Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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8 OCT. 2, 2021 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED UNDER THE DOME It Should Matter More To Kelly By Tyler Horka Never forget Mardy Gilyard's infamous press conference from the day after Brian Kelly announced he had taken the job at Notre Dame and would be stepping down from his post as Cincinnati's head coach effective immediately. "Hopefully he packed his things up and gets to South Bend in a hurry so we can focus on Florida," said Gilyard, a Cincinnati wide receiver on the last Bearcats team Kelly coached in 2009. Kelly left right away, yes. And Cincinnati subse- quently lost 51-24 to Florida in the Sugar Bowl a few weeks later. That was quarterback Tim Tebow's final game with the Gators, and it was head coach Urban Meyer's penultimate season in Gainesville. Maybe Kelly being on Cincinnati's sideline wouldn't have made much of a difference. Or maybe it would have. Bearcats fans will never know, and that's what made Kelly's abrupt departure so hard for them to come to grips with. Kelly was piloting the first undefeated season in program history and could have capped it off with an emphatic victory over the strongest program in the country at the time, but he jumped ship before seeing the realization of that possibility through. Now Cincinnati is as strong as it's ever been since Kelly departed. Notre Dame defensive coordinator Marcus Freeman has much more of a personal connection with the team he coached for the last three seasons as its defensive coordinator. But Cincinnati fans would much rather say, "We took down Coach Kelly in his own house!" than "We beat a three-year assistant!" And for that, this game should matter more to Kelly than Freeman. Freeman Should Be Motivated By Todd D. Burlage With a strong Cincinnati contingent expected at Notre Dame Stadium — and with some bad blood still boiling among the Bearcats faithful after both Irish head coach Brian Kelly and his first-year defensive coordinator Marcus Freeman left the Queen City school for Notre Dame — this matchup of ranked teams provides plenty of side stories, and some extra motivation on both sides. After putting Cincinnati football back on the map as its head coach from 2007-09, Kelly left there for Notre Dame 12 seasons ago and turned the page on his stepping-stone job. Freeman, meanwhile, recruited almost all of the top returning players on a 2021 Bearcats defense that hasn't missed a beat this season, despite his departure and absence. After more than a decade, Kelly no longer knows any of the current Bearcats, while Freeman is familiar with nearly every one of them, especially the six returning defenders he recruited and coached to a 9-1 record and a No. 8 ranking last season in the final Associated Press Top 25. Clearly, there will be some personal feelings from both Kelly and Freeman trying to beat the school that became a launch point to their Notre Dame careers. But since leaving Cincinnati, Kelly has won more than 100 games at Notre Dame and put his three-year Cincinnati stint in the rearview mirror. That's not the case for Freeman, who would never live down building and developing a defense with mainly three-star recruits at one school, then getting beat eight months later by those players with an Irish roster loaded with four-star talent. Point ✦ Counterpoint: WOULD BEATING CINCINNATI MEAN MORE TO BRIAN KELLY OR MARCUS FREEMAN? FREEMAN KELLY Kurt Hinish has seen a lot during his 44 appear- ances and 29 starts since playing immediately as a Notre Dame freshman in 2017. So, we'll forgive the 2021 Irish team captain and veteran anchor of their defensive line for keeping his answers brief and his forecast suc- cinct when recently asked about the early season struggles of a unit that entered the Wisconsin game ranked only 73rd nationally in rush defense (145.7 yards allowed per game) after finishing No. 16 in the country (113.0) in 2020. "We'll be all right," Hinish said with a wry smile pre-Purdue when pressed on the issue. Hinish and his defensive teammates emphatically responded by holding the Boiler- makers to 57 rushing yards and 2.3 yards per carry, while adding seven for tackles for loss and four sacks. Hinish — the definition of Pittsburgh roughneck — will leave Notre Dame as one of its career lead- ers in games played and forever will be remem- bered as a free-spirited and no BS guy. Blue & Gold Illustrated and other local me- dia recently spoke with Hinish about his time at Notre Dame, the reasons for a sluggish start under first-year Irish defensive coordinator Mar- cus Freeman, and where improvements need to come from. BGI: What's your mindset when a long rushing play is allowed? Hinish: "If one of the plays gets through one of our gaps and bleeds through the middle, I take responsibil- ity for that, even if it's in the opposite A-gap. "I feel responsible for that because it is in the middle of the defense. We all hold one another accountable." BGI: How does that accountability become contagious? Hinish: "I missed a tackle for loss against Toledo. We were sitting in the film room watching it, and that play came up. [Defensive tackle] Jayson [Ademilola] turned around and gave me a look. "I looked at him back, I was like, 'You're right.' We have to make those plays." BGI: One of the anticipated strengths of your defense in the preseason was in its ability to stop the run. Why has that yet to happen? Hinish: "Going back and watching the film, it's always one missed tackle, one missed assign- ment. That just comes with missing the details, and that just comes with playing fast. That's something we have to clean up, and that's some- thing we have been cleaning up. "I've missed three or four tackles for loss be- cause I wasn't in the correct position to make the tackles." BGI: How do you correct the problems? Hinish: "We've been making mistakes, and that's going to come with playing fast. When we're on our details and find that happy medium of playing fast and playing mistake free, that's when we're going to be good. "What's been biting us in the ass is the tackling, and that's something we've been working on." BGI: What's the mood of the defensive players? Hinish: "No one in that facility is taking any- thing easy. We're all working extremely hard, especially when we come off the practice field and even in the meeting room. "There's a vibe in the facility that can be felt. We need to have a sense of urgency and intensity when we come outside for practice. … We're still a great group of ballers, and we're going to be a great group of ballers. We just need to find the mix, find the medium, that's what it takes." — Todd D. Burlage Five Questions With … GRADUATE STUDENT NOSE TACKLE KURT HINISH HINISH