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

Top News

Herm Edwards has been fired at Arizona State. In just over 4 seasons he was 26-20 with the Sun Devils. With a NCAA investigation still pending, ASU has turned to running backs coach Shaun Aguano as the interim head coach.

Sports Illustrated has a copy of the proposed new NCAA calendar suggested from the 10 conferences and Notre Dame which includes:

  • Opening up week 0 to all teams
  • Hosting recruits for week 0 would be allowed
  • Moving the start of bowl games up a week
  • Allow coaches to visit recruits off campus as juniors
  • A 48-hour dead period in November before the transfer portal opens
  • Moving the start of ESD to the 3rd Monday in December
  • A new recruiting dead period during Memorial Day weekend

Tennessee has given head coach Josh Heupel a $1 million raise as he now makes over $5 million per season.

Nebraska has fired defensive coordinator Erik Chinander.

Marshall’s offensive line coach Eddy Morrissey resigned late last week. Going out on top after beating Notre Dame, I see.

Both athletic directors from Oklahoma and Oklahoma State have agreed that the Bedlam rivalry will not be played once the Sooners move to the SEC.

Air Force will host Army next year at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver.

The ACC headquarters have officially moved from Greensboro to Charlotte, North Carolina.

RIP to eardrums in Corvallis as Oregon State is bringing in 40 temporary speakers in to the lower bowl of their stadium ahead of the USC game this weekend.

From the “I immediately regret this” department Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff has said it’s possible UCLA will remain in the league and he doesn’t anticipate any other schools ever leaving the conference.

Notre Dame alum Jackie Young won a WNBA title with the Las Vegas Aces on Sunday.

Uniform of the Week

Stop me if you’ve heard this before–a college football team decided to break out black uniforms for a night game. This past Saturday the next edition was the Georgia State Panthers. Founded in 2010 and now celebrating their 10th season at the FBS level, the school plays their home games inside a reconfigured Turner Field in Atlanta where the Braves used to play.

I really like the way they put this together, although I’m sure Georgia State wishes they didn’t lose to Charlotte by a point wearing them. I get kind of a mixture between Memphis and Air Force. The “Atlanta” across the chest is pretty cool. Although, I’m not sure why the Under Armour logo moved from the left chest to the bottom of the collar. It’s such an odd decision when it balanced better on the left chest opposite the Sun Belt patch.

Recruiting

Georgia wideout Adam Hopkins (0.9250) has committed to Auburn.

Alabama reached into Texas and gained a commitment from edge rusher Jordan Renaud (0.9667) on Monday. The Tide also grabbed receiver Jalen Hale (0.9765) from the Lone Star State on Wednesday, too.

California linebacker Blake Nichelson (0.9139) is headed to Florida State.

In the 2024 class, running back Chauncey Bowens (0.9120) committed to Florida and tight end Joey Olsen (0.9263) committed to USC.

YouTube Channel

Notre Dame is set to play in Lase Vegas in a couple weeks. My first trip was in the summer of 1996 for the USA Roller Hockey National Championships and we stayed in Excalibur which was…an experience. We played 4 games total, 2 in the conference area of Cashman Field where they set up a handful of roller rinks, and then 2 outside on the actual Cashman Field set up right in the infield. It was unsafe and scorching hot in all this hockey equipment. We casually destroyed teams from Pasadena and Hawaii outside in that heat for without a doubt the strangest sporting experience of my life.

If you’re going to the BYU game, where are you staying? I’m not really into poker or blackjack so for me choosing a place to stay depends on location, sportsbook situations, food options, and general vibes. On my last trip we stayed at New York, New York which is a quiet chill place with solid food options but so far away from most of the places we were going. With the game at Allegiant Stadium, it would be a good location for most, I think.

My favorite casinos in no order, again based largely on vibes and sportsbooks, would be:

  • Luxor
  • Casear’s Palace
  • The Venetian

I have not been yet but the new sportsbook at Circa in old Las Vegas (currently being advertised on the Irish Illustrated podcast!) has the unquestioned top location to watch sports now. We’ll have some more Vegas content coming up during the bye week, so stay tuned.

Tunes

Any time you’re a musical duo specializing in dance, disco, and house music while turning yourselves into robot personas and making it seem eminently cool, you have become legends. I had a friend in college who had Daft Punk’s 2001 album Discovery and through his love of anime that’s how I came to absorb some of their content. I didn’t really dig any further into the group until their 2013 album Random Access Memories came out, and even then I waited a couple years. Once during a quiet day at work I fired up my Spotify and let this LP play much to my surprise.

