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UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 15, 2017

Mike McGlinchey

South Bend, Indiana

Q. Mike, here's a game that you thought you might not get to. Three years, your last game at Notre Dame, thoughts going into this last week and considering after what occurred last week?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Yeah. It's kind of hard to believe that five years is up. Tough. It's bittersweet. I know I've put everything I had into this place, in Notre Dame and this team and this university. And it's a little bittersweet to think I'm not going to be able to come back and play in Notre Dame Stadium anymore after this week. We've had a hell of a season. It's been an emotional roller coaster, and I want to make sure we go out against -- the rest of the senior class, not just myself and getting a win against Navy this week.

Q. Everybody talks about the Navy offense and what the defense has to come up with. What unique things does Navy do defensively that you have to be prepared for?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Well, they play a couple of different fronts, and they move a lot, so very rarely are they stationary. They bring a lot of pressure. They bring a lot of different looks to try and confuse offenses. And you just gotta stay disciplined to your tips and your alignments and what normally you see out of defenses and what you've trained yourself for the last five years doing. You know, it's going to be the same kind of -- it's going to be football. It's going to be -- they're going to line up 11 guys, we're going to line up 11 guys and we're going to see what happens. But yeah, they do a lot of different things, try to mix it up a lot of different ways and try to create a little confusion for offenses.

Q. What's the one thing, the one moment that you're going to recall you think the most 10, 15 years down the line of you playing here at Notre Dame?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: That's a really tough question. You know, I think I'm going to remember this season as a whole. I think that coming from where we came from and the state of the program and where it was last year and being a captain of that team, and then being a captain of this team. I mean the amount of turnaround that we were able to have, it's something that's very, very memorable. And I take a lot of pride in being able to be a part of it, on top of obviously the things that -- the main thing that I'm really going to take away from this place is the relationships that I've built. I've made the best friends in the world. I've been mentored by some of the greatest coaches and other players that you could ever ask for. And I think that anybody who really knows this place is the best part about it is the people that you get to meet. And that's the thing that I'll be talking about for the rest of my life, not just the next 10 to 15 years.

Q. Take us back to what was (indiscernible)?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: It was pretty awful. Yeah. No other words to say than that. We're not really worried about that right now. We're worried about trying to win the next two games against Navy and Stanford and we're going to start against Navy.

Q. What's the mindset now after Miami, finishing these last two weeks strong? What's the mindset?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: The mindset is the same as it's always been. We're going to go out and try and dominate our opponents, and that's really all you can really say about it. The mindset hasn't changed. We've got a lot still to play for; chances at a great bowl game and just pride of who we are and what we've built and what we're about. And I think that message hasn't changed throughout our entire football team, and that's what you're going to see on Saturday against Navy.

Q. How important a decision was it for you to be able to come back, just in your game?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: I think it was huge. You know, I would have probably been kicking myself if something had happened here the way it's been happening this year, and knowing that I could have been a part of the turnaround would have been tough to swallow, and if I wasn't, obviously from just a feeling standpoint. In terms of my game, I think I've grown a lot over the last year. I think I've done a lot of things well. Obviously I've made some mistakes here and there, but that's part of football, and I do my best to keep cleaning those up. But you know, I think I've taken a big step forward in my individual game, in the way that I've learned how to lead and deal with my teammates. I think that I've had another opportunity to grow and then continue to learn how to be a professional under Coach Hiestand and working with Q and the other guys each and every day. And you know, I got another year to spend at ^ Notre Dame and that's always a plus.

Q. The ultimate goal of a National Championship, a little bit slimmer now, so does sort of the goal shift to looking at it as let's get 10 wins this year, let's go to a New Year's Six bowl? What's sort of the goal shifting for you guys?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: I don't know how much it's shifted. I think that whether it's this year or not, I think that the goal is still to win a National Championship. And if I can do my part and if it's not this year and going to the next year and years to come, if I can kind of try and help out that process and that cause, then I'll feel pretty good about that as well. But you know, there's a lot of pride and tradition here to maintain and be dominant. And that's what we're going to try and do these next two weeks, and if we're lucky enough to play in a New Year's Six bowl game or wherever we wind up playing, then we'll do that as well. But the goal is still the same. Whether it's now, whether it's in the future, it doesn't really matter. The goal is to bring Notre Dame excellence and that's what we're going to continue to try to do.

Q. Coach Kelly was talking yesterday about the importance obviously of refocusing^ . What's maybe your personal process of refocussing after a game like that?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Well, you know, it's the same as pretty much every other week. Obviously it's just a little harder to swallow when you watch the film. But yeah, the process is you go in on Sunday, get your treatment, try to make yourself feel a little bit better physically, and then later in the afternoon watch the film until you see what you need to see. And after that, Sunday you just put everything aside, and Monday you -- normally we watch the same film with Coach Hiestand and the rest of the team with their position coaches, but after Monday it's over. And then, you know, you start game planning Monday afternoon, and then as soon as Tuesday hits, it's all about the next opponent. And that's the only process that you can continue to have in this game is to always look forward. You can't control what has happened in the past. You can only control what you're doing right at the present, and that's all we're trying to do and that's all I'm trying to do. Trying to get a little bit better each and every day. And you gotta take that process and that mindset out to the ^ practice field and into the meeting room and into your study each and every day.

Q. Do you feel like you tell the guys anything different? There are only two games left, and there's more of a sense of urgency or anything like that?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: I don't think there's more of a sense of urgency at all. I think that I don't really need to say much. That's the great thing about what this team has become is such -- it's such a different mindset. It's a never-faltering, never- wavering kind of mindset that our football team has. And obviously we took a big lump on last Saturday, but that's not affecting ^ who this team is and what this team is about. We're going to prepare the same way that we've been trying to prepare, hopefully prepare a little bit better and make sure that we get the win against Navy. And that's really all that we're focused on. There's not really much else to say other than keep the process forward and make every day your best one.

