Notre Dame fans can’t be blamed if they’re tired of hearing about Brian Kelly. The present and future are bright enough for the Irish under Marcus Freeman without looking to the recent past. But bear with us for a moment.
In a conversation with CBS Sports, Kelly indicated that he believes the Irish can defeat Ohio State in the College Football Playoff title game and finally win another national championship, something he failed to do in 12 seasons with the program. Here’s the quote in full:
“I’m happy for all those guys, I pull for them. A lot of the guys there that are on both sides of the ball, I recruited. Obviously I want to see those guys win it all, and I think they’re in a great position. Totally excited for those guys.”
In the same conversation, Kelly worked to refute the notion that he left the Irish because he couldn’t win a national title with them. That led to segments like this one on ESPN’s “SportsCenter”:
Three years later, here’s what Kelly says about that:
“They’re selling it the way they want to sell it. Why do you leave Notre Dame? You leave Notre Dame because you’re taking another challenge. I took Notre Dame to championships. It’s just the way you want to twist it: ‘You only leave Notre Dame to go win a championship.’ I wasn’t leaving Notre Dame because I couldn’t win a championship. You can win championships at Notre Dame, but I chose another path because I wanted a different challenge.”
The problem with that is he left when the Irish still had a bowl game on their schedule. Any coach with honor would or at least should have stuck it out until then. But it all worked out because the Irish promoted Freeman, and they have him as opposed to some other program.
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