I wish this wasn’t their last album! It’s so weird, eclectic, and really marketable all in one package. Everyone remembers the hit single “Get Lucky” which took over the entire 2013 summer. Check out this song “Giorgo by Moroder” as an example of a unique and funky song. This is a triumph in how to overlay conversational speaking on to the band’s music.

Trivia

Which program is leading FBS in scoring through week 3?

The Other Football

The Premier League came back this weekend after the mourning of Queen Elizabeth II as City wiped out Wolves 3-0, Son netted a hat trick in Tottenham’s 6-2 win over Leicester, Arsenal shut out Brentford 3-0, and Everton got past West Ham 1-0.

We’re headed into an international break and when we come back it’s North London Derby time.

UEFA has confirmed that Russia will remain banned and cannot play in the 2024 European Championships.

Barcelona have recorded a profit (wink, wink) of 98 million Euros for the 2021-22 season.

Streaming

Grimy 1970’s New York City movies, you know I’m in and will always watch. This week I’m discussing the 1974 crime drama The Taking of Pelham One Two Three which I caught on Netflix a while back. I went into it knowing nothing (outside of it being a subway crime of some sort) and hadn’t watched the 2009 re-make either. The modern film has a 51% score on Rotten Tomatoes while the original has a nifty 100% score. There are no lies in that top score.

My prior experience with actor Walter Matthau was in Grumpy Old Men and Bad News Bears. I thought he did an excellent job in this role as a transit official. However, Robert Shaw really shines as a bad guy on the train and had to feel great about his career at the time. As Pelham was released Shaw was in the middle of filming his more famous role as Quint in the upcoming Jaws movie released 8 months later.

A Look Back

The 2017 season opener at home against Temple is our look back this week. We know Notre Dame was coming into this game with a lot of questions following that season while the Owls were coming off a 10-win season but replaced head coach Matt Rhule with Geoff Collins in the off-season. You want to talk about the stock of someone dipping quickly, look no further than Rhule being a struggle bus in the NFL with Carolina. I know I’m a college guy and my advise is to never go to the NFL. Although, the Panthers gave him $62 million so perhaps his advisors shouldn’t listen to me.

This was the debut of what would become the 33 Trucking campaign. And we got fireworks right away. All three of Josh Adams, Dexter Williams, and Brandon Wimbush went over 100 rushing yards on a day where the Irish totaled 422 yards on the ground. Four. Hundred. Twenty-two. Great times. It’s amazing that these 2 seasons at Temple got Geoff Collins the Georgia Tech job, that’s not looking too hot for him lately.

18S Paddock Club

Formula 1 is off this week and we’ll have a preview of the Singapore Grand Prix next Thursday. In the meantime, we have to tackle some topics around the paddock.

7 Burning Questions for F1

#1 Did Red Bull pull a fast one on Porsche?

It’s more like Red Bull pulled a fast one on the rest of Formula 1. They got everyone to agree to an engine freeze for 2022-25 on the basis that Honda was pulling out of the sport, re-worked that relationship where Honda still builds and maintains their engines for the next 4 seasons anyway, THEN used this flirtation with Porsche to fight for 2026 engine rules in their favor all while pleading their case as a new manufacturer with rights to more test bench hours and budget cap spending only to steal some of the best engine people from their rivals to make Red Bull Powertrains strong enough to do this all on their own.

It started to make sense once it was reported that Porsche has zero IP for any F1 hybrid power units and was likely only going to badge the Red Bull engines for money. And, Red Bull doesn’t need the money. The IP that Porsche used to have is now owned by fellow VQ Group member Audi who are setting up their own engine program ahead of buying the Sauber Racing team.

#2 Which team will make a big jump in 2023?

It’ll be Williams if they replace Latifi or else it’ll be McLaren. The Williams car is sneaky decent on the right tracks and a huge upgrade over their 2021 car. Nyck de Vries just showed it can be done for someone in his first race! If they get a halfway solid driver in that seat next year I think there’s a midfield push in the making.

McLaren’s car was trash for a few races to start 2022 but Danny Ricciardo has been so bad that Lando Norris’ back is far too sore carrying the team for 2 years. Danny Ric may be lucky to get 30 points this year. In the 5th best car! Maybe it’s a big ask for rookie Oscar Piastri but I could see him with a solid 60 points and McLaren moving past Alpine next year.

