Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/388723
Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly … On senior quarterback Everett Gol- son's spike/fumble: "We have guys upstairs who saw it. They thought his arm was moving forward. I'd have to have a better perspective of it than just what somebody was telling me." Notre Dame senior linebacker and team captain Joe Schmidt … On Irish head coach Brian Kelly saying such a performance would usually result in a loss: "He said that to you, and he echoed it to us. A lot of the other stuff that he said we'll keep in house. We have to be better. "Syracuse is a great team, and I'm not going to take anything away from Syracuse, but we have to be better on defense. I'll let the other guys talk about what we have to do on offense and special teams. As a defense, we can't make the mistakes we made to- night again. "The good news is we're going to fly back tonight, and we're going to go back to work Monday morning." On the ugly manner of the win: "You never want to take away a win from being a win. … You have to give it its due. We want to make sure we're focusing on getting better in the future, but at the same time, we got to enjoy it." On any satisfaction gleaned from the win: "You've got to be happy, I guess. I'm hard on myself. I missed a couple tackles, and I just can't stand that. "Obviously I'm upset about that, but as a whole I couldn't be happier about the win. Syracuse is a great team." Notre Dame sophomore linebacker Jaylon Smith … On returning home for two games: "It's always good to be home. You've got your family, crowd, students there. Your classmates and things like that. We're looking forward to going back home for the next two games." On the chance to learn as much from a win as a loss: "You talk about Stanford and North Carolina and Flor- FROM THE LOCKER ROOM Sophomore linebacker Jaylon Smith made a team- high nine tackles and helped the Irish contain Syracuse's potent ground attack (93 yards on 29 carries, not including the 42-yard run on a fake punt). PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA