Drue Tranquill Sees His Role As 'Quarterback Of The Defense'

The way junior safety Drue Tranquill sees it, he’s a quarterback of the defense.

Entering a 2016 season in which he appears ready to serve as the starting strong safety, Tranquill hopes the worst — a pair of injury-shortened seasons — is behind him and that the best part of his Notre Dame career is about to arrive.

“You kind of say you’re the quarterback of the defense back there. You’re the farthest back and you can see everything from back there so you definitely have to get guys lined up and in the right spot,” Tranquill said.

Now in his third season at Notre Dame, Tranquill not only understands the defense better than ever, but he’s also been singled out by teammates and coaches as a player that has stepped up on the leadership end of things following the departures of six defensive starters.

“There’s a lot of moving in the secondary so there are a lot of details that you need to add in there,” Tranquill said. “That comes with study and developing your mental game. You see all the talent in these guys so it’s not a physical issue. It’s a matter of if they can absorb the material [defensive coordinator Brian] VanGorder is giving them and absorb the material [defensive backs coach Todd] Lyght is giving them and apply it. What that looks like for me is meeting with them outside of our typical meeting times and really investing in them and forming relationships with them.”

“Strong leadership, strong presence on the field,” head coach Brian Kelly added. “He's a physical player, but he also has the ability to play a couple of different positions for us, as well, and we didn't use some of our different defensive looks.

“But he's a guy that we can count on. He's very smart, a hard worker, and he's got some great tone and a great leadership tone for us back there, as well.”

Kelly isn’t the only Irish coach intrigued by Tranquill’s versatility. The Fort Wayne, Ind., native immediately reached the field as a freshman in 2014 in sub packages and recorded a tremendous first half against Georgia Tech’s triple-option look last September before sustaining the second of his season-ending ACL injuries.

“Drue Tranquill is such an interesting athlete because of his size and strength and his power and his speed combination,” defensive backs coach Todd Lyght said. “We can move him around a lot, plus with his football intelligence, he's the type of guy we can put him at strong safety, we can put him at free safety, we can put him at outside backer, we can put him in the Joker position. When you move a guy around with that position versatility, it really strengthens your defense and that's what we look to do with Drue this year.”

The entire program is optimistic about a potential defensive turnaround after a pair of mistake-plagued seasons under VanGorder, perhaps none more so than the player whose positive attitude helped him overcome back-to-back knee injuries that ended his season.

“We have a lot of young guys stepping into new roles and with that you never know what you’re going to get,” Tranquill said. “Guys just keep developing and keep getting better. We always say the sky is the limit and with young guys it’s all about what they want to put into it and their discipline. I think we’ve got a lot of young guys coming and they’ve got a lot of potential.”