Notre Dame Fighting Irish College Football Pregame Quote, 12/26/2018

Is there a larger story here where both quarterbacks started the season, one is transferring, one may transfer. Is that just the lay of the land these days, you start and depart? I mean, quarterback position is so unique, right? It’s the most, I think, heralded position on the field. And so, you know, coaches are always looking for a guy they can trust to lead the team. And so if you’re a second string guy, it’s like, you know, if the coach trusts the first guy, your odds of playing are pretty slim. Especially if it’s a younger guy that beats you out. And so it kind of becomes a game of well, I don’t have that great of a chance to see the field, especially if the guy starting ahead of me is younger. So I think that’s why you see a lot of guys making that move.

I talked to Ian [Book] about that, and I asked him was there a point where he had to win the locker room before winning the job because I compared it to Tua [Tagovailoa] last year. He throws that touchdown pass to win the championship and everybody goes nuts and Nick Saban says at some point he’s going to have to win the locker room. We had a similar situation where DeShone [Kiser] took over Malik [Zaire] and our locker room just split. And it was awful. It was everything you hoped to stay away from in regards to just team camaraderie and togetherness. It was like there were two different camps almost. And maybe the guys in the locker room wouldn’t admit to that, but I think looking back, that’s kind of what happened.

This situation has been totally different. And maybe that comes with experience. We all experienced ’16. Both guys, you would think the guys were best friends, Ian and Brandon [Wimbush] they’re always trying to make each other better, always talking, always dabbing each other up. And our guys, some guys on the team are better friends with Brandon but it’s like they equally support Ian, and it’s been great for us.

I asked Chip [Long] about that. He said in a ‘Sports Illustrated’ story, it got to the point as far as the quarterbacks go where it was about the other ten and not just one to keep morale high. What do you think that meant? I mean, I think what that means is you’ve got guys like Sam Mustipher, Miles Boykin, Dexter Williams, Tony Jones, all these other guys around him. It’s not everybody puts so much of a focus on the quarterback position. There are ten other guys who not only make him better but make the team move forward as a cohesive whole.

I think Coach Long is saying it isn’t like the quarterback getting us up and inspiring us on a daily basis. Let’s have the other ten guys help pick him up and move forward.