Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.
In the News
It’s been nearly 40 years since the Supreme Court ruled on amateur athlete compensation but they appear ready to rule in favor of players after the NCAA had a very terrible day in front of America’s highest court on Wednesday. Still a long way to go, but the public polling in this country seems to be lining up in the courts and the dam will break at some point.
Notre Dame held its Pro Day on Wednesday. You can view the highlights and results HERE.
Clark Lea should be happy as Vanderbilt is committing itself to spend $300 million on athletic facility upgrades that will help the Commodores football program.
Long-time Wisconsin athletic director and former coach (and former Notre Dame coordinator) Barry Alvarez is retiring.
Howard Schnellenberger, who built up the Miami Hurricanes while winning their first title in 1983, passed away recently.
According to Pete Thamel, leaders are not happy with NCAA president Mark Emmert. This my shocked face.
Chad Morris is heading back to the Texas prep football ranks and taking over the head coaching duties at powerhouse Allen High School.
Throwback Article
Notre Dame is going to return to Ireland at some point and don’t forget we have the uniforms ready for such an occasion.
The Portal
Former 4-star receiver Giles Jackson is leaving Michigan after 2 seasons in Ann Arbor. He had amassed 24 receptions and 976 kick return yards in his short career.
Quarterback David Summers is leaving Syracuse after 2 seasons with the Orange.
Helmet Talk
Do you like Oklahoma’s helmet? I’ve always liked the candle apple color and how it shines a little bit off the rest of their slightly darker uniforms. As you can see clearly in this picture, the Sooners fattened up their helmet logo and made it more bold for the 2018 season.
I’ve never liked the logo, personally. The school had a pair of italicized logos that were used for many years although never on their helmets. I’d like to see them try those out even if it’s not traditional.
Recruiting
One of country’s top safeties Myles Rowser (0.945) out of Belleville, Michigan committed to Arkansas. That’s a weird choice.
Another safety Trejon Williams (0.920) is staying local and will attend Oregon.
Miami picked up dual-threat quarterback Jacurri Brown (0.932) out of Georgia.
Tennessee running back Jordan James (0.928) committed to Georgia. The Dawgs also picked up outside linebacker Jalon Walker (0.977) out of North Carolina a day earlier, too.
House of the Week
According to his Wikipedia page, Lenny Kravitz does not own a home in the United States. He recently sold his place in Miami and owns property in Paris, the Bahamas, and today’s featured video in the rolling hills of Brazil.
Zero surprise that Kravitz would have a low bed and a copper tub all right next to each other in his bedroom. Nor, that he has an amazing stack of Fender amps and a custom Gibson guitar nearby. Those hand-painted walls are awesome.
Off the grid! No cell service with his whole band living at the compound must lead to some frayed nerves once and a while. But, Kravitz is such a chill dude perhaps it permeates everyone around him. It would seem like you’d need a lot of people to work this farm but the Google machine says Kravitz is worth $80 million so he’s got a nice bank roll going.
Tunes
Hall & Oates are one of my favorite pop groups of all-time, just an amazing catalog of hit songs that they strung together for a number of years. Although, it’s always made me chuckle that they were a little older when they made it big. For example, they are both around their mid-30’s in this video:
“I Can’t Go for That (No Can Do)” has such a sublime intro, especially for a hit pop song. I found it curious that the group spent approximately $14.73 on this music video for a song released in November 1981. I guess it was the early MTV period as the channel had just debuted a few months earlier and artists had some work to do in crafting their videos.
On This Day in Sports
On this day in 1983, New York Islanders winger Mike Bossy scored against the Pittsburgh Penguins to become the 1st player in NHL history to score 60 goals in 3 straight seasons. Perhaps the most underappreciated player in league history, Bossy remains the all-time NHL leader with 0.762 goals per game (573 goals in 752 games) while never finishing higher than 3rd in any single MVP voting.
Book Nook
Let’s do things a little different this week. I’m interested in reading a Carl Sagan book, does someone have a recommendation on which one to read first? Let’s set aside Cosmos and see if there are other books to read first.
Hot Take
Count me among the folks who believe that with the NFL moving to a 17-game schedule (and likely 18-game schedule in the future) the league should change the beginning of the season each year so that the Super Bowl falls on the Sunday before the Monday President’s Day in February. If they started the 2021 season on Thursday, September 16th instead of September 9th this would be the case this year.
Trivia
I am a 21st century running back who ran for just under 1,000 yards and 12 total touchdowns in my Notre Dame career but I never led any of my team’s in rushing during a season. Who am I?
I saw Hall and Oates in the spring of 81′ in the field house at Holy Cross. (Voices came out in 80′) They were terrific. A year later they would not be playing a venue that small.
That’s crazy.
I think I was about 12ft from the stage. I was into heavier stuff and punk and new wave at the time. It was an eye opener into a really great genre of music.
One of the grad assistants I had at ND, his senior prom band was REO Speedwagon.
I saw them about two years ago and they’re still awesome. This song in particular is a crush groove, and it also was a fantastic backbone in sample form for a classic hip-hop track from De La Soul.
Trivia question…. cam mcdaneil?McDaniel? He might have led the team in rushing in 2013 though, sheesh running back play in the kelly years has been a rollercoaster
Yeah, CMC led the Irish in rushing for 2013.
Not sure how many guesses I would need to get to cam McDaniel. These trivia questions are making me realize how many guys I just completely forget about
Torn between Jonas gray and Theo but guessing Theo led 2012 team since cierre missed 4 games. I’ll go Jonas
Didn’t Jonas have a breakout senior year where he then (maybe?) led the team in rushing that year?
He tore his ACL against bc so essentially missed 3 games
Wood led 2011 with almost 100 more carries than Gray.
Riddick is a good guess, though. The 2012 leader was pretty tight.
For the record my guess was Jonah
Oh man Jonas ran for 12 td, never led his team in rushing but finished with 1100 yards in his career. Every week so close…
Trivia: how about Tarean Folston.
He led the 2014 team in rushing, by a lot.
Trivia guess: I’ll probably be the only one to guess him since I seem to be the only person who loved him and thought he was wildly underused – GA3.
Ding, ding.
Two of his TDs were kick returns. Very tricky.
Oh my, au secours (help!) — I saw the kickoff rtn vs USC, best play of a tough night. But who was the other team against whom he ran the other one back ?
The first game that he played in for the Irish, as a true freshman, on his second touch, against Michigan State.
I’ll toss out a guess — Robert Hughes?
I don’t think he led any team in rushing but he ran for almost 1,400 yards in his career.
Love that Hall & Oates song, this remix is 1000% worth a listen as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3YWiOUB6oE
That’s a nice groove.
The only non-Cosmos book by Sagan that I read was Contact. I thought it was very good. At the very end he throws a real mind-bending concept (possibility? Not sure how to describe it) regarding the ratio, Pi.