bowl game last year (and got crushed).
I love how any Notre Dame-related post brings all the crazies out of the woodwork.
Samardzija was a shoo-in because of baseball, and Brady followed his high school teammate, Ndukwe. Ndukwe's dad brought tape of Brady and convinced Ty to give him a scholarship. Great recruiting.
Oh, and before Weis came, Brady threw more INTs than TDs and generally looked bad --- you can't use the "well he was a frosh/soph" at the time excuse if it doesn't work both ways. Before Weis came, Samardzija had all of about 10 catches in two seasons - 0 tds.
Ohio State should be very proud of their victories over Kent State, Youngstown State, Akron, Minnesota, Northwestern, etc. The best two teams they have played have been the worst two teams ND has played.
When Ohio State or Florida start playing that kind of youth up and down the lines, where people need time to develop, and have such little depth that they have more than ten extra scholarships, then maybe we can talk.
I hate Florida with all my being, but most of their team graduated last year, and they seem to be doing OK. They even have a sophomore QB who is fair to middlin'.
Of course, we are talking about a different class of football.
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