A big congratulations is due to Manti Te’o who started out his long week on the awards circuit by winning the Butkus Award, which is given to the country’s top linebacker. Manti’s week, during which he is sure to keep piling up hardware (do they FedEx these things home or is he checking them in his suitcase?) will now officially end at the Heisman Trophy presentation in New York as Te’o was announced as one of three finalists alongside Texas A&M’s Johnny “Scooby Doo” Manziel and Kansas State’s Collin Klein.
You may also recall that 4 years ago Te’o won the inaugural high school Butkus award. Well, fast forward to today and while Manti was being awarded the collegiate version Notre Dame commit Jaylon Smith became the 5th winner of the high school Butkus Award. Yup, these are good times in South Bend.
To give you a better idea of what kind of company Te’o is in with this award, just look at the previous winners:
[table “” not found /]While early indications from “Stiff Arm Trophy” (a website that collects voting information from Heisman voters that publicly release their top 3) show Te’o firmly implanted in second place, we can still hold out hope that the most deserving player — representing the best defense and the best team in the country — brings home Heisman #8 for Notre Dame.
If you haven’t seen it yet, make sure to watch Manti’s Heisman music video below by Pat McKillen, a Notre Dame graduate and friend of Her Loyal Sons. Also check out his ND themed original “Loyal Sons” by clicking here, and find some of his excellent non-ND music at www.patmckillen.com.
Proof that, sooner or later, everyone comes around to love the Irish.
After growing up as a Notre Dame hating, misguided youth, it only took one visit to campus during high school for Twibby to realize the error of his ways. From that point on Twibby and the Irish have had what can only be described as a true Hollywood love story. When he's not reminiscing about his time in South Bend and pondering ways to get a 5th year of eligibility as a student, Twibby writes about Notre Dame and the rest of the college football world for HLS. Along with the Irish, he is a diehard fan of the Chicago Bears, Bulls, Blackhawks and Cubs with a strange affection for Northwestern Wildcats football.
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