Q. Coach Kelly also said he mentioned USC turned their season around after losing to you guys. Does that resonate at all with you or with your teammates, like you guys could maybe do that?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Yeah. I mean obviously it's a good lesson. They didn't let things -- I mean we beat them just about as bad as Miami beat us. So it's kind of almost the exact same situation. But you can always look and find different examples of how to do things and how to do things well, and that's just something he drew from and that's something that we can look to. But we know we're a very different football team than USC and we have different opponents left, but yeah, our mindset is to just win and dominate the next two games and that's all we're going to try and do.

Q. (Indiscernible) thoughts given to pregame introduction, parents down there, just sort of getting that out of your system before the start of the game?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Yeah. You know what, I've been trying not to think about it too much. It's definitely going to be hard for me. I think a lot of people can attest to this, that I love this place with everything I got, and I've always worked and wanted to put my best effort and play forward for this place, for my teammates, for my coaches and just Notre Dame in general. It's something that I'll always treasure. I consider myself the luckiest man in the world to be able to play football at this awesome place here. And it's going to be tough. I don't know if I'll be able to think about it right in the tunnel because I have a job to do. But afterwards, when or if we get the win and singing that alma mater for the last time in the Stadium, I'll probably be a little bit of a mess.

Q. I guess when you think about you have a job to do, is it going to be easier to remember that before the game?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Yeah, it'll be a little easier. It's the last time I'll run out of that tunnel, and at least I'll have my mom and dad on the field. I'll give my mom a hug; she'll settle me down a little bit. And the rest is just a football game. It's hard to think about other things when you got a football game going on in front of you. I've never had a problem with focusing on what my task is supposed to be and never let any outside forces other than the game affect what I'm thinking about. And I'm going to do the same thing on Saturday, and then afterwards, like I said, I'll probably take time to reflect in what happened and try to soak it all in.

Q. And B.K. mentioned yesterday about felt like you guys learned a lot at Miami. Maybe it won't be applicable this week but down the road. What do you think the program learned that can help you guys the next time you're in a spot like this?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: That college football is a crazy beast and no matter what the Saturday is or what your opponent is, you gotta bring it to the best of your ability because as hard of a thing you have to do is win each and every Saturday. And Miami was certainly a fantastic opponent and it was an unbelievable atmosphere. And having that kind of an experience to draw from, and we didn't come out on the right side of that, but I think that gaining that experience, especially for our younger guys and for the team and the program as a whole, getting a little taste of where we could be is just that much more of a driving force, I think; that kind of a feeling you don't ever want to have, and coming out of the side that we did on Saturday certainly allows us to learn of how to better prepare ourselves mentally, physically and just know that each opportunity needs to be cherished and treated as such. And it's so important to take each game with a great amount of pride and great amount of focus in order to win the game. And I think that's where we learned a lot, and I think that's where we're going to continue to learn.

Q. When you think about the young offensive linemen that have watched this starting group become great this year, whether it be the process of practice, execution of the game, what do you hope they will learn from what you guys did this year?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: I hope they learn -- I was actually thinking about this a little bit this week. I hope to God that the guys that are younger than me and have watched me play over the last year or two or however long they've been behind me that they learned the same things from the guys that I did that I was behind as well. You know, I'll always cherish the times that I've had with -- or the times that I was able to learn from Zach, Zach Martin and Chris Watt, Nick Martin, Ronnie Stanley, you know, all those guys that have come before me, because they are just world- class guys, world-class football players, and I owe them a lot. And they showed me the right way of how to do things and how to be a Notre Dame offensive lineman and what it means and what all goes into being that. And I hope that the younger guys like Rob, Tommy, Liam and all the other -- obviously I just named the tackles, but the younger guys behind me feel the same as what I've tried to do for them. And you know, I take a lot of pride and try to be the best teammate I can be, be the best coach or kind of player-coach I can be to help the young guys out, and that's all I really hope that they have learned from me is really how special this place is, how important it is to learn from Coach Hiestand and how to go about your business the right way.

Q. Notre Dame obviously has a lot of rivals. Seems like half the season you have to spend your time talking about other teams. But what's kind of special about this week and the rivalry you guys have?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: Well, the Naval Academy is as premier of an institution as you can get in America. You know, it's a great amount of respect in this rivalry. Obviously it's one of a long tradition. But you know exactly who is across from you on the field each time we play them. They're the best and the brightest, and they're going to go on and serve our country to the best of their ability, and it's something that you have to show respect to, because those guys are -- you know, what they do and what they prepare for is a lot greater than what I have to deal with. And so being able to be a part of that rivalry and what they bring each and every time we've played them, I mean it's exciting. It's a lot of -- there's a lot of pride on the line. And certainly a lot of respect both ways.

Q. Obviously you focus mostly on game plans during this week, but do the coaches spend any time or do you guys as veterans try to spend any time teaching the young guys a little bit about the connection between the two?
MIKE McGLINCHEY: I don't know. I don't think I've ever tried to enlighten people on rivalries here. It's pretty easy to figure it out. And I think each guy has his own experience with each different team. I'm sure each guy has their own individual rival that they either hate or love playing that much more. I know I certainly do. And it's just something you learn and experience, and it's part of why this place is so cool, because everybody is trying to get our number, and you know, it's about bringing it each and every week and playing for those traveling trophies that we have, and it's just another part of our cool tradition. Thank you guys.

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