Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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24 MAY 2019 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY LOU SOMOGYI I nstant gratification/stardom has seldom been a part of Notre Dame's running back corps dur- ing head coach Brian Kelly's first nine seasons. • Entering 2011, senior Jonas Gray had only 75 career carries for 309 yards and zero touchdowns. As a senior, his 114 carries resulted in 791 yards (a whopping 6.9 yards per carry) and 12 scores before an ACL tear ended his campaign (although later a Sports Illustrated cover followed during a three-year NFL career). •The ensuing year, senior Theo Riddick made the transition from wideout to the backfield after totaling only 54 carries for 252 yards and zero touchdowns his first three seasons. Returning to the backfield as a se- nior, Riddick accounted for 1,287 total yards — 917 rushing, plus 370 receiv- ing — for the 12-1 Fighting Irish squad that advanced to the BCS National Championship Game. He is now en- tering his seventh season in the NFL. • Going into 2015, senior C.J. Pro- sise — a former safety and wide re- ceiver — had 10 carries for 126 yards to his credit. He moved to running back as a se- nior, rushed for 1,029 yards, 6.6 yards per carry and 11 touchdowns, plus snared 308 yards worth of passes on a team that started 10-1 before injuries shelved him. He became a third-round draft selection — the highest in 12 years by a Notre Dame running back. • Finally, last year the enigmatic Dexter Williams — who never com- piled more than 39 carries in a year — entered his senior campaign with "same old story" written all over him when he was suspended from play- ing the first four games in 2018. Following that hiatus, Williams be- came a stalwart, rushing for 995 yards at 6.3 yards per clip and 12 touch- downs in his nine games while help- ing Notre Dame earn a bid into the four-team College Football Playoff. The senior backfield floor now be- longs to Tony Jones Jr., who has ac- cumulated 624 rushing yards his first three years, or 17 less than Williams had going into his last year. There is zero guarantee that Jones will be as produc- tive as the aforementioned quartet of predecessors, but he had at least walked a similar path through the 2019 spring. "We're seeing a guy that is running with low pads, playing physical, and it's the same guy every day," Kelly said. "We got an A-plus Tony one day and [then] a C-plus Tony [in past years]; we're getting a consistent Tony every single day. He's made those ad- justments to come out here and prac- tice at a high level every day." Junior Jafar Armstrong, at this point, has the higher ceiling. Like Prosise — and, to a degree, Riddick — Armstrong made the adjustment from wideout last season and de- buted with 383 rushing yards, 5.3 yards per carry and seven touch- downs, to go with 14 catches for 159 yards. Either way, both Armstrong and Jones are likely to form a tag team in the backfield. As the lone proven back at the be- ginning of last season, Jones' high- lights included averaging 5.0 yards per carry against a vaunted Michigan defense, 174 yards of total offense in a hard-fought 22-17 victory ver- sus Vanderbilt, and a crucial 51-yard touchdown reception in the 24-17 triumph against USC — on his birth- day, no less — to help secure the Col- lege Football Playoff bid. One of the benefits of becoming a senior is attaining wisdom on how to consistently approach competition and daily life. Williams had a reputa- tion of getting sidelined with nag- ging injuries prior to his senior year, as has Jones, who was withheld from the Blue-Gold Game as a precaution. "I think I've found a way to balance my life, to worry about the things that I can control and just keep fighting through it," he said. "I need to bal- ance my emotions, balance as a per- son and things in my head, and stop thinking so much about things and making it so difficult when it's really just playing a sport and having fun." Now, when someone such as fresh- man Kyren Williams calls and Face- Times him late at night about ques- tions, Jones recognizes even more how vital it is to set the right example. "I don't even like that word 'vet- eran,'" said Jones, who still has a fifth year of eligibility in 2020. "All the young guys look up to me and ask me stuff … the roles are flipped. "But I feel good because I know what to do — and I know how to help them because I know how it feels." After playing his first three seasons under Autry Denson (now the head coach at Charleston Southern), Jones has had his own adjustment under new running backs coach Lance Taylor. "First I want to thank Coach Den- son for all he's done for me as a per- son," Jones said. "Coach Taylor is a different type of coach. He's hard on us, but it will help us in the long run. "Our meetings are different. The way we talk about things [are] different." What has remained unchanged is the quest to bloom, especially as a se- nior. Over the past two years, the 6.7 rushing yards per attempt averaged by the duo of Josh Adams (2017) and Wil- liams (2018) has been extraordinary. Adams had the benefit of running behind a magnificent line led by two top-10 NFL picks in Quenton Nel- son and Mike McGlinchey, while also displaying underrated breakaway ca- pabilities. Williams had an explosive- ness that was conspicuous when com- pared to fellow backfield mates. This type of yards per carry probably will be less likely in 2019, so efficiency and consistency will be extra imperative. "I don't know if I want to be so happy toward just growing," Jones said. "I want to be that guy who is remembered in years past. I just want to grow as a player and as a person off the field." Like those before him, all Jones can do now is take it and run. ✦ DELAYED HANDOFF Tony Jones Jr. attempts to be Notre Dame's next late-blooming running back Jones compiled just 624 rushing yards in his first three years at Notre Dame, but will have an opportunity to surpass that total during his senior season. PHOTO BY ANGELA DRISKELL