Mike Heuerman Archives - Her Loyal Sons https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog A Notre Dame Football Blog Thu, 31 Dec 2015 17:29:34 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.8.3 https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/HLS-Avatar-Option-2-150x150.png Mike Heuerman Archives - Her Loyal Sons https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog 32 32 Urban Meyer Better Than Brian Kelly In Most Ways https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2015/12/31/urban-meyer-better-than-brian-kelly-in-most-ways/ Thu, 31 Dec 2015 14:58:41 +0000 http://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/?p=32543 This entry is part of Her Loyal Sons’ continuing Fiesta Bowl preview series: Defensive preview, Ezekiel Elliott accident, Costume Gameday, offensive preview, Injured Irish returning, comprehensive bowl overview. Today, we examine the coaches. By almost all metrics, Ohio State’s Urban Meyer has had a more successful career recently than Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly. Let’s compare:...

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]]> Courtesy of ESPN

Courtesy of ESPN

This entry is part of Her Loyal Sons’ continuing Fiesta Bowl preview series: Defensive preview, Ezekiel Elliott accident, Costume Gameday, offensive preview, Injured Irish returning, comprehensive bowl overview. Today, we examine the coaches.

By almost all metrics, Ohio State’s Urban Meyer has had a more successful career recently than Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly. Let’s compare:

HEAD-TO-HEAD (ON THE FIELD)

Kelly and Meyer have never faced each other. The pair were on a collision course to the 2010 Sugar Bowl, with Kelly’s Cincinnati squad emerging as a undefeated Group of 5 powerhouse and Meyer’s team blemished only by a loss to #2 Alabama in the SEC title game. Kelly scuttled those plans, however, when he left the university to accept the job at Notre Dame. Meyer’s Florida squad dismantled the Bearcats, 51-24. Jeff Quinn, now an offensive analyst for Notre Dame, replaced Kelly as Cincinnati’s coach that day.

CURIOUS CONNECTIONS

@CoachBrianKelly/Twitter

@CoachBrianKelly/Twitter

Meyer announced an indefinite hiatus from coaching before the Sugar Bowl, citing health and family reasons. (Kelly reached out to the departing coach after he was hospitalized.) During that break – and under the auspices of Kelly at Notre Dame – Meyer was the featured presenter at the university’s football coaches clinic.

Meyer had strong ties to the university, having once served as an assistant under both former Irish coaches Lou Holtz and Bob Davie. Then-athletic director Kevin White had a meeting with Meyer to discuss the Irish’s head coaching vacancy after Ty Willingham’s dismissal, but Meyer had already made up his mind to coach at Florida for “family reasons.”

As recently as 2008, Meyer still considered being Notre Dame’s head coach to be his “dream job.” Although never officially confirmed, Meyer allegedly asked Notre Dame to consider relaxing academic requirements so that he could recruit better players.

Meyer also holds strong ties to Cincinnati, where Kelly coached before Notre Dame. It’s his alma mater. It’s his father’s alma mater. He met his wife there. His sister, Gigi Escoe, is vice president of undergraduate affairs. Meyer even attended practices at Cincinnati while Kelly was coaching there.

Four of Meyer’s current coaching staff have worked previously for Kelly.

Kelly knows that he coaches in the shadow of Meyer, as some Irish fans wonder what could have been. He even joked about it, in a press conference soon after the bowl pairing was announced:

We’re going to wrestle, arm wrestle before the game, and whoever wins gets the Notre Dame job. No, I mean, I think that’s just great talk for the fans, and Urban is a great coach. Who knows; I’m not going to be here forever. Maybe he’ll get a chance one day to coach at Notre Dame if that’s what he wants.

JUST WIN, BABY

Here’s a welcome coincidence for comparison purposes: Urban Meyer and Brian Kelly have coached 77 games against FBS-level opponents in their last six years of coaching. For Kelly, this encompasses his entire tenure at Notre Dame. For Meyer, it’s his last two seasons at Florida and his first four at Ohio State.

Urban Meyer is a more successful coach than Brian Kelly in that 77 game stretch.

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Urban Meyer teams scored more points than Brian Kelly teams in that period.

[table “” not found /]

Urban Meyer teams won more games against ranked opponents than Brian Kelly teams in that time.

[table “” not found /]

Urban Meyer teams won more big games than Brian Kelly teams.

