Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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20 DECEMBER 2016 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED Kelly, who has had his own prob- lems on the field during a losing sea- son, said he has no reason to believe he won't be the head coach at Notre Dame in 2017. "This matter … has nothing to do with me and my status here," Kelly said. "This academic piece probably strengthens what I've been doing rel- ative to advocating for our student- athletes and the support staff neces- sary for them to be successful. "This obviously has been some- thing that's been going on for a few years. The announcement that comes out today has nothing to do with lack or additional support for Brian Kelly. "Any negative criticism that's out there about me right now is because we're 4-7. It has nothing to do with the public announcement that came out here today." Notre Dame's one-year probation has no implications on bowl games or scholarship reductions, Kelly said. ✦ Players React To NCAA Penalty Outsiders are looking for a reason to hate on Notre Dame's football program, senior left tackle Mike McGlinchey said. The NCAA's order that Notre Dame's wins be vacated from the 2012 and 2013 seasons in the wake of an academic misconduct investigation gives those people more ammunition. But McGlinchey, one of four team captains for the Irish this season, said the 2016 team isn't letting the penalty affect them. "Whatever the NCAA decides is what the NCAA de- cides," McGlinchey said. "We understand that Notre Dame is a top-class university. Things are handled the right way, and that's the way they acted on it. "We don't really know what's going to happen from here on out, but the team understands that it has no bearing on what we're doing on Saturday and what we're focused on." Notre Dame has announced that it is appealing the harsh penalty, which head coach Brian Kelly deemed "ex- cessive." The school did not dispute the NCAA's findings, and the appeals process could take months. McGlinchey and fellow captain and senior defensive lineman Isaac Rochell were focused on the season finale at USC Nov. 26, not the case against Notre Dame. "It's not something we're overly concerned about; it doesn't affect our team," Rochell said. "I don't think that situation is over with, so who knows. We can talk in six months, seven months or whatever." McGlinchey went to bat for the school's academic repu- tation, calling Notre Dame the "best university in the world" and stating that the football locker room is filled with "some of the highest character guys in the country." "You never want to have those kind of mistakes in your program and especially with guys you consider your teammates," McGlinchey said. "But people make mistakes and it just so happened that they're at this uni- versity. People like to throw a little hatred at our school, and that's fine. "It's frustrating, but at the same time it has no affect on us moving forward." Rochell and McGlinchey said Irish head coach Brian Kelly briefly discussed the issue with the team. Though it wasn't a major point of discussion, the seventh-year coach felt it necessary to address with his current players. "He literally just told us the facts and told us what's going on," Rochell said. "He just wanted to assure everybody that it doesn't affect us, doesn't affect our team now and won't affect Notre Dame next year or in the future." For McGlinchey, who was a freshman on the 2013 team that went 9-4 and won the Pinstripe Bowl, it doesn't change anything. "We know we won the games," McGlinchey said. "They're not going to take that away from us. They can take it away in the record books all they want, but we won the games. We had a good season that year, and they had an even better season the year before that. "Go ahead and scratch them off a piece of paper, but we know we won those [21] games." — Matt Jones Falling Down The Chart Entering the 2016 college football season, Notre Dame was clinging to its No. 1 spot on the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision all- time winning percentage chart. Its .73215 win- ning percentage (892-313-42) was just ahead of No. 2 Michigan's .72987 (925-331-36). By the start of October, after Notre Dame opened 1-3 and Michigan 4-0, the Wolverines edged ahead to the top spot. By the end of this November, the NCAA's ruling recommending that Notre Dame vacate its 21 total victories from 2012 (12-1) and 2013 (9-4) because of self-reported academic fraud would make the Fighting Irish hard pressed to ever reach the top again in the winning percentage category, unless they win the impending appeal in court. Notre Dame could fall to the sixth spot in win percentage, behind Michigan, Boise State, Ohio State, Oklahoma and Alabama. In total wins, it would drop to fifth, behind Michigan, Texas, Nebraska and Ohio State. In NCAA parlance, "vacating" a victory is not the same as forfeiting one. When USC was stripped of the 2004 national title, it merely gave it zero wins instead of 13. Notre Dame remained 6-6 that year even though it lost 41-10 at USC. It counted neither as a win nor a "non-loss" for the Irish. The losing team retains the loss. A vacated win affects only the penalized team's season records, all-time records and the head coach's record. A team that was 9-4 during a season in which it fielded ineligible players would have its record revised to 0-4. Instead of 59-30, Brian Kelly's record at Notre Dame now would be 38-30. Among top 10 all-time programs, Ohio State had 12 victories vacated by the NCAA during the 2010 season, Alabama had eight victories and one tie forfeited by the NCAA during the 1993 season plus 21 victories vacated by the NCAA between the 2005-07 seasons, and USC had 14 victories vacated by the NCAA during the 2004 and 2005 seasons. — Lou Somogyi Senior offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey said the NCAA ruling has no bearing or affect on the current or future Notre Dame teams. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA With Notre Dame vacating 21 victories from 2012 and 2013, Michigan now takes com- mand in all-time winning percentage. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA