Players say goodbye to Davie but look toward future of Irish football
MIKE CONNOLLY
Sports Writer
As soon as Bob Davie stepped off the podium following his farewell press conference, he walked directly to Grant Irons. The now-fired head coach embraced his fifth-year senior captain.
Irons was a part of every team Davie coached and said that he was shocked that his last season at Notre Dame would also be the last for Davie.
"We were definitely caught off guard by the timing of it," Irons said.
The players officially learned of Davie's firing in the team meeting room of the Stadium at 1:30 p.m. Many, however, already knew Davie was fired by watching television and reading stories on the Internet. Quarterback Carlyle Holiday was woken up by a phone call telling him he would have a new coach in 2002.
"It's a little bit shocking," Holiday said. "Things like that happen and we have to go on from there."
None of the underclassmen interviewed by The Observer — Vontez Duff, Shane Walton, Holiday and Nick Setta — said they planned on transferring. They all said that it was unfortunate that Davie had been fired but they would accept athletic director Kevin White's decision.
"We have to continue to improve regardless of who the coach is," Holiday said. "We have to get back to competing for the national championship."
To help find a new coach, three players have been named player representatives to help select the new coach — Walton, Gary Godsey and Jeff Faine.
Although the players said that firing coaches was part of football, they said it was difficult to watch Davie get criticized throughout the season.
"It's hard because you listen to Coach Davie five minutes ago [at his press conference] pouring his heart out and we know what he did," Setta said. "A lot of the reporters, the students, the faculty ... they don't know what he had to go through and how much he put into this program. Sometimes they look down on him as a person and not just as a coach and that's disappointing. You really wanted him to succeed because of how people got down on him."
Davie said he left his players with just one request for the 2002 season — win.
"I'm going to watch you next year and I'm going to tape every one of those games and I want to see you win," he said.
All Sports Stories for Monday, December 3, 2001