Ranked vs. Opp Ranked
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Vs. Teams Over .500
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Via ESPN

Via ESPN

But as Lou Holtz is fond of saying, “You don’t have to be the best team in the country. But we do have to be the best team in the stadium today.”

Kelly does have one statistical advantage. He’s 12-3 in games played on neutral sites, while Meyer is just 8-3. That’s a bit misleading. Kelly’s neutral site games were mostly against Navy and underwhelming competition in the Shamrock Series. Meyer’s teams were playing for conference titles, big bowl wins and national championships.

HEAD-TO-HEAD (OFF FIELD)

(Photo via @NDfootball)

(Photo via @NDfootball)

Brian Kelly’s student-athletes are more successful in the classroom than Urban Meyer’s, although Meyer has been trending up.

In the early 2000s, the NCAA created the Graduation Success Rate for Division I colleges. Here’s a quick explanation before we get to the numbers:

The GSR holds colleges accountable for those student-athletes who transfer into their school. Second, the GSR does not penalize colleges whose student-athletes transfer in good academic standing.  Essentially, those student-athletes are moved into another college’s cohort.

Meyer’s Florida team from 2009-10 scored a 67, while his 2010-11 team scored a 76. At Ohio State, he’s logged GSRs of 75, 78 and 81.

Kelly’s team remains among the standard bearers for successful student-athletes. Since 2010-11, Kelly’s teams have scored 97, 97, 93, 94 and 93.

***

Since Meyer joined Ohio State on Nov. 28, 2011, he and Kelly have battled repeatedly for prized midwest recruits.

In total, 77 student-athletes held offers from both Ohio State & Notre Dame and ultimately chose one of those two schools. (My data is collected from Scout.com.)

Urban Meyer and his recruiting team have won 43 head-to-head battles, while Brian Kelly and his staff have prevailed in 34 contests. Winning a national championship has certainly helped: Meyer has landed 13 commits who also held a Notre Dame offer since taking the trophy; Kelly has landed 8 in the same time period.

Meyer’s big splash in his return to coaching also convinced many high schoolers to sign on the dotted line. Ohio State won 9 consecutive recruits against Notre Dame between December 2011 and February 2012. (The player to break that streak – Davonte’ Neal – is no longer with the Irish.)

Notre Dame’s best run against Ohio State was 5, which occurred between April 2012 (Mike Heuerman) and January 2013 (Max Redfield). It’s likely no coincidence that this was also the time the Irish made its bid for the championship.

Ohio State has done an excellent job of keeping talent in state, landing 20 commits that also held competing offers from Notre Dame. Notre Dame has just six commits from Ohio who also had Buckeye scholarship offers.

Notre Dame and Ohio State have each grabbed five recruits from Florida, Meyer’s old stomping grounds and three each from Michigan, which borders both universities’ homes. Notre Dame has dominated Illinois, picking up four recruits to Ohio State’s one. The Irish also lead in their home state of Indiana, two recruits (Jaylon Smith & Josh Barajas) to one (Austin Mack).

Ohio State has grabbed five 5-star talents to Notre Dame’s 2. The Buckeyes also attract more 4-star talent: 38 commits with competing Notre Dame offers to the Irish’s 29.

[table “” not found /]

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]]> Morning Roundup: April 3, 2015 https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2015/04/03/morning-roundup-april-3-2015/ Fri, 03 Apr 2015 12:00:59 +0000 http://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/?p=28816 Good morning! I’m here to catch you up on all that has transpired with the Notre Dame football program in the last 24 hours. Here are your headlines: PODCAST Irish Illustrated (F): Irish hit spring stride (50:55) ND Insider: Podcast: ND Insider recruiting update 4-2 (10:42) RECRUITING – OFFERED Bruin Report Online ($): Video: Lucas...

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]]> Good morning! I’m here to catch you up on all that has transpired with the Notre Dame football program in the last 24 hours. Here are your headlines:

PODCAST

RECRUITING – OFFERED

RECRUITING – ND INTERESTED, NO OFFER

CURRENT TEAM

COACHING

IRISH IN THE NFL

MISC.

