Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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UNDER THE DOME Mik Aoki began his second spring with the Irish baseball team in February after finishing 23-29-1 last year. Aoki revived the baseball programs at Columbia and Boston College prior to Five Questions With … HEAD BASEBALL COACH MIK AOKI coming to Notre Dame. In 2001, he led Columbia to its first 20-win season in 14 years. He then reeled off two more 20-victory campaigns before joining the Eagles in 2004. Aoki brought Boston Col- lege to the NCAA Regional round for the first time in more than 40 years while coaching four All-ACC players in 2009. He graduated from Davidson in 1990 where he was a three-year starter. This season, the Irish jumped out to a 7-5 start with a benchmark victory over No. 11 LSU in Baton Rouge. The Tigers are the highest-ranked team Notre Dame has defeated since downing No. 7 Nebraska in 2007. In his first season at the helm, Aoki guided the Irish to a 23-29-1 record in 2011. PHOTO BY JOE RAYMOND is beating LSU to your team's confidence and getting established in your second year? Blue & Gold Illustrated: How important players in our program, the level at which LSU has been for the last 20 years or so is the level we all want Notre Dame baseball to get back to. I think you need to go out there and play a few games in your non-conference schedule that are like that to give yourself a little barometer of where you are as a program. "Every year we need to … go play some quality teams." Aoki: "For me, and I think for all of the starting pitchers] are guys that typically when they're throwing well they com- mand the strike zone very well. They're strike throwers. You're going to need to string some hits together to beat them. "You want to pitch and play defense and get a little timely hitting. That's sort of the age-old axiom in baseball." Blue & Gold Illustrated: What do you hope the identity of this team will be? Aoki: "I think in this new age of the new bat you better be pitching first. [Our coach. Is strict discipline a big part of your coaching philosophy? Aoki: "You don't want to be too crazy and over the top and dictatorial, but I Blue & Gold Illustrated: Your players describe you as a "drill sergeant" type of think at some level or another kids crave that structure and respond well to that structure. So you put your rules in place, you understand and you try to com- municate to them the way you want to see the game played." in your career. Does that give you an advantage by coaching presumably smart kids? Blue & Gold Illustrated: You've coached at some pretty good academic schools really good kids. … The quality of the person that I've had the privilege to coach has been really high. This whole team is no exception to that. They're phenom- enal kids and that part is really good." Aoki: "I think the biggest thing with that is I've had the privilege of coaching pared to Boston College and Columbia? Aoki: The biggest thing is probably the level of expectation for baseball. I don't Blue & Gold Illustrated: What's the biggest difference at Notre Dame com- mean this as a slam on BC or Columbia, but I don't think the places I've been have looked at baseball and said, 'We should be able to compete at a national level.' … Notre Dame really across the boards feels as though they should be competitive at every sport they put out there." — Dan Murphy 10 APRIL 2012 Running back/linebacker John Panelli (left) and lineman Marty Wendell (right) were 1949 graduates and passed away in the first week of March, both at the age of 85. PHOTOS COURTESY NOTRE DAME MEDIA RELATIONS when the Irish were 36-0-2 on the gridiron with three national titles — were lost during the first week of March. Both running back/linebacker John Panelli (passed away on March 2) and lineman Marty Wendell (March 7) were 85 and 1949 graduates. Last fall Blue & Gold Illustrated listed 10 of the greatest one-two running back punches in Notre Dame history during one season, and at No. 8 was the duo of Panelli with College Football Hall of Fame member Emil "Six Yard" Sitko. During Notre Dame's 1948 unbeaten campaign, Panelli rushed for Two of Notre Dame's greats from its Golden Years in 1946-49 — 692 yards and 7.52 yards per carry — the third highest by an Irish back in one season, behind George Gipp (8.11 in 1920) and Reggie Brooks (8.04 in 1992). The 12th pick in the 1949 NFL Draft by Detroit, Panelli earned the R.I.P. JOHN PANELLI AND MARTY WENDELL Coffman award for Most Valuable Player in the East-West All-Star Classic in 1949 and played five years in the NFL before starting a con- struction equipment dealership in Southfield, Mich. He was a founding member and president of the National Football League Alumni Asso- ciation, which worked with NFL franchise owners to create a fund for pre-1960s players who were not pensioned, many of whom were in financial difficulty. He also was active in Notre Dame clubs, including serving as president of the Notre Dame Monogram Club. Pound for pound, the 5-9, 210-pound guard/linebacker Wendell was one of the toughest and most overshadowed players ever at Notre Dame. On Irish teams where fourth-team players such as Art Statuto — who starred in the NFL — couldn't crack the top three units, the relatively undersized Wendell played guard alongside College Football Hall of Fame members such as George Connor, Leon Hart, Jim Martin, Zygmont "Ziggy" Czarobski and Bill "Moose" Fischer. Yet, back in 2000 former teammate Jack Connor recalled the respect the rugged Wendell — nicknamed "Spearhead" — had among his teammates just in blocking or tackling drills alone and knowing where Wendell was in the line. "You'd pretend you had a shoelace untied or something to let an- other guy ahead of you so you would be blocking someone — anyone — else [than Wendell]," Connor said. "After you'd hit Marty head on, you just didn't ever want to do it again." Named an All-American by the then prestigious Collier's Magazine, Wendell played in the College All-Star Game in his native Chicago and one season in the NFL before opting for a career in general contracts for construction and carpentry contracting. BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED