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UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 13, 2008

Charlie Weis

COACH WEIS: Fire away.

Q. Charlie, are we day-to-day or questionable?
COACH WEIS: I'll show up as a coach, but I'll be gone for the year as a player. Tommy Brady's got nothing on me.

Q. In all seriousness, what happened?
COACH WEIS: The play was already past me, so I'm very safe -- because of my bad feet, I'm always safe on the sidelines. I always error on the side of caution. So the play was by me, but my vision went to the right and then one of their guys hit John Ryan, and I never saw it coming. I just knew as soon as I got hit.
I'm layin' down there, and other than the fact that I knew my knee got blown out, you're sitting there, and they want you to pop back up and I said, "Let's relax here for a second, fellas," because I knew I wanted to regain my composure. You know when it gets blown out; it was blown out. You didn't have to guess.

Q. Was there an official diagnosis?
COACH WEIS: MCL/ACL. How do you like that? I feel like an athlete. First time in my life! (Chuckles.)

Q. And just for the team today, obviously for the team it would be maybe a watershed moment in terms of where they were, where you were. How do you characterize this for your guys and where do you go from here?
COACH WEIS: We challenged them as a team to pick it up in the fourth quarter because as we all -- the question was for everyone; it wasn't just for media. It was for players, for the coaches, for everyone: Where are we going to go from here, fellas?
I think you could tell by how they started the game how this was going to go. We knew the weather report. We knew it was supposed to get bad later in the game, and we wanted to get on top of them, and it was going to be bombs away. That was the game plan going in. We had more, we just didn't get to 'em. It was bombs away. We had respect for Michigan's front, and we felt if we nickeled and dime'd 'em all day, it could be tough sledin'.
Fortunately the game played out the way we wanted. The second thing was, I had all over the locker room and all over our meeting last night and this morning that turnovers was going to determine the outcome of the game. And you're not going to turn over four times like we did last week and walk out of here a winner, and fortunately we won that significantly.

Q. Charlie, you said you wanted to use Lou Holtz and the '88 team being here. Talk about the atmosphere.
COACH WEIS: We used them yesterday; today was ours. Yesterday was to show respect for the '88 team, and we did it at the pep rally, and Lou came to dinner last night and I had him talk to our team for about five minutes last night. And today was not Lou and not the '88 team, it was those guys stepin' up and trying to earn the respect that Mo Crum was talking about at the pep rally yesterday. They wanted to make a statement that Notre Dame is not some garbage school out there that everyone can crap on all the time.

Q. Last week you felt good about a team that came back in the fourth quarter. You learned that your team could come back. What did you learn about your team today?
COACH WEIS: I learned that they could pick up where they left off, and I think that was the most significant factor of everything. Obviously when you get on top of 'em, boom, boom, boom, early, the whole complex of the game changes for both teams; it isn't just for us.
Neither one of us is really built at this time to play from behind in a significant margin, at this time. I think the fact that we got on top of 'em big early gave us a decided advantage in the game.

Q. Was this a game more about the big picture and the emotion and inspiration outweighs, the nitpicky stuff?
COACH WEIS: First of all, I don't know how much tape I'm going to be watching here tomorrow morning, although I still intend to get in and do my job, but I don't think it will be a nitpicky job. The players have tomorrow off and I hope they handle themselves well tonight, but this was a big win for our program and for our kids, and I'm happy for 'em.

Q. Charlie, you talked the first day you were in here on media day about we're not going to talk about 2007. Today maybe the rest of the world doesn't talk about 2007 anymore?
COACH WEIS: Let's hope so. You know, as usual is the Notre Dame way, it will be, "Well, they beat Michigan, and they're a growing team and going through transition. Let's see what they do against Michigan State."
Every week it's the same old story, but I tell ya what. For our team and for our students and for our alum and for our fans, today was a big win.

Q. How happy were you for your players there at the end?
COACH WEIS: I was very, very happy until the ice got dropped on my head. I said, "I'm already having a bad day, fellas!" That was the nicest ice bath I've ever had, though, I have to tell you; it felt pretty sweet.

Q. Charlie, without obviously having a chance to have seen the film yet of today's game, how much better do you think your team was today than a week ago?
COACH WEIS: Well, I think that to play in inclement weather as the game went on, and to play a complementary game, which is what this was, we made some big plays on special teams and offense and defense, and I think at this stage of our program I think it's important that we play a complementary football game.
I think all three units have to step up and make some big plays, and I think that's what we did today. As long as we show up every week and get some plays out of all three elements, you know, I think that gives us a chance.

Q. Charlie, can you talk about the impact that Mike Anello had on this game with what he did early?
COACH WEIS: I tell ya what, you figure after last week, having four solos in a game and becoming -- achieving cult hero status, especially in our locker room, you wouldn't think that he would be in an opportunity to make so many plays, but I don't know if it was I was right, it looked to me like he caused three fumbles or caused a couple of fumbles. Every time I turned around he was around the ball.
I tell ya, sign me up. Give me a bunch of Mike Anellos on special teams that run like that and show heart, and he doesn't just show heart, he's a playmaker. I'll take a bunch of guys like him.

Q. Charlie, you talked about bombs away early. What does that say about your confidence level in Jimmy?
COACH WEIS: Well, I mean, we didn't even get to the away until after the first two touchdowns had been scored. So the first two plays after that were the first two plays of the openers, so the pass interference on the pass to Floyd followed by the touchdown pass to Golden, they were the first two plays we were -- we on our own 5 yard line, and we were callin' em, and if it was pouring, we were still calling 'em, so obviously I must have confidence that the quarterback will make a good decision and make the play.

Q. I think it's the second string game now, no sacks allowed. Can you talk about that? That's a pretty good front they showed you.
COACH WEIS: Okay. Let's just leave it at that okay?

Q. At the risk of repeating that and having you knock on wood again, how much better is your offensive line from last year?
COACH WEIS: They're much better in two facets in particular, much better in pass protection -- although Jimmy did get us out of a couple. He rolled out, and he's learning now, he's growing up, throwing the ball away, instead of doing something stupid, which we might have done last year so they worked together.
And in a running game -- you're running against a team that's giving up a yard a carry. This is a stout defensive front four, and they will continue to be a stout defensive front four all year long. But when they knew we were running it, and it turned into a slug fest, it showed that our guys are willing to go toe-to-toe with them.

Q. Charlie, once you went up 21-0, you wanted to hit 'em quick and early, but at that point did you want to slow the pace down? Because they started to pick up the pace offensively.
COACH WEIS: The intent was as we got into the openers, we were so far into the game it was 21-0. We had run two plays of the openers. So in the game, we had three-step drops to get the ball out quick, and we had some inside runs figuring that they were going to cover four or bring their linebacker blitzes, and we wanted to play conservative, keep everything in front of us.
Not put us at risk. And I said to 'em, "If we have to punt a bunch of times, then we punt a bunch of times, that's just the way we're going to have to play the game today," because I think that's the way you have to play against this Michigan team. You can't figure that you're going to have a bunch of drives where you're going to go up and down the field all day long.

Q. What's that next step with your knee? Is surgery certain?
COACH WEIS: Yeah, I'll get it done sometime, you know. We've got a bunch of recruits in. We got stuff going on. I'll get through the next couple days and get through the game plan on Monday, and then probably get it done Tuesday or something like that.

Q. Finally --
COACH WEIS: Maybe instead of having a press conference on Tuesday, now that I'm thinking about it. That timing might work out just great.

Q. "To hell with Michigan" is a compliment?
COACH WEIS: It really is a compliment. I'm a big fan of college football, and there are certain coaches -- there are certain coaches that really, really -- you know, I looked up to and respect, and Bo is one of the guys at the top of the list. I found it humorous growing up how he would hammer on Notre Dame all the time; I thought it was humorous.
I think that's funny, so I say it, and it's not funny. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm not funny, but I tell ya what, there is no one who respects Bo more than me. And the funny parts about it is I told -- Schem and I have the talked about it, because I told him the whole story and he said, "My dad would be rolling over in his grave. He would love this stuff."
This is what college football is all about; it's not personal. I've got a lot of respect for Michigan and always will.

Q. Charlie, on that note, Michigan and Notre Dame is a rivalry game. How sweet is the win against a rival?
COACH WEIS: I think it was big for us to step up against a top opponent at home, okay, after a question mark game last week, and to see how we were going to show up. We definitely showed up against a good opponent, and it's pretty sweet.

Q. Is there something about what you guys do defensively in the red zone that allows David Bruton to make the plays in the red zone?
COACH WEIS: I don't know, but tell him to keep doing it. Defensive coaches have done a nice job in the red zone and fortunately for us offensively we did a much better job in the red zone as well. What did we score, three out of four times we got down there? That was big after last week going one for four.

Q. What is the feeling for Golden Tate two games in a row, better than the previous game?
COACH WEIS: He's got a lot of confidence. He's a legend in his own mind, just go ahead and ask him. (Chuckles.)

Q. Coach, Mike Floyd was out there all day today. Could you talk about what got him on the field so much?
COACH WEIS: What got him on the field so much was David's back. David was a go, but we only used David in three wide receiver sets, so that's what we used David in, so that put -- Michael's behind him, and the last couple days of the week when David's back tightened up on Wednesday, or whatever.
Ironically, it tightened up after his press deal with you guys, so I don't know if that's coincidental or not, but his back tightened up and -- okay, well, his back tightened up on Wednesday and Thursday, and Michael was getting the reps with the first group, so it was better for us rather than get away from the flow, what we're doing, just to practice it the way we did it.

Q. Was that the same deal with Chris Stewart and Trevor Robinson?
COACH WEIS: Chris got rolled up that day, and Chris played first half and then it looked like he was starting to hobble some, so we pulled the switch and went to Trevor. I think Trevor played the whole second half, I think. I'm not positive but I think so.

End of FastScripts

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