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]]> Morning Roundup: March 18, 2015 https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2015/03/18/morning-roundup-march-18-2015/ Wed, 18 Mar 2015 12:00:31 +0000 http://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/?p=28529 Good morning! Here are your headlines: FROM OUR SITE Step one: Northeastern VIDEO WatchND: Brian Kelly press conference – March 17, 2015 (42:18) Blue & Gold Illustrated: Video: Kelly previews spring ball (3:03) Irish247: Video: Kelly previews spring practice (3:08) Irish Illustrated: Video: Kelly welcomes QB battle (3:03) Irish Sports Daily: ISD video: Brian Kelly...

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]]> Good morning! Here are your headlines:

FROM OUR SITE

VIDEO

PODCAST

RECRUITING (2016 offers / 2017 offers)

CURRENT TEAM

COACHING

SCHEDULE

MISC.

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]]> Know Thyself, Know Thy Enemy: Tight End https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2013/07/24/know-thyself-know-thy-enemy-tight-end/ https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2013/07/24/know-thyself-know-thy-enemy-tight-end/#comments Wed, 24 Jul 2013 04:30:24 +0000 http://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/?p=20887 With Anthony Fasano, John Carlson, Kyle Rudolph and Tyler Eifert, Notre Dame has put together a string of tight ends that might very well make ND the new “Tight End U.” Losing Eifert, the 2012 Mackey Award winner, to the NFL will be a tough obstacle to overcome, particularly without Everett Golson at quarterback. Many...

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]]> With Anthony Fasano, John Carlson, Kyle Rudolph and Tyler Eifert, Notre Dame has put together a string of tight ends that might very well make ND the new “Tight End U.” Losing Eifert, the 2012 Mackey Award winner, to the NFL will be a tough obstacle to overcome, particularly without Everett Golson at quarterback. Many have noted Tommy Rees’s tendency to lock onto one receiver (first Floyd, and then Eifert), and he will not have the safety blanket of throwing to one of the premier targets in college football again this season.

With a position chart consisting of Troy Niklas, Ben Koyack, Alex Welch (returning from injury) and freshman Mike Heuerman, Notre Dame has some depth at tight end but does not have any proven stars. That being said, Chuck Martin’s offense is loaded with potential at the position. Though Eifert was the go to receiving target coming off the end of the line in 2012, current juniors Niklas and Koyack both had considerable playing time but were used mainly as blockers. The two combined for a total of 8 receptions for 114 yards and 1 touchdown.

Looking nationally, the majority of the nation’s top tight ends from 2012 have graduated or moved on to the NFL. Of the eight semifinalists for the Mackey Award last year, only Washington’s Austin Seferian-Jenkins returns to college football this season. Of course, Seferian-Jenkins is facing off-the-field issues stemming from a March DUI, so just how much he sees the field this season is still up in the air.

Irish Player to Watch
Troy Niklas
Position: TE
Year: Junior
Height/Weight: 6’7”, 260 lbs.

The former Los Angeles Times lineman of the year and two-way high school standout signaled a huge recruiting win for the Irish when they were able to pluck him out of Southern Cal’s backyard to come to south bend. Niklas played in 12 games as an outside linebacker during his freshman campaign, earning 20 tackles and a fumble recovery before making the move to offense as a sophomore. After making the move during spring practice, Niklas ended up becoming an important part of Irish run packages while also showing off some potential with his hands against Navy and Purdue. After Notre Dame lost the country’s best receiving tight end to the NFL, Niklas will need to step up and fill part of the downfield void left by Eifert.

In 2012, Niklas played in all 13 games but only caught 5 passes. Again, the pass catching numbers will rise significantly in 2013. He was essentially forced into trial by fire as a sophomore and will come into this season with considerably more experience. There is no question that at 6’7” and 260 pounds Niklas looks the part, often getting compared to Rob Gronkowski – both of whom seem to end up shirtless a lot. If Niklas is able to use his size and athleticism to create an advantage over smaller and slower defenders, he could end up having a monstrous season for the Irish.

*Note: you’ll want to start at the 7:00 minute mark below.

Enemy Player to Watch
Xavier Grimble – USC
Position: TE
Year: RS Junior
Height/Weight: 6’5”, 250 lbs.

Half of Notre Dame’s 2012 opponents have tight ends named to the Mackey Award watch list (Kaneakua Friel of BYU, Devin Funchess of Michigan, Xavier Grimble and Randall Telfer of USC, Gabe Holmes of Purdue, Chris Coyle of ASU and Luke Kaumatule of Stanford). While Chris Coyle boasts the most impressive stat line of the group with 57 receptions for 696 yards and 5 touchdowns last season, he is undersized and less of an all-around threat than is USC’s Xavier Grimble. Grimble, a redshirt junior from Las Vegas’s Bishop Gormon high school (same high school as DeMarco Murray, Shabazz Muhammad and C.J. Watson) caught 29 balls for 316 yards and 5 touchdowns as a sophomore after recording 4 scores as a freshman.

