Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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www.BLUEANDGOLD.com MARCH 2020 69 football today. Or as Hyman Roth noted in The Godfather: Part II, "This is the business we have chosen." ANALYSIS: SPRING SETBACK What stood out to me about Jurk- ovec was last spring's Blue-Gold Game in which he was about as dis- consolate as any player I've seen in four decades after merely a practice session. Whereas Book asserted himself as the clear starter by directing four touchdown drives in seven posses- sions against the top defense — two of his other marches ended with a lost fumble by running back Jafar Arm- strong in the defense's territory and a missed fourth-down attempt after traveling 67 yards — Jurkovec was conspicuously off his game. He passed for only 135 yards on 26 attempts, was "touch sacked" 12 times — sometimes when he was not allowed to improvise, but often be- cause he held on to the ball too long — and aesthetically did not throw the kind of pass that would be deemed prototype at this level. "Very frustrating," Jurkovec sum- marized to the media after the game. "I'm just not where I need to be … I have a long way to go with every- thing, physically and mentally." Whereas top quarterback class- mates such as Fields, Trevor Lawrence (Clemson) and J.T. Daniels (USC) all enrolled early in January 2018 at their respective schools, Jurkovec stayed in high school where he also earned all-state honors in basketball at Pine- Richland. Then upon Jurkovec's arrival at Notre Dame in the summer of 2018, a sidearm motion in his technique was eventually addressed by the staff. "It's been tweaked a lot, so I'm just going to have to keep working on that," Jurkovec said of his mechan- ics. "In high school my form changed multiple times. I have a lot to work on, physically and mentally … I'm always going to have to work on my mechanics." Similar to 2015-18 Notre Dame quarterback Brandon Wimbush, Jurk- ovec displayed a proclivity to throw the deep ball well and with accuracy, but has struggled with the shorter ele- ments of the pass game. Like Wimbush, he also believed he could be more effective when not donning a red jersey in practices that makes him off limits to contact. "A major portion of my game is being able to make things happen, whenever I'm live, being able to scramble, run a little bit and make things happen with my feet," Jurk- ovec said. "Taking that away was a little weird for me … I understood that being the two [quarterback] they didn't want to [tackle me]. I would like to do it, but it's just the circum- stances." Another fine line for Jurkovec to walk is not forgetting the mistakes made, but also not dwelling on them to the point where they become coun- ter-productive and clog his mind. "There's a lot that I can learn from it, but at the same time it was not real football, just the way that it's set up," he said of the Blue-Gold Game. "I'm not going to put too much emphasis on it, but I'm definitely going to use it to learn from. "Yeah, it is a process, but I've been here a good amount of time now, so I really need to ramp it up." Head coach Brian Kelly was not nearly as panicked. "He's pushing himself a little too hard," Kelly said. "The game's a little too hard for him right now and you can see it. He never played like that in high school. "He made it simple, and he's mak- ing this game way too hard. … We'll get him to the point where it's simple." Unfortunately, it's not going to be at Notre Dame. Sometimes, a reboot and a fresh start is needed. For Jurkovec, this was that time. ✦ Transfer Rate In addition to transfers before graduating such as Phil Jurkovec, there are two other ways quar- terbacks undergo transition. The first is through accepting a position change. At Notre Dame in the last 20 years this has in- cluded Arnaz Battle (1998-2002) and Carlyle Holiday (2000-04) to wide receiver — both of whom would play in the NFL — and Jared Clark (2000-04) — at tight end. The most recent example is Avery Davis (2017-present), who has dabbled at running back and cornerback. The second are those who received their undergraduate degree at Notre Dame before opting to use their fifth season as a graduate transfer elsewhere. There have been five of them in the Brian Kelly era. • Dayne Crist — The former five-star recruit was Kelly's first starter, but he missed the last four games of 2010 with a torn ACL and lost his starting job in the first half of the 2011 opener. He transferred to Kansas to reunite with former Irish head coach Charlie Weis, but lost the job while finishing 116th out of 116 nationally in quarterback efficiency rating. • Andrew Hendrix — He reunited with former Irish offensive coordinator Chuck Martin at Miami (Ohio) in 2014, passing for 3,280 yards, running for 324 and accounting for 29 touchdowns during a 2-10 campaign. • Everett Golson — Exiled for the 2013 season because of academic reasons, Golson returned as the starter in 2014 but transferred to Florida State after the spring of 2015 when it appeared he would be in a time-share situation with Malik Zaire. Succeeding Jameis Winston, Golson had a promising start before a loss and concussion sidelined him as a starter the second half of the season. • Malik Zaire — Following a season-ending injury in the second game of 2015, Zaire found himself behind DeShone Kizer in 2016, and opted to use his fifth season at Florida. He played in only four games, completing 32 of 56 passes for 349 yards and carrying 22 times for 39 yards. • Brandon Wimbush — The former 2017 starter appeared in five games for Central Florida this past season, completing 13 of 24 passes for 167 yards and carrying 11 times for 48 yards. — Lou Somogyi Wimbush became the fifth signal-caller under Brian Kelly to use his final year of eligibility at another school, appearing in five games for Central Florida in 2019. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA