Notre Dame, coach temper expectations

Chicago Tribune

SOUTH BEND, Ind.

Brian Kelly, coach of a Notre Dame team bearing expectations that swell by the minute, discussed those prospects Friday in a slate gray suit with a green tie. When he begins the work of justifying the optimism today, we can rule out at least one sartorial option.

“I don’t walk around with my Top 25 T-shirt on,” Kelly said, a day before his Irish team opened preseason practice.

There are reasons for that, beyond the fact probably no one prints such a shirt: The Irish coach doesn’t want a team with the marquee achievement of a Sun Bowl win figuring it has it made, and he doesn’t want his players thinking so small.

Notre Dame has a No. 18 preseason ranking and no shortage of BCS clamor ringing in its ears. Managing that buildup and perhaps even crafting it into something useful could be a more significant job for Kelly than selecting a starting quarterback.

“I want them to have good feelings about who they are and where they’ve come,” Kelly said. “But I think I’ve said this pretty clearly: I want to be in [Oklahoma coach] Bob Stoops’ position today, where he’s talking about being No. 1. That’s why we’re here.

“We want to get to the point where we’re part of the conversation as a championship-caliber football team. We’re not there yet. We’re thrown in the mix there. Eighteen to 25, pick a number out of the hat. Right now, we’re being recognized for maybe a little bit of what we did at the end of the year and because we’re Notre Dame.”

It’s naive to believe impressionable college athletes are deaf to the hype and blind to the rankings.

But a group with 17 players that started at least seven games in 2010 and a navigable schedule before it has the potential to thrive ... if it can grasp the coach’s version of avoiding complacency.