NCAA Football Daily Domer

Hours after losing to Connecticut on Notre Dame's Senior Day, Fighting Irish coach Charlie Weis sat down at length with John Walters and talked to the FanHouse writer one-on-one about his experience coaching at his alma mater. The following is what transpired between coach and reporter very early Sunday morning.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- The November darkness is unseasonably warm. Charlie Weis steps out of his black Yukon SUV toting two bagels and two coffees. Clad in gray Notre Dame football sweats and shower sandals, America's most renowned embattled football coach, if not employee, has brought breakfast for his first visitor of the day.

The time is 4:28 AM.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Scott Smith, a Notre Dame team captain, crouched at the 25-yard line in mortal sadness, his face a shade of crimson, his eyes welling with tears. Zach Frazer, a former classmate of Smith's who had just taken the snap that ended the game and, effectively, Charlie Weis' Notre Dame career, accepted hugs from teammates past and present. A dispassionate Jimmy Clausen jogged over to the edge of the stands to pose for a photo with his two brothers and his mom.

Connecticut 33, Notre Dame 30. Fire away, Jack Swarbrick. Fire away.

Even Charlie Weis, who begins every press conference with that two-word salutation to the media, would concede that it is time.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- "Patrick tends to follow Brian," says Brian Coughlin of his two sons, who are both walk-on wide receivers on the Notre Dame football team.

When Brian went out for wide receiver at Brother Rice High School in suburban Chicago, Patrick followed. When Brian was elected class president his senior year of 2005-06, Patrick ran for and won that office in 2006-07.

Brian matriculated at Notre Dame in 2006. Patrick ventured to South Bend the following autumn. Brian moved in to Dillon Hall. Patrick followed. Brian chose accounting as his major. Patrick selected accounting as his major.

In the spring semester of his sophomore year, Brian tried out at wide receiver as a walk-on. And made it. One year later, Patrick followed suit.

FanHouse writer John Walters is living in South Bend, Ind., during one of the most pivotal seasons in Notre Dame history. Check back daily for his dispatches on the Irish.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- At 8-4 or 7-5, Notre Dame is bowl-eligible ("Hellllllo, Jacksonville!"). At 6-6, the Fighting Irish are bowl-execrable. The Irish could accept a bowl bid with that record, but would a Notre Dame reeling from four straight defeats and a likely coaching change actually do that?

The feeling here is no.

So, while much of the inquiries to players this week have concerned the seniors' final game at Notre Dame Stadium or the status of their coach, the game with Connecticut is for all intents Notre Dame's bowl-eligible bowl. Win and you'll be wearing pads in December. Lose and you limp in to Palo Alto to face the hottest team in America.
And if the Irish do go bowling, the questions become even more intriguing.

Will Charlie Weis still be the head coach?

FanHouse writer John Walters is living in South Bend, Ind., during one of the most pivotal seasons in Notre Dame history. Check back daily for his dispatches on the Irish.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- The numbers are fluid, but if you search stories on the web for the past two weeks you will find that no head coach, with the exception of Florida's Urban Meyer, is written about more than Charlie Weis. And if you were to eliminate the stories that pertain to Meyer possibly leaving the Brigadoon that is Gainesville for the "Deadliest Catch" climes of South Bend, then Weis may be number one.

Nick Saban. Mack Brown. Brian Kelly. The Patterson/Petersen duo, Gary and Chris. None of them have had even half the stories being written about them that Weis does even though all five of them have guided their teams to undefeated seasons thus far. Weis' team, as you know, is but 6-4.

FanHouse writer John Walters is living in South Bend, Ind., during one of the most pivotal seasons in Notre Dame history. Check back daily for his dispatches on the Irish.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- The questions were fewer, the themes less philosophical, the antagonism nearly absent. There was a scent of resignation at Charlie Weis' weekly Tuesday noon press conference -- emanating from the media.