In two games against Notre Dame, Grimble only has 3 catches for 21 yards. Of course, playing on a team where Marqise Lee and Robert Woods are also options for the quarterback means that far fewer balls are going to find their way to you. When you watch Grimble play, you’ll notice he moves extremely well for someone his size though certainly doesn’t have the wow factor of fellow Pac-12 tight end Seferian-Jenkins.

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]]> https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2013/07/24/know-thyself-know-thy-enemy-tight-end/feed/ 1 National Signing Day 2013 Recap https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2013/02/07/national-singing-day-2013-recap/ https://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/2013/02/07/national-singing-day-2013-recap/#comments Thu, 07 Feb 2013 11:00:55 +0000 http://www.herloyalsons.com/blog/?p=18043 After all the insanity that was January, we deserved a National Signing Day like this. All 18 unsigned verbal commits sent their national letters of intent to South Bend. There were no surprise defections; in fact, the only surprise of the day was a positive one as Eddie Vanderdoes became the 24th and final member...

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]]> After all the insanity that was January, we deserved a National Signing Day like this.

All 18 unsigned verbal commits sent their national letters of intent to South Bend. There were no surprise defections; in fact, the only surprise of the day was a positive one as Eddie Vanderdoes became the 24th and final member of the recruiting class dubbed as the Irish Mob.

Just how great was this recruiting class? Let’s take a look:

IrishMob13

 

And below is the full roster for the recruiting class of 2013 complete with links to their bios here at HLS:

Name Position Rating Status
Colin McGovern T 4 Stars Signed
Corey Robinson WR 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Devin Butler CB 3 Stars Signed
Doug Randolph DE, LB,WR 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Durham Smythe TE 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Eddie Vanderdoes DT 5 Stars Signed
Greg Bryant RB 5 Stars Signed
Hunter Bivin T 4 Stars Signed
Isaac Rochell DE 4 Stars Signed
Jacob Matuska DE, LB,TE 3 Stars Signed
James Onwualu WR 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Jaylon Smith LB 5 Stars Signed
John Montelus G, T 4 Stars Signed
Luke Cole CB 4 Stars Signed
Malik Zaire QB 4 Stars Signed
Max Redfield S 4 Stars,5 Stars Signed
Michael Deeb LB 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Mike Heuerman TE 4 Stars Signed
Mike McGlinchey T 4 Stars Signed
Rashad Kinlaw ATH, CB 3 Stars,4 Stars Signed
Steve Elmer T 4 Stars Signed
Tarean Folston RB 4 Stars Signed
Torii Hunter Jr. WR 4 Stars Signed
Will Fuller WR 4 Stars Signed

Personally, I’m thrilled with this class. The only thing that would’ve possibly made this class better would have been if Alex Anzalone had stayed in the fold to bring the class to a full 25, but, honestly, at that point, I’m just being greedy.

With this class the Irish could almost field an entire team of just freshmen on both sides of the ball save for one linebacker. The Irish managed to snag four five-star players (according to Rivals) which is the most I can ever remember the Irish having in a single class.

Notre Dame also only trailed a single school in the Rivals average star ranking. That school is Southern Cal, who bested the Irish’s 3.92 average stars with 4.42 average stars — of course, USC only managed to sign 12 players, so that skews that average ever so slightly.

Oh, and right below the Irish in the same ranking: Alabama with 3.84 average stars.

I could go on and continuously gush about this class, but the bottom line is that Notre Dame finished yesterday with an elite recruiting class. It is incredibly well balanced, addresses areas of need, and stocks the depth chart in crucial areas like both the offensive and defensive line (and Brian Kelly said he still considers those areas of need for 2014 — this is a man after my own heart).

Be excited, be very excited about what Brian Kelly and his staff just pulled off. This future is beyond bright for this team.

Finally, the folks at IBN Sports have reached out to us to share their ND signing day segment, featuring Mike Frank of Irish Sports Daily. They have loads of other signing day segments over at their site as well so be sure to check them out if you are interested.

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