Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/400621
BY ANDREW OWENS T arean Folston has always been able to lay a bruising hit on a chasing defensive back or an incoming linebacker, but he didn't always want to choose that route. Now a sophomore at Notre Dame, he remembers his days in high school when his coach would give him grief for choosing to run out of bounds rather than attempt to pick up the difficult yardage and welcome a hit or dish out one of his own. "I definitely remember that," he said with a laugh from inside Notre Dame's Isban Auditorium at the Guglielmino Center. "After that, he joked with me about stepping out of bounds. I feel I didn't step out of bounds, but that I was forced, but after that he gave me crap about it for the longest time and we joke about it to this day. "That day as a sophomore he found out what made me tick. He kept getting that in my head and was making me mad, and I started running with aggres- sion and I never looked to run out of bounds after that. It's just about get- ting those tough yards and going out of bounds didn't do it for us." Now you'll never see Folston opt for the reassuring safety of the sidelines over the bone-crushing impact of a de- fender, but he is smart to use finesse with a juke at times to make players miss, as seen in Notre Dame's 50-43 win over North Carolina Oct. 11. Head coach Brian Kelly was 26-2 in the first 28 contests at Notre Dame in which his team won the time of posses- sion battle, but that has at times been difficult the past two seasons with an on-and-off rushing attack that ranked 66th nationally through six games with an average of 4.3 yards per carry. Folston admitted he prefers to benefit from a rhythm — as he did with 18 car- ries for 98 yards and five receptions for 71 yards and three total touchdowns in the win against the Tar Heels — but he also remains diplomatic when dis- cussing Notre Dame's running back by committee. "It helps in the long run with the ro- tation to keep all your backs fresh and healthy for the whole season, the long season," he said. "Also it helps to kind of get a rhythm. I could say it helps for both, but I'm not picking a side." He did pick a side immediately fol- lowing the win over the Tar Heels. "You get a better feel for the game, I guess, if you stay in more," he said. "I'm still trying to make the most of my opportunities." Kelly has shown the willingness to ride the hot hand among Folston, fellow sophomore Greg Bryant and senior Cam McDaniel. "We got into a really good rhythm with [Folston] in there [against North Carolina], tough yardage, breaking tack- les, running through tackles, and that's what we've been asking the backs to do, is to run through tacklers," the coach said. "They're physical, strong backs, and once we saw he was going to run in that kind of manner and demeanor, he was going to get more carries." While it doesn't make for as interest- ing a highlight film, Kelly has singled out Folston's strides in pass protection. "He does little things sometimes that don't show up in the stat sheet that as coaches, we really appreciate," Kelly