Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/608448
UNDER THE DOME the 2015 regular season due to injury. LINEBACKERS Total: 9 Players (Eligibility): James Onwualu (2016), Jaylon Smith (2016), Jarrett Grace (2016), Nyles Morgan (2017), Greer Mar- tini (2017), Te'von Coney (2018), Jamir Jones (2019), Josh Barajas (2019) and Asmar Bilal (2019) The Skinny: Smith is a likely departure because he is a pos- sible top-10 draft pick next spring. Grace could apply for a sixth sea- son of eligibility. CORNERBACKS Total: 9 Players (Eligibility): KeiVarae Russell (2016), Cole Luke (2016), Devin Butler (2016), Nick Wat- kins (2017), Nick Coleman (2018), Shaun Crawford (2019), Ashton White (2019), Donté Vaughn (2019) and Julian Love (2019) The Skinny: Russell seemed to be in the same boat as Stanley before the season as virtual locks for the NFL Draft, but a late-sea- son fractured tibia might lead him to contemplate a fifth year. He won't be a first-round projection like Stanley. SAFETIES Total: 10 Players (Eligibility): Avery Se- bastian (2016), Max Redfield (2016), Nicky Baratti (2016), John Turner (2016), Nicco Fertitta (2018), Drue Tranquill (2018), Mykelti Williams (2019), Spencer Perry (2019), Jalen Elliott (2019) and D.J. Morgan (2019) The Skinny: The Irish are ex- tremely thin here, which has led them to try to keep Sebastian off the field since suffering an injury versus Texas in the season opener so he can return for a sixth season. Baratti is a fifth-year candidate that could return be- cause of depth concerns. Turner has moved around on defense, including linebacker, but he has never really cracked the two-deep rotation. SPECIALISTS Total: 4 Players (Eligibility): Long snap- per Scott Daly (2016), punter Ty- ler Newsome (2018), kicker Justin Yoon (2018) and long snapper John Shannon (2019) The Skinny: The only question here is if Daly returns for a fifth year, giving Notre Dame two schol- arship long snappers. It will likely depend on attrition elsewhere. ✦ Defense Continues To Evolve Now at the end of his second season in charge of Notre Dame's defense, coordinator Brian VanGorder's unit is still "evolving," according to head coach Brian Kelly. Including the first 11 games of 2015 and the 13 from 2014, Notre Dame allowed 40 touchdown drives of 75 yards or more. To compare, the Irish yielded zero such drives in 2012 during the undefeated regular season. With an aggressive scheme, the goal is to produce more turnovers at the cost of allowing long drives and explosive plays. The takeaways, however, just haven't been there for the Irish. Last season, Notre Dame ranked 41st in the nation with 23 turnovers forced. This season, the Irish had just 13 takeaways through 11 games for a national ranking of 103rd. "I still think it's personnel driven" Kelly said. "You're still looking at who you're putting on the field. We've had a number of times where our pressure has certainly done really big things. Ten out of 12 of Boston College's drives were virtually nothing. "I think Brian has brought the kind of pressure and aggressive defensive play that we're looking for in a transition. We're still evolving defensively. We're still working to build our defense. "We're not there yet, clearly. But it's been the kind of transition that I expected. And we're going to get better as we continue to recruit and develop our defense." — Andrew Owens