Notre Dame: Fires Weis

[BooCocky]

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Notre Dame fired coach Charlie Weis on Monday after a string of disappointing seasons that was capped by an agonizing four-game losing streak.

Athletic director Jack Swarbrick announced the decision, saying in a news release: "We have great expectations for our football program, and we have not been able to meet those expectations."

Forde: Command Decision

Charlie Weis is the latest and most costly in a series of Notre Dame coaching mistakes, but there's nothing wrong with the Irish that a good hire can't fix. Story

Swarbrick said he recommended to university president the Rev. John Jenkins on Sunday night that Weis be let go with six years left on his contract. Weis leaves his alma mater with a 35-27 record in five seasons, among the worst of any Fighting Irish coach.

Assistant head coach Rob Ianello, who also is Notre Dame's recruiting coordinator, will assume responsibility for football operations until a new coach is hired, Swarbrick said. Ianello has spent the past five seasons on Notre Dame's staff.

Notre Dame players have scheduled a midafternoon players meeting that will include a vote on whether they want to play in a bowl game after a 6-6 season. Swarbrick has said he will consider the players' wishes in deciding on a bowl trip.

Following a 6-2 start this season, the losing streak began with the second upset by Navy in three years. Then came losses to Pittsburgh and Connecticut -- in double overtime -- and in the season finale to Stanford, and it seemed inevitable Weis would be gone.

Speculation about possible replacements for Weis has been rampant for weeks. Among the top names, Florida's Urban Meyer and Oklahoma's Bob Stoops already have said they plan to stay where they are.

Speaking on a conference call Monday, Stoops said: "I'm going to be at Oklahoma next year, so I can't be at two places at once."

Cincinnati's Brian Kelly has also been mentioned, along with Stanford's Jim Harbaugh and TCU's Gary Patterson.

Weis, meanwhile, has told people in South Bend that he's already heard from roughly six NFL teams about becoming their offensive coordinator next season, sources told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.

A brash offensive coordinator with the NFL champion New England Patriots when he was hired, Weis raised Irish expectations with back-to-back appearances in BCS bowl games in his first two seasons.

Since then, though, one of the nation's most storied football programs has gone 16-21 -- the most losses ever by the Irish in a three-year span.

Weis' record is worse than his two predecessors, Tyrone Willingham and Bob Davie, who also were fired. Notre Dame will be looking for its fifth coach this decade.

Weis has six years left on a 10-year contract signed midway through his first season, just after a thriller against top-ranked USC that ended in a 34-31 loss.

The way that game played out served as a model for the Weis era. Clinging to a 31-28 lead with less than 2 minutes to play, Notre Dame allowed the Trojans to convert on a fourth-and-9 from their own 26. That ultimately set up a quarterback sneak in the waning moments, when Reggie Bush pushed Matt Leinart into the end zone for the winning score.

What made Weis' fall worse for fans of one of the nation's most storied football programs was that it began so promisingly.

Weis came to Notre Dame brimming with confidence after serving as offensive coordinator for the three-time Super Bowl champion Patriots.

The first two seasons under Weis produced more victories (19) than any other Notre Dame coach, including Knute Rockne, Frank Leahy and Ara Parseghian. Both seasons, though, ended with BCS bowl losses.

Asked about his start at the time, Weis said: "I really haven't done anything yet."

He didn't know he had reached the high point of his tenure.

With Brady Quinn, Jeff Samardzija and other key players gone in 2007, the Irish started 0-5 for the first time in school history. They finished 3-9, leaving Weis one loss shy of matching Davie's school record of 16 losses in his first three seasons.

Most shocking, though, was the fact the Irish finished last in the NCAA in total offense just three years after Weis said at his introductory news conference that when it comes to X's and O's "we have the greatest advantage."

The past two seasons the Irish have collapsed in November. They got off to a 5-2 start before going 1-4 down the stretch a year ago. This time they ended the season with four tough losses.

Notre Dame fans who celebrated Weis' cockiness when he was winning grew tired of his Jersey attitude when the Irish started losing, with many calling him arrogant.

His biggest failure, however, was his team's inability to play good defense. The Irish never finished higher than 39th in the country in total defense and gave up big play after big play.

Weis appeared to know his firing was imminent, saying a day after the loss to Connecticut on Nov. 21 that he would have a hard time arguing against his dismissal "because 6-5 is not good enough" -- an echo of his words when he took the job.

Overall, Weis' teams lost six games by 26 points or more. That's the same number Willingham had in three seasons. Davie had only one such loss and Lou Holtz didn't have any. Weis had a pair of 38-0 losses to Michigan and USC that tie for the eighth-most lopsided losses in Notre Dame history.

Whoever replaces Weis will be charged with ending the longest title drought in school history. Notre Dame has not topped the AP's final poll since the end of the 1988 seaso

I'm not really surprised/ He didn't get the job done at one of the most prestigious universities in College Football. After Quinn left Notre Dame they never found a spark. They were able to recruit well just could never coach them. Weis' tenure is a huge disappointment because his big bowl bids weren't even with his own recruits. Who replaces Weis? Is it going to be Bob Stoops, Urban Meyers, Brian Bellick, Chip Kelly, Brian Kelly, Jim Harbaugh? Someone out of the blue? Where does this leave Notre Dame and last but not least where does this leave Weis? I say Weis goes back to the NFL to be the offensive coordinator in Cleveland where he can be reunited with Brady Quinn.

 

[Big Sexy]

Weiss was just a horrible college coach. He did a great job recruiting offense because he was at a big time university and he was a very successful, super bowl winning NFL coordinator. However, once the recruits got there he couldn't coach them up. You can have all of the talent in the world but that means nothing if you can't coach. He also seemed to forget about the defense when it came to both recruiting and coaching.