#3 Haas is rumored to be signing a big American title sponsor, who will it be?

Rumors abound that Alfa Romeo (being shot into the sun as Sauber sells to Audi mentioned above) reached out to Haas about a sponsorship but Mean Gene Haas said no thanks. Despite being the most broke team on the grid Haas has struggled gaining a legitimate title sponsor but they are reportedly set to bring in a big American company.

I’m hoping they go with a blue-colored company to complete an American color scheme with the Haas red. HP? Intel? IBM? Dell? Walmart? Sysco? American Express? Pfizer? Microsoft? There are so many options.

#4 Why can’t Lance Stroll figure out his hair?

This dude has that son-of-a-billionaire absent mindedness about his entire style that fascinates me. He looked normal in his Williams days. A couple years later, he grew it out for this ratty look over his ears. Then he kept that length and went with this swept back drug dealer look.

Last year with Aston Martin he largely relied on a just-got-out-of-bed look with shorter hair. He made it even shorter in what looked like an attempt to cut his own hair. For 2022, he lengthened again without much styling, although an improvement over his previous looks. Now, he’s back to barely styling his hair with minimal effort. What an absolute goof.

#5 Should F1 reconsider its power unit penalties system?

There isn’t much to do unless you start taking some super drastic measures, which the sport will never do, and even if they did it would still favor the rich teams. The problem specifically for 2022 is that cars follow each other so well that the stronger teams can easily cut their way through the field, even at tracks where it’s traditionally pretty difficult. Just look at the last race in Monza, at least 1 car from Red Bull, Ferrari, and Mercedes started with engine penalties but no other cars finished above those top 3 teams.

#6 Would it be a good idea for Ferrari to keep some of the yellow accents they brought to the Italian Grand Prix?

I really want to see an all-yellow livery with black trim some day. I really liked the yellow race suits and accessories for the drivers and it contrasts well with the red car. I personally am not a fan of red in general which makes me begrudgingly accept the Ferrari livery and at the same time the entire team just looked absurd in red everything (although plenty of black trim has helped in 2022).

Make mistakes in yellow, at least. 

They won’t change the car color, nor the red race suits either. Both are far too traditional with decades of branding tied to Ferrari. What they absolutely need to do is go back to the yellow uniforms for the pit crew and other associated team members.

#7 With Red Bull still trying to get American IndyCar driver Colton Herta into F1 next year, what’s the status of the F2 drivers?

Haas, McLaren, Ferrari, and Mercedes don’t have drivers in their academy who are close to a F1 seat. The other 5 have things stewing in the minor leagues:

Red Bull – In F2, Indian Jehan Daruvala (23) is 5th but way too old to be considered for F1 at this point in his career. New Zealand’s Liam Lawson (20) is 7th but has been picking up practice sessions with AlphaTauri and at least favored by the team for a possible seat long-term. Japan’s Ayumu Iwasa (20) is 9th while last year’s F3 champion Norwegian Dennis Hauger (19) is probably the team’s best long-term option to be a F1 mainstay but has struggled in 11th place during his rookie F2 campaign.

Alpine – British driver Olli Caldwell (20) has struggled in 21st place in F2 and isn’t talked about as a serious F1 future driver. Australian Jack Doohan (19) is 4th, has shown tremendous pace, and thanks to the Oscar Piastri saga has been vaulted into consideration for a F1 seat at Alpine as he moves into the top prospect in their academy.

Alfa Romeo – Frenchman Theo Pourchaire (19) is their academy gem who finished 2nd in F3 in 2020, 5th in F2 last year, and is 2nd in F2 this season. They seem content with making him wait for a seat until Bottas retires or Zhou moves on down the road which may be a risky decision (see Piastri, Oscar).

Williams – American Logan Sargeant (21) is 3rd in F2 right now and should have the Super License points necessary to take a seat in 2023 should it come open. He’ll drive for Williams in Austin FP1 and comes with some financial baggage which prevented him from driving in F2 for the 2020 season.

Aston Martin – They just started a driver program and signed F2 champion Felipe Drugovich (22) to become their reserve driver for 2023 and he will take a FP1 session at Abu Dhabi later this year.

Trivia Answer:

Well, I was hoping Kansas would hold on but damn it now Michigan leads the country at 55.3 points per game.