Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.
In the News
Former Hawaii quarterback Colt Brennan was found dead at the age of 37 years old.
The NCAA seems to be clearing the way to allow NIL rights before July 1st.
Buffalo hired Maurice Linquist to replace Lance Leipold after Linquist was briefly hired by Michigan this off-season. The 37 year-old has been a defensive backs coach at 7 different schools with a stop at the Dallas Cowboys in 2020 before his brief off-season stint with Michigan.
The FCS Championship is this Sunday as Sam Houston State will take on South Dakota State at 2 PM on ABC.
The Pac-12 finally found its replacement for outgoing commissioner Larry Scott by hiring George Kliavkoff who had been the president of sports and entertainment of MGM Resorts International. At his introductory press conference, Kliavkoff said:
I want to go on the record that the Pac-12 is in favor of the expansion of the College Football Playoffs and the implementation of consistent guidelines for name, image and likeness. We think that both CFP expansion and NIL [Name, Image and Likeness] legislation are good for college sports fans, good for our student athletes and can be a significant competitive advantage for the Pac-12.
In a cloud of protest, Northwestern’s new athletic director just resigned after 9 days on the job.
Throwback Article
Check out some cool freakin’ sports trophies.
The Portal
Notre Dame’s Jordan Johnson picked UCF and Dillan Gibbons picked Florida State as their transfer destinations.
Linebacker Henry To’o To’o led Tennessee with 76 tackles and 10 TFL last year. He’s transferring to those upstart Crimson Tide.
USC running back Stephen Carr is leaving Los Angeles.
Navy running back Jamale Carothers has over 1,000 yards in his career and entered the Portal recently.
Former Ohio State offensive lineman Max Wray has chosen Colorado as his new destination.
Wazzu receiver Jamire Calvin is headed back to the waters of the Dread Pirate at Mississippi State.
Former top 100 recruit Jaren Handy is leaving Auburn for Indiana.
Helmet Talk
How many more years will pass until Notre Dame opts for this throwback helmet?
FREE THE UPSIDE DOWN SHAMROCK.
Recruiting
It’s been a slow week for blue-chip recruiting nationally, although Notre Dame picked up tight end Holden Staes (0.903) recently. Commit post HERE.
Taking a look at the team rankings, the Irish sit in 4th place with their 13 commits. However, the 90.81 player average is the lowest among the top 9 ranked teams.
House of the Week
I’ve held off on sharing this video for a while because I’m a big Serena fan and I know my wife is too. She consumed this the first day it was posted and thought it was just okay. I immediately became worried. This is a home in a spot just north of Miami, according to AD.
As someone who built an addition and took a while to furnish it this home from Serena hammers home how irritating it is to have echo in a room when you’re talking. Generally speaking, you don’t want to feel like you’re in an empty gym inside your house.
I have to say, super disappointing tour from Serena. We only saw essentially 3 rooms (art gallery, office, and living room area) and even her trophy collection seemed really boring given the amount of tennis success displayed.
Tunes
The Smashing Pumpkins were probably my favorite band some time around the fall of 1995. It didn’t last long, though. But the Siamese Dream to Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness 2-album run had me deep into the jams from this band. For a while, Jimmy Chamberlin was my favorite drummer and I’ve always adored his quick-tempo foot hi-hat in “Cherub Rock.”
This is one of my favorite songs to go on a run, as well. Ironically, Chamberlin had a serious drug problem and ended up being the most normal person out of this group! Once the Pumpkins passed their musical peak in the 1996-97 window they were just too weird–and Billy Corgan too unlikable–for me to keep up.
On This Day in Sports
The New York Giants served the New York Yankees an eviction notice from the Polo Grounds on this day in 1920. The order was later rescinded but the Yankees ended up building their own stadium which they moved into for the start of the 1923 season and that kind of worked out well for them.
At the Cinema
It’s difficult for me to think of a movie I watched in a theater where I had a better time than Ace Ventura: Pet Detective in the spring of 1994. I had been a massive fan of In Living Colour and was deeply ready for Jim Carrey’s big-screen debut. This one did not disappoint.
I remember watching this opening scene and thinking how badly I wanted to re-watch it immediately in the theater. Straight out of the gate, Carrey gives you everything you’re about to deal with as Ace. I can’t believe he dropped The Mask and Dumb and Dumber later this same year, what a legend. The quick elevator scene in the opening just slays me every time.
Hot Take
Chicken pot pies are the worst food in the world. This is a deep scar from childhood where I was made to eat them a few times and I just cannot do it if you paid me.
Trivia
Name the only opponent and season in which Ian Book ran for over 100 yards in a single game.
Trivia question – I’m guessing it came in the second half of 2019, when the traditional running game completely disappeared. I seem to recall Book doing a lot of running in the Duke game that year, so that’s the game I’ll go with.
Definitely concur, I think he had like 140+ that game; ND kept running an outside buck sweep with pulling guards, the linebackers immediately vacated to cover it, and book pulled the ball and ran through the middle for monster games. Very clever read play
Correct, ya’ll.
More of a Zwan guy myself
Zwan was outstanding and I will brook no dissent.
Ah, Serena, the 600th best tennis player in the world.
I like our current plain shiny gold helmets with the iconic deep blue jerseys. You instantly know it’s ND
Serena hate will result in a permaban.
