Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.

Top News

Notre Dame will open spring practice on March 17th St. Patrick’s Day. That date, plus April 2nd and April 12th will be partially viewed by the media. Only the March 26th practice will be a full media viewing. The Blue-Gold Game will be played on April 23rd with a draft of rosters by captains done on April 20th.

Notre Dame’s Pro Day will be held on March 25th.

Kevin Austin ran a 4.43 in the 40-yard dash yesterday at the NFL Combine. Jack Coan clocked in at a scorching 4.90 time.

As it ends, Art Briles will not be taking the OC job at Grambling State.

The NCAA has increased the threshold of THC in an athletes body to trigger a positive test and decreased the penalties for testing positive with smoking marijuana.

Former 5-star receiver from the 2020 class Demon Demas was suspended by Texas A&M following an arrest for assault against his girlfriend.

It was revealed by his family that former Hawaii quarterback Colt Brennan had CTE.

Uniform of the Week

Everyone loves the SMU “Dallas” uniforms but I’m not here to talk about them today. I want to focus on their home blue standard uniform. They are an important example of how something small can change the entire look. For example, their jerseys and pants are really nice, if basic. They are dominated by blue with a little bit of red trim. What I love is that the helmets have red facemasks and the red pony in blue outline.

If they kept blue as the dominant color for the helmets it changes everything. They sometimes wear red jerseys and although there are examples of them inverting the helmet logo, when they don’t it looks so different. The lack of contrast really makes them look like a generic football team from a bad movie. The contrast above is much cooler.

Recruiting

Former four-star corner in the 2021 class Jaylin Davies is leaving Oregon.

Watch out for D-II West Florida quarterback Austin Reed who is in the Transfer Portal. He won the National Championship in 2019, his team didn’t play in 2020, and he’ll be moving on with 2 years of eligibility remaining.

Productive Memphis defensive lineman Morris Joseph (18.5 career TFL) is in the Portal.

YouTube Channel

When I was in college The Chappelle Show was pretty much the only appointment television outside of sports that we would watch together in the dorms. Of course, there were many classic skits but re-watching a full episode can be a little cringe these days. I don’t think I’ll ever feel that way about Key and Peele’s skits which are aging like fine wine. This airplane skit I think about and chuckle to on a regular basis.

“If 9/11’s t’wer to happen up on this here plane”, “we gonna draxx them sclounst”, “oh we definitely gonna drive some hypothetical’s on that terrie’s clavicle”, “he doesn’t have the heart nor the gumption”, “okay max leg room”, “because with great power comes great responsitrilitrence”, and “perfectly lee-gwell.” So many lines for the ages. The “I’m on vacation” by the straight man at the end always slays me. An all-time performance from a straight man in a comedy skit.

Tunes

The song featured this week was actually released almost a year ago from the band The Anxiety which is a duo of singers Willow Smith and Tyler Cole. If you were wondering, yes that is the daughter of actor Will Smith. She’s the singer who opens up the song. While doing some research, this song initially blew up on Tik-Tok, while I heard it on my Apple Music on a modern hits channel. Click, saved to my playlist.

Just a few points from me. I am really surprised that they let the intro play for such a long time, just about 20 seconds. Especially for a relatively short song at 2:43 seconds. I like it, but I’m also wondering if it’s a bar or two too long. Also, the live version on Smith’s page has way more pageviews and it sounds much different. Smith’s voice looks like it’s not treated as much and it’s missing some of the backing vocals that make the original version charming.

Trivia

When was the last time a player returned at least 3 punt returns for touchdown in a single season? Choices include 2019, 2017, or 2014.

The Other Football

The war in Ukraine has sent massive reverberations throughout world soccer as FIFA has banned Russia from the World Cup, suspended the Russian national teams, while UEFA has come down with similar sanctions.

Russian owner of Chelsea, Roman Abromovich, went from mysteriously letting the board run the team for a while to now publicly putting the team up for sale, including eating the $1.5 billion in debt that the club owes him.

Elsewhere in England, Tottenham were knocked out of the FA Cup after a late winner from Middlesbrough in extra time.

Napoli scored a late winner this past weekend to move into a tie for first place in Italy as AC Milan and Inter both tied.

MLS kicked off last weekend with the following teams picking up a win: Columbus Crew, DC United, New York Red Bulls, Atlanta United, Orlando City, Austin FC, LAFC, Nashville SC, and LA Galaxy.

Streaming

Is it weird to feel this aching sense of melancholy while watching “There Will Be Blood?” It’s easily one of my favorite movies this century and one that left me riveted the entire time. I was curious how it was going to end and the relationship between Daniel Day-Lewis and the young preacher is one of those things where it made me so uncomfortable and yet I couldn’t look away.

It’s also one of those turn of the century movies that feels both incredibly old during the oil drilling scenes that take up so much of the movie. And yet, when the movie ends it’s the late 1920’s and DDL is living in a huge mansion that all feels so incredibly modern, like he ended up living 130 years or something. He has a bowling alley! I don’t know, something about that transition from the rural outdoors living in a grimy world to a house living comfortably in a situation that looks so modern stirs something inside me.

A Look Back

There have been some frustrating losses to Pitt over the years but as I look back at the record books my goodness has Notre Dame really put it on the Panthers on occasion through the years. For example, there was a stretch from 1991-96 where the Irish dominated in 5 games scoring a combined 243 points.

Today, we take a look at the 1993 game when Pitt was shutout 44-0 in South Bend. This was a good time to be a Notre Dame fan. The close win over Michigan was a few weeks earlier and since then the team had won comfortably to reach 5-0 while feeling like something special was on the horizon.

18S Paddock Club

Alfa Romeo became the final team on the grid to unveil their 2022 livery. In terms of design, the car switches from primarily white to primarily red. The front wing switches from white to black while a swath of black also extends down the side of the nose. The four-leaf clover remains near the engine cover but the traditional Alfa Romeo logo is removed in favor of a 1920’s throwback script. Also, notice the red/white coloring of the wheel rims.

Alfa Romeo C42. 

Barcelona Testing Recap: Many teams were dealing with the bouncing “porpoising” effect at the end of the fast straights. McLaren was a team highlighted for using a possibly inventive (or illegal) flexi-floor to manage the bouncing. Teams could raise their ride height and fix the problem but don’t want to lose performance from sealing the floor in the process. Every team save Alfa Romeo are reportedly over the weight limit with several teams asking for an increase.

Drama continues to swirl around the Haas team. The FIA ruled on Tuesday that Russian drivers are allowed to compete so Nikita Mazepin could keep his seat. However, the British Grand Prix is banning Russians, plus Haas is still working through the possible removal of their leading sponsor Uralkali, a company largely controlled by Mazepin’s oligarch father. As of Thursday night, there were reports that Mazepin will ultimately lose his seat with Haas reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi likely to take over in the short-term and/or former Alfa Romeo and current Ferrari reserve driver Antonio Giovinazzi being more of a long-term solution.

After Michael Andretti’s failed attempt to buy Alfa Romeo/Sauber this winter there are fresh reports that Andretti Autosport is ready to pay the $200 million entry fee and create a brand new F1 team starting in 2024. They are awaiting a response from the FIA. According to Andretti they are prepared to use Renault engines and will utilize their Indianapolis home base with a factory in England.

*Sign up for our 18 Stripes F1 Fantasy League*
https://fantasy.formula1.com/
Code: b955a1b60d

Trivia Answer:

2017, Dante Pettis at Washington returned 4 punt returns for scores.