Notre Dame Coach: Te'o Not Exposed in Alabama Game

Published on 16-Apr-2013 by Stacey Mickles

Football - NCAA    NCAA Football Daily Opinion

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Notre Dame Coach: Te'o Not Exposed in Alabama Game

Either Brian Kelly is the most supportive head football coach in a America or the dumbest.

Kelly, who is the head coach at Notre Dame, was asked if his star player, Manti Te'o, was exposed in the national championship game against Alabama. His response was puzzling:

"I at first felt that we got pushed around a little bit, but as we watched more film, I think our guys didn’t play their very best, and Alabama obviously played very well in that game. But I think as people watched more film and saw Manti Te’o and his body of work over the last four years, they came to their own conclusion that this is a very, very good football player."

What game was he watching?

I'd like to believe that Kelly is just trying to help his star player, who looked average and at times below average in the Alabama game, get picked high in the draft, which is understandable. But this isn't the first time the Irish coach took little jabs at fantasy like this after the national championship game.

It seems as if Kelly even refuses at times to acknowledge the loss. It was "they (meaning the Irish) played bad", not that Alabama was just the better team ... and for those who watched the game, they were.

I guess if Brian Kelly acknowledges how bad the Irish played, that means he has to acknowledge that they didn't belong on the same playing field as Alabama, that he coached a lousy game, and that  the Irish may have played a softer schedule than the Tide.

And if you are the Notre Dame coach, you can't have that happen. You have to keep the illusion that Notre Dame football is still the best program in the country. Acknowledging anything else would be realistic.