He’s not alone. I wasn’t going to bring it up but Serena’s “I know better than my doctor” attitude is garbage. My wife is a doctor who delivers a lot of babies so I’m admittedly thin-skinned about it. Any celebrity “doctors almost killed me and my baby, trust your doula’s chakra” type celebrity talk makes me bristle.
Serena is the 600th best tennis player in the world because you disagree with her comments after having a difficult and scary delivery?
C’mon, that’s not fair. You know that I was merely saying that not everybody holds her in as high esteem as you. Yes, I can separate athlete from person, if that’s your point. But you said “I’m a big Serena fan” and reasonable minds can disagree on that point.
I don’t want to make a big deal about this because I love this site and check it daily even when there’s no new content and I feel like I’m being treated like a troll right now.
Okay sure, but are comments and events from nearly 25 years ago (the 600th best player comment) and the birth of her child leading off why ya’ll aren’t big fans of a tennis icon?
More power to you, I guess.
Serena is the 600th best player in the world, if that, per John McEnroe, who knows the subject better than you. Why do you think there are separate gender divisions in every sport rather than open divisions for men and women to compete? Div 1 college players (certainly number 1s) at the better tennis programs would beat her.
I don’t hate her at all. She’s the best woman player of her era. Period.
1) Who is arguing that Serena could be the top men’s players in the world?
2) What is the point of telling everyone she’s the 600th best player in the world?
I just get tired of all the people who’ve never played competitive tennis touting her as the best player ever. That’s all. Its usually by male feminists as well as many women.
That’s all. A hot take of mine, which I think is the kind of thing you get, right?
I think most people calling Serena the best ever do so comparing her to her female competition, like Federer did a few years ago.
I think other people who get upset about Serena relative to men say things like “male feminists” and need to work through some sexism issues.
McEnroe stated “Serena is the best female tennis player of all time”. He was then asked why do you say “Female tennis player, is she not the best tennis player of all time?” That’s when he said she is #700 counting men. This according to him on the Colbert’s show. If that’s how it went down, then perhaps his statement is not that controversial.
I don’t think anyone worth listening to would say “she’s this best tennis player ever counting men”. Anyone “tired of all the people saying that.” is only making a strawman argument. IMO
That is exactly what McEnroe said. He was then attacked as a chauvinist on the Today show, including by a couple who were fired for sexual harassment sometime afterward.
So you’re saying nobody around you says what I hear fairly frequently here at my tennis club in Tucson. Good for you, you have no need to roll your eyes like I do then.
Like I said, “Anyone worth listening to”, and I doubt very much that many, if any, at a tennis club are saying that she’s better than the men. You’re straining creditability with that statement.
How the f—- would you know what’s said at my tennis club?
Good grief, you’re better than that cheap shot, man.
Gee you’re thin skinned when someone disagrees with you.
As for male feminists, they do exist, and despite your politically correct indoctrination, no, I don’t need sexism training. Are you an academic by chance? They’re big on thought control these days.
Just stop, this is beyond embarrassing for you.
Do you think nearly dying in childbirth has something to do with it? She had to advocate for herself multiple times because her history of clots was overlooked. I’m all for listening to your physician, but you’re missing key context.
I’m with Eric: lots of bizarre Serena takes.
We spend all year obsessing over who the 33rd best football team in the world is. Calling her the 600th best tennis player is not that sneaky of an insult to all of us
Whats the context for this pregnancy bit?
She detailed things in Vogue, I’m not sure she’s commented much on it since:
https://www.vogue.com/article/serena-williams-vogue-cover-interview-february-2018
African American women are way more likely because of pregnancy and birth related issues. From her description, this sounds exactly like why.
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2019/p0905-racial-ethnic-disparities-pregnancy-deaths.html
Pretty reasonable for Black people in general to be skeptical of the medical profession. Tons of articles around this if you google.
Imagine being so good at tennis that you don’t remember when you won Wimbledon or where you keep the trophies. She could have just made up a year and it probably would have been right. I feel like someone else filled that trophy room for her. I did like the oh 2nd place, what is that doing in here.
Duke 2019
The hot take should have been Jim Carey hasn’t been funny for 20 years and is actually really irritating
My man is almost 60, though.
Here’s a hotter one — Will Ferrell isn’t that funny. A lot of his comedy is being a big goofy dude screaming.
Also he’s a Southern Cal fan.
I am a huge, huge Smashing Pumpkins fan. I would argue for them as one of, if not the best, bands of the 90s. Their heyday was a bit before my time, so I never got to see them live, but still.
I spent a day or two this past summer listening to all their albums from Zeitgeist forward in a row. Yeesh. There are a couple flashes of brilliance in there, but it’s mostly crap. Total Billy Corgan vanity project, and that’s saying something.
Anyways they’re playing Riot Fest this year and I will absolutely go.
I just can’t do Corgan anymore. His voice fit just right in their 90’s peak and ever since then it just doesn’t work. Looking like a fat, weird version of Bill Burr doesn’t help either.
I must point out, owning the Pumpkins best CD ever, but having paid no attention to them after, that I am super happy to have been reminded of this song which I also love. Allow me to point out that the lyrics (especially the first verse and above all the refrain) are quite suited to our current moment of the pandemic.
Let me out!!!
100%. I revisited “Bullet with Butterfly Wings,” and that song is still great. His voice on the other hand did not age as well…