Weiss can go back to the NFL and get pretty much any offensive coordinator job he wants. There a lot of teams that will be looking and he should have no problem finding a job.

As far as Notre Dame goes, they have a lot of potential suitors but the one that makes the most sense is Brian Kelly. All this guy does is win. He won with Grand Valley State in Division 2, he won at Central Michigan, and he is winning at Cincinnati. In fact in his entire college coaching career he has only had one losing season. That was a 4-7 season in 2004, his first at Central Michigan. He has also shown himself to be a solid recruiter so he looks like Notre Dame's most logical choice.

 

[Mitch Henessey]

Weis was a terrible college coach. This should've happened last year. He never really got Notre Dame to the "promise land" everyone thought he would. His biggest moment was that lose to USC some years back. A loss was his biggest moment that sais enough about his tenure as a college coach. And the only reason why it's remembered is because USC was king of the college football world at this time.

This should've happened last year. He's another student of Bill Belichick that just couldn't make it on his own.

 

[It's...Baylariat!]

Charlie Weis could not coach defense. Period. If he was able to just run an offense, then he'd be in good shape. Jimmy Clausen has nearly 3,500 yards passing and Golden Tate has almost 1,700 yards receiving. So offense isn't an issue. Defense is.

Weis will find success on an NFL team as their offensive coordinator. But as a coach, he failed. He failed to bring his team back to the prominence it's used to. He used Tyrone Willingham's recruits to go to two BCS games and get beat, and with his team, he managed to go 3-9 in 2007, and have two 6 loss seasons. Just not good enough to keep his job.

 

[BooCocky]

The defense at Notre Dame has been horrendous but shouldn't some of that fall on the coordinator of the defense? I am no supporter of Weis but I still don't think he should receive all the blame. The coordinators have to do something and for the last 2 years or so the Defense failed to produce. As a head coach you can only do so much. If you have something and your team doesn't execute it isn't necessarily your fault. But I guess he has a say in who coordinates the defense so you can blame him, but he shouldn't receive all the blame.

Also, Stoops pretty much said he wasn't leaving Oklahoma. We'll wait and see. Money talks and ND can afford to pay a shit load of money.

 

[Shocky]

Charlie Weis is to blame if he brought in the Defensive Coordinator is the problem. Notre Dame has never had a problem scoring points for the most parts, it's that their defense gives up more points.

I'm personally sick already with the Brian Kelly talk. I just want this next week to be over and hopefully a turn down by BK for the Irish Job. I seriously think it's a big mistake for him to leave a gold mind at Cincinnati for a coaching job that has had the touch of Death for the last 20 years. Why would the Irish hire a coach that is an offensive coach when they just fired a coach that was an offensive coach?

 

[BooCocky]

The ND athletic director said the Irish are not interested in an offensive head coach, so i guess that rules out Kelly. They need to work on the defensive because Weis was incapable of improving them. Also Patterson turned them down to because he just signed a extension with TCu. I don't know where this leads them because Gruden also declined. But money talks, and any of them could end up going to N.D except for Patterson. I've read some articles that they are very interested in Billick. So I think he could be the replacement. O well, we'll find out soon enough.

 

[Big Sexy]

The ND athletic director said the Irish are not interested in an offensive head coach

I've read some articles that they are very interested in Billick. So I think he could be the replacement. O well, we'll find out soon enough.

These two statements contradict each other. Brian Billick is an offensive coach. I know his time in Baltimore would seem to say otherwise but Billick has always been an offensive guy. He was the O Coordinator for the Vikings back when they had Carter, Moss, and Cunningham.

 

[BooCocky]

These two statements contradict each other. Brian Billick is an offensive coach. I know his time in Baltimore would seem to say otherwise but Billick has always been an offensive guy. He was the O Coordinator for the Vikings back when they had Carter, Moss, and Cunningham.

He could be an offensive head coach but he knows how the defense works. That's something Weis never learned. Weis was always a Offensive Coordinator, never the head coach. Billick on the other hand was a coordinator and a head coach. He knows enough about both sides of the ball to get production from his players, and I am sure he learned some things in Baltimore while having some good coordinators. It could be a contradiction, but if they're going the route of a new coach they will choose a defensive coach. If they're going the route of taking a NFL coach, they'll choose someone like Gruden or Billick. They are people with coaching experience at the highest level of competition. They know how to get production on both sides of the ball...

 

[Shocky]

Brian Kelly just confirmed he's staying at Cincinnati, thank God. It'd be a horrible mistake for him to leave a program that is quite literally on the cusp of being in the National Title picture year after year (with a loaded underclassmen roster right now), for a program that needs sometime to rebuild. However, Thad Matta also said he was staying at Xavier right before he was driving up to Columbus to take the Buckeye basketball job.

As far as Notre Dame, new name has come up, Randy Edsall. UConn is a program that was a 1-AA program, and in a decade has one a share of a Big East Championship. UConn doesn't play a flashy style of ball, they run the ground, and hope the defense stops it. I think the man coudl be a fit in South Bend with his mindset, the problem is will Notre Dame be patient enough with him, time will tell.

People don't realize how good this UConn team is this year. Sure they have 5 losses, but those 5 losses are by a total of 15 points. I'd challenge anyone to find a team that has ever lost that closely all year. It's not like they are bad losses either. They lost a freak game to UNC at home at the beginning of the year. They lost on the Road to an eventual top 10 team in Pitt, lost to a top 25 WV in the last minute, along with Rutgers. And finally lost on the road in the last minutes of the 4th to a top 5 team in Cincinnati. Edsall has done a great job with UConn.