Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM JUNE/JULY 2022 29 that's not true. Look at the change I did." Willingness to take a leap of faith isn't necessarily innate. It's a quality learned and developed. Sometimes, it's simply listening to an inner voice. That's what Stuckey did when he made the trip to the national championship game three years ago. Now he's the wide receivers coach at Notre Dame. Stuckey called it "a favor of God." Whatever it was, it certainly wasn't an accident. "We knew when he came in he was different," Elliott said. "He was special. He has a unique passion, love and a way of inspiring and identifying the good in everybody and being able to accentuate those positives." "Once he made this commitment that he wanted to be a coach, he's done the same thing that he did as a player — he's blossomed," Swinney added. "And he has a bright, bright future." Not just a bright future. A golden one. "The moment you're around him, there's an energy, there's a personal- ity there that you immediately put your belief in someone like that," Notre Dame offensive coordinator Tommy Rees said. " To m m y p u t h i m t h ro u g h t h e wringer," Notre Dame head coach Mar- cus Freeman said of the interview pro- cess. "Tommy came in and said, 'He's the guy I want.' So I said, 'Let me inter- view him.' I spent 30 to 45 minutes with him and said, 'He's the right person for our program.'" 'LIKE A ROCKET SHIP IN THIS PROFESSION' Stuckey's stay on Swinney's staff spanned all of two years. Clemson went back to the CFP in 2019 and again in 2020. The Tigers had a 24-3 record while Stuckey was there. Then Baylor head coach Dave Aranda called Swinney, and Stuckey was gone. Just like that. It didn't surprise Swinney in the slightest. "I told him, 'If you come in here and commit yourself to a couple of years, it is not going to take you long,'" Swinney recalled of his initial pitch to Stuckey in 2019. "'You're going to be like a rocket ship in this profession.'" Freeman did to Aranda what Aranda did to Swinney. He poached Stuckey from the Bears' staff. Ironically, it only took Stuckey three years to land a job Swinney desperately wanted when he already had eight years of coaching on his ledger. Swinney was let go from the staff at Alabama when head coach Mike DuBose was fired after the 2000 season. Swinney had been an assistant there, his alma mater, since 1993. Notre Dame had an opening for a re- ceivers coach at the same time, but Irish head coach Bob Davie picked Joker Wil- liams, who only stayed on the Irish's staff for one season. Davie was fired af- ter the 2001 campaign. "It didn't work out, but it's cool all these years later to see one of my guys be the receivers coach there," Swinney said. All it took was a trip to Northern Cali- fornia, an awakening, a phone call and some coffee. ✦ "Change isn't always bad. As young people we have this vision. And if anything deviates from that, the world is over. I can tell them that's not true. Look at the change I did." STUCKEY During his two years on the staff at Clemson, Stuckey helped the Tigers to a 24-3 record — winning the ACC title and reaching the College Football Playoff in both seasons — and the national championship game in 2019. PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER