Captured by preseason optimism
Scott Blaszak
The Early Essays
Five-straight losses to close a football season at Notre Dame and the off-season assumes an ominous posture. Rumors of an imminent coaching change, player transfers, less than flattering media attention. ("What has happened to Notre Dame football?" read a story in Sports Illustrated earlier this year) all have driven Bob Davie and company under wraps. Progress, if it has been made, has been cloaked. Practices have been closed to the media and with such unceasing talk of Davie's precarious job security, you get the impression he'd close the first five games to the media if he could.
But he can't. This is Notre Dame, where the head coaching position is one of the highest profile positions in sports. Davie's relationship with the media to now has been rather junior high — awkward and clumsy, dull conversations filled with uncomfortable pauses. But, and what I think he has now just finally grasped, it doesn't matter. Bottom line is you win and people love you. A BCS berth and forgotten will be his methodical southern drawl, his boring honesty, his bungling of the Joe Moore firing, his troubles with clock management. Let's face it, college football coaches aren't adored for their polish and charisma. Joe Paterno, Bobby Bowden, Phillip Fulmer, these aren't guys you would gravitate to at a party. Of course, Holtz spoiled us. I've never seen someone play a crowd better than at his speech two years ago in COBA — and, when he was passionate, there was never a better game day coach in the business.
We've got Bob, though, and a beast of an early schedule. As for our chances, I'm optimistic, perhaps stupidly so. The offensively line, save a rash of injuries like last year, should be solid. Arnaz will do fine and, conveniently, he's really, really fast, a trait shared by many of the skilled players. Broadly speaking, there is talent on this football team that has been lacking for some time.
But I do this every year. The preseason lends itself to promise. New players are invincible until proven mortal. Reports from practice are both obscuring and inconclusive — the team is battling against each other, after all, so how do you know if they're any good or not? Each year the bait is offered; each year I bite. Darrell Campbell will solve our chronically docile defensive line; Brock Williams has two years of improvement to flaunt. Hope. It's addictive, replenishing and cyclical. It is, too, I think, American.
If we do not have a successful season, if my fragile optimism is crushed (yet again) against a brutal September schedule and, if, in consequence, Davie is coaching the Akron Zips next fall, then my four years here at Notre Dame, at least in regard to football, is a waste. Enduring three painfully inconsistent seasons in order to lay the foundation for Notre Dame's return to the upper echelon I can stomach, but if Davie should stumble once again, this time fatally, then his tenure will take on a Faustian connotation. "You were there for all four Davie years?" alumni will ask me, with the same pity in their eyes typically reserved for students of the '80-'85 era. "I'm so sorry."
Enough gloom. Like I said, I'm optimistic and ecstatic that this week Nebraska, the consensus number one in all the land, marches into Notre Dame Stadium. ESPN will be here. (Lee Corso will most likely predict a 'Husker victory Saturday morning and the Irish crowd will chant "Corso sucks!" for the remainder of the broadcast. And it's true, Corso does suck.) This is big time college football, whether we deserve it or not. Fortunately the game occurs early on the schedule when the Irish is clean-slated, undefeated, the way it should be, a state that hasn't lasted even halfway into September in the past years. I've waited impatiently since that heartbreaking summer day in Ann Arbor last year for our loss column to return to zero.
Experts haven't given us much of a chance to hang with Nebraska. I, for one, do not see us folding over. Say what you will about the competence of the coaches; it's the players who wear the gold helmets. The players keep us in this game. We will not be bowled over by the 'Huskers, not my Notre Dame. I cannot say if we win because a desperate hope has clouded any objectivity I could have mustered. But I can say that come one-thirty on Saturday afternoon, with Notre Dame Stadium swelling over with a boisterous Notre Dame nation, as NBC pans the storied ground for that moment before the kickoff, in the moment before my insurmountable expectations are wed jarringly to four quarters of a game played by 20-year olds, Nebraska won't appear quite as daunting. Big games between quality, talented programs often, even when one is such an underdog, take on a feeling of equality. Turnovers, line play, special teams, these are the deciding factors. And then there's the intangible, emotional confidence that Notre Dame will always benefit from — never mind the previous season. And home field advantage is huge. It's our house. It's our victory.
Scott Blaszak is senior English major. He is a new columnist and his column will appear again in the coming weeks.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, September 8, 2000
