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Notre Dame’s Defense Deeper, But Also Younger

Junior linebacker Nyles Morgan is one of the pivotal new faces for the 2016 Irish defense.
Junior linebacker Nyles Morgan is one of the pivotal new faces for the 2016 Irish defense.

The overall performance of the 2015 Notre Dame defense did not live up to the expectations of the Fighting Irish coaching staff and its followers. So how is it supposed to be better in 2016 with the loss of its top lineman (Sheldon Day), Butkus Award winning linebacker (Jaylon Smith), top sack man (Romeo Okwara, with eight), top safety (Elijah Shumate), top playmaker at corner (KeiVarae Russell) and the Mike linebacker who was the Team MVP two years ago (Joe Schmidt)?

Now in his third season as Notre Dame’s defensive coordinator, Brian VanGorder had a veteran defense last year that featured senior and junior starters at every position other than nose guard, which rotated freshman Jerry Tillery and sophomore Daniel Cage. This year the Irish have more “developmental” players along the two deep, notably Tillery shifting to Day’s three-technique, sophomore Asmar Bilal at Will linebacker (where classmate Te’von Coney is recovering from shoulder surgery), and even freshman Devin Studstill, an early entrant, taking reps with the first team at free safety while competing with senior Max Redfield for a starting role.

The junior class especially is going to be pivotal to Notre Dame’s success with the addition of Andrew Trumbetti at weakside end, Nyles Morgan at Mike linebacker, Drue Tranquill (coming off two knee surgeries) at strong safety and Nick Watkins at cornerback. Like VanGorder, they are in their third year together, meaning they should have a pretty good grasp of the operation.

“Looking at my first spring here a couple of years ago, I think our personnel is much different this time, much deeper,” VanGorder said of what could compensate for the loss of so many marquee players from 2015. “We may be a little bit more developmental, but you can’t forget that even in that first year we were taking Jaylon Smith and moving him from Sam to Will, and he was very uncomfortable there in the beginning.

“In my mind, we’re much further ahead than we were two years ago relative to our depth, relative to snaps and experience with some guys, and obviously the experience in the system should help.”

Under VanGorder, Notre Dame has signed a pretty good balance of players at each position the past three recruiting campaigns: 14 linemen, seven linebackers, seven cornerbacks and six safeties. The problem is nine of the linemen are freshmen or sophomores, as are five of the linebackers and six of the cornerbacks. In addition, four of the safeties are true freshmen.

“Last year at this time, we had three scholarship corners in our spring ball,” VanGorder noted. “That’s much better. We’ve got safeties now, a three-deep safety group. We’ve got a lot of defensive linemen.

“There’s a lot of developmental players there that have got to get a lot better for us to compete for championships and such, but they’re there and we think they’ve got the talent and the ability through experience, through coaching, through their commitment to it all to become good, solid players for us. It’s much better, but it’s young.”

Learning VanGorder’s system, he admits, won’t come overnight.

"The battle of coaching versus young player is not an easy process,” VanGorder said. “A vision for them for what they can become as a player, coming from me they can’t quite see that. They’ve got their dreams and they’ve got their ideas of what they want out of this game of football, but they don’t really necessarily have a good picture of the player that they’re going to become and the things that they’re going to do really well and can do really well.

“They don’t necessarily see the things that they need to really, really emphasize and make it their purpose each and every day right now. That’s been the most interesting thing.”

The challenge is perhaps even greater at Notre Dame because the expectations are always going to be immense — even when the Fighting Irish have not won a major bowl game since the 1993 season.

“The youth of college football and the youth of these guys make it … it’s quite challenging because it doesn’t matter,” VanGorder said. “We’re at Notre Dame, so we put a guy out there and it says ‘ND’ on him, the expectation is that he’s going to go out and win and succeed.

“It’s a fine line as we push and try to develop players, being realistic about kind of where they are. … I really see them as so young.”

The one new face that maybe has emerged the most is Morgan in place of Schmidt at Mike linebacker.

“He’s impressive,” VanGorder said. “How he’s persevered, how he’s show toughness, went through some hard times. This is his time. He’s done a really good job.

“I think he’s a much different middle linebacker right now relative to the other players’ trust. His communication has been solid. He’s been very good so far.”

Another has been Studstill at free safety.

“It’s going to be a good thing for Max,” the veteran coach said of the freshman challenging Redfield. “Having said that, Devin is very talented, very good athlete. He’s very committed to learning.

“The competitiveness this spring — although Max should understand it a lot more than Devin does — I think will be a good thing, and we’ll probably take it right into training camp. We’ll see how both players react.”

A third intriguing figure is another early entrant, freshman defensive end Daelin Hayes. Unfortunately, the five-star prospect has played about only seven high school varsity games, mainly because of a shoulder problem, and the staff this spring is withholding him from impact drills.

“He’s a good-looking player,” VanGorder said. “Explosive, sudden, very dialed in, very competitive. It’s really driving him crazy not to be out there and be able to play.

“But he’s doing some individual stuff, and during that individual stuff his traits are really obvious. He’s going to play a lot of football for us.”

It’s going to be a matter of patiently working through the growing pains. Among the many experiencing it this spring, according to VanGorder, are Tillery at three-technique, Bilal at his new Will position and Josh Barajas working behind Morgan at Mike.

Encouraging to VanGorder is the return of sophomore Shaun Crawford and Tranquill from ACL injuries. The loss of Crawford last August truncated the nickel package, and the absence of Tranquill after week three greatly diminished the “speed package” on the back end. The return of both allows for much more flexibility. Meanwhile, senior starting corner Cole Luke also is being groomed as Crawford’s backup at nickel.

“Drue is very bright, a very good student of the game,” VanGorder said. “It’s important to him. Any task you give him, he’s going to work at it and learn it. In our system, because we’re so multiple, we like to take players like him who are high production players and do more with them — like we did with Sheldon, like we did with Jaylon at times. He gives us a lot of advantages.

“In our system, since we have a lot of defense, it’s designed to really be able to take high-production guys and cross-train them and do some multiple things with them. It gives us choices that maybe fit particular players a little bit better than some situations where, ‘This is what we do, this is all we have, and you either fit it or you don’t.’ We’ve got enough defense where we can find the things we can do well and play within those capabilities and traits.”

With so many newcomers to the 2016 defense, every edge will be needed.

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