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quently had difficulty wrapping up on tackles because of it. "I don't want to bring his play into the spotlight, per se, but he helps us because he can get us lined up back there," Kelly said of why Collinsworth played. "But he clearly isn't 100 percent either. We would like to have the two young guys back there, but they haven't been consistent enough. That's forced Austin into the game, and he's not 100 percent. He's given us every- thing he has, though." That raises the ques- tion about whether the scheme is too com- plex, or even wrong, if it cannot put the best athletes on the field. For example, when the nation's top-rated l i n e b a c k e r, J a y l o n Smith, began prac- ticing with the Irish in August 2013 as a freshman, Kelly said it was the responsibility of the coaching staff to find a way to get him on the field. "When it comes to coaching, if we make it that complicated that I can't get Jaylon Smith on the field, then we're not really good coaches," Kelly said in August 2013. "… I think we can make it such that we can get talented players like Jaylon Smith on the field." When asked the day after the Louisville game whether it applied to Red- field and Shumate, Kelly said the cases are not quite the same. "It's a dramatic shift from where we were last year to this year in terms of the scheme that we're playing," Kelly said. "We're never going to put it all on the players. It's part coaching as well. You're right in the premise of your question that we've got to get the best players on the field, but they also have to be the most productive players. It's also about production while they're on the field. "Max and Elijah are not on the field just because there are mental mistakes, but there are production lapses as well. It's a little bit of both in that sense. In other words, it's not just simply the scheme. It's also about production, and we've got to keep an eye on both of those things." UNDER THE DOME Despite spending most of the season as a starter and ranking third on the team with 51 tackles through 11 games, junior safety Elijah Shumate has found himself on the bench late in the season. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA