Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/393046
UNDER THE DOME versity president Fr. John Jenkins and director of athletics Jack Swarbrick held a press conference announcing the opening of the inquiry Aug. 15. For context's sake, when Notre Dame took the field against Stanford, it marked 50 days since that press conference, and in that stretch only head coach Brian Kelly has spoken publicly about the investigation, facing the media up to four times a week. Unlike the players, Kelly has not been a part of the investigation in any respect. Nonethe- less, Kelly understands the players' frustration, explicitly referring to Russell's outburst on In- stagram. "I feel for my players," Kelly said Thursday. "I feel bad for them. At least, that's the feelings that I have. They're miss- ing significant amount of playing time. That's hard to give up, playing time. "I know when I was in college, you miss a game, you're an 18-, 19-, 20-year-old, that's catastrophic. I under- stand what they're going through. I know it must be difficult. I feel for them." As frustrated as his players are, Kelly insists he is not, even though he is missing three likely starters in Russell, Daniels and Williams. Instead, Kelly has re- mained attentive to the 80-plus players he does have at his disposal. "My focus has been on the group that I have," Kelly said. "My frustra- tions are in the game and taking care of the football and all that stuff." If the investigation re- sults in Kelly having any or all of the five players in question at his dis- posal, the exact timeline of their return remains the grayest of areas no matter what medium one uses to figure it out. Russell mentioned other hearings. Daniels feels nothing in this life should need seven-plus weeks to be resolved. Kelly referenced the need for a ruling — guilty or innocent — after the hearings. In other words, there is at least one more step to this elongated process. "We're in that [hear- ing] process today, to- morrow," Kelly said Oct. 2. "I haven't heard anything else other than I think we'll wrap [the hearings] up in the next 24 hours or so. "I didn't talk to Kei- Varae first-hand, but based upon the informa- tion that is second-hand, third-hand — I don't have any first-hand infor- mation — it sounds like sometime next week." With that resolution could come NCAA sanc- tions. Such a possibility was included in Jenkins' and Swarbricks's initial comments. Earlier in this saga, Kelly said he had not heard of NCAA NOTRE DAME FOOTBALL TICKETS 25 YEARS IN BUSINESS Call today for Special Discount 1-800-925-2500 www.NotreDameTickets.com