Last Tuesday, when it still appeared as if this season and this coaching staff could be salvaged, the noon presser possessed the frenzy of feeding hour at the zoo's big cats house. The media peppered Weis with questions for approximately one hour, many of them too "big picture" in Weis' opinion, to merit a reply.

This week? The session lasted just 34 minutes, and only two questions were truly worth repeating here.

FanHouse writer John Walters is living in South Bend, Ind., during one of the most pivotal seasons in Notre Dame history. Check back daily for his dispatches on the Irish.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- It was just moments after Notre Dame obliterated Nevada, 35-0, in the season-opener and before the band had yet to strike up the Alma Mater. I stood next to WNDU-TV's Jeff Jeffers, who has been covering this program for more than three decades. Each of us incredulous, we gaped at one another.

"Did that just happen?" I asked.

"Did it?" he replied.

Have you seen Nevada lately? The Wolf Pack are 7-3. They are fifth in the nation in scoring offense -- that's right, the same team the Irish shut out, Notre Dame's lone shutout of the Charlie Weis era -- is averaging 39 points per game. They're No. 1 in rushing offense and it isn't even close. Nevada is averaging 353 yards per game on the ground. The next most prolfic rushing attack, Georgia Tech's, averages 314 yards per game.

PITTSBURGH -- There exists a surfeit of essays, all written within the past few hours, on why Charlie Weis should be fired. Instead of adding to the drudgery, I've compiled a list of 35 thoughts (one for each victory Weis has had in South Bend) that came to mind in the wake of Notre Dame's 27-22 defeat at Pitt.

35) If motivation were all it was about, then Tony Robbins would be an SEC coach. And if intelligence were all it was about, Charlie Weis would be a winner.

34) One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting to yield different results. Mr. John Swarbrick, please stop the insanity.

33) Notre Dame's "Stepford Wives" act during post-game interviews is emblematic of why they are a failure. All four players who spoke to the media -- linebacker Brian Smith, wide receiver Golden Tate, quarterback Jimmy Clausen and safety Kyle McCarthy -- used a variation of the term "I'll have to go back and look at the tape" when asked to assess a shortcoming. If you control players' speech off the field, how much do you also stymie their self-expression on the field.

PITTSBURGH -- Given our location this evening, I feel a responsibility to work the term "confluence" into the text. For instance, it is an interesting confluence of events that brings Charlie Weis back to Pittsburgh for the first time since his 2005 debut as he is about to coach the most important game of his career. The Fighting Irish have tackled November with all the prowess that they have tackled anything of late, which is to say not well.

The Irish are 3-7 in their last ten November contests after having won their first seven under Weis. We'll see this evening which way the proverbial arrow is pointing in terms of Notre Dame's November nitty gritty.

Key stat heading into the game? Pittsburgh leads the nation in sacks. That's bad news for a team with an immobile quarterback and a back-up who, though experienced, has yet to attempt a pass in a game this season (Evan Sharpley). I cannot, in the words of Matt Millen, "underemphasize enough" how important it is that Clausen, who is likely more dinged up than either he or Weis is letting on, remain in the game.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Pennsylvania is a second home of sorts for the Irish, and not because it happens to be the birthplace of Irish legend Joe Montana.

Nor is it because Pittsburgh's the home of Beano Cook, who once predicted those two Heismans for Berwick, Pa., native Ron Powlus (currently the team's quarterbacks coach).

"We have more subscribers in the state of Pennsylvania than any other state," says inveterate Blue and Gold Illustrated editor Lou Somogyi.

The Panthers, despite their 8-1 record and No. 8 AP ranking, have been averaging crowds in the mid-40,000 level this season at Heinz Field. Saturday night's game, however, despite being available free on television (ABC), is a sellout (65,000-plus) and the Panthers are selling an additional 1,000 standing-room-only ducats. The attendance could possibly break the modern-record for a sporting event in Pittsburgh (66,731 for a 2002 "Backyard Brawl" contest between West Virginia and Pitt).