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In five years, Charlie Weis went from being Notre Dame’s coaching savior to likely the fourth coach the university has let go, if you count George O’Leary’s five days on the job, in an eight-year period.
Weis started so hot with the Irish that his first contract was torn up seven games into his tenure and replaced with a 10-year deal.
Notre Dame was initially rewarded with back-to-back BCS bowl games, but the blowout losses – 34-20 to Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl after the 2005 season and 41-14 to LSU in the Sugar Bowl after 2006 – were harbingers of misery to come.
Notre Dame spiraled to a 3-9 finish in 2007, starting the worst two-year stretch in program history as the Irish went 7-6 in 2008, giving Weis a 10-15 record in his third and fourth seasons.
A 49-21 victory over Hawaii in the Hawaii Bowl to finish last season gave the Irish hope, as did landing a prized defensive recruit, linebacker Manti Te’o.
Notre Dame entered this season with a schedule that was supposed to be manageable enough to return the program to prominence.
Instead, the Irish were haunted by close losses – five by a total of 21 points – and a 6-2 start fell apart in November as the Irish went 0-4. Notre Dame also endured losses to rivals Michigan (38-34 Sept. 12) and USC (34-27 Oct. 17) and a second home loss in three years to Navy, which the Irish had defeated 43 times in a row before 2007.
Notre Dame entered the season’s final week at 6-5, and Weis said it would be hard to argue with Notre Dame if he was not brought back for a sixth season.
And just as hard to argue is a body of work that has not lived up to the standards Weis set in his first two seasons when he went 19-6.
Under Weis, Notre Dame has gone 1-13 against teams finishing in the Top 25, lost five games to USC by an average of 19.8 points and had losing records against Boston College (1-2), Michigan (2-3) and Michigan State (2-3).
The Irish under Weis also haven’t defeated a team with fewer than four losses or a team that finished in the top 10 of any major poll.
The schematic advantage Weis said he brought to Notre Dame, after being the offensive coordinator for three New England Patriot Super Bowl winning teams, never materialized.
He is the first coach in program history not to reach 50 points in a game, and his teams were shut out three times.
Defensively, the Irish haven’t been able to field a championship-level squad in Weis’ five seasons.
Notre Dame has been defeated by 40 or more points six times and 30 or more 19 times in the past five seasons.
Off the field, Weis has performed.
His recruiting classes, starting in 2006, were constantly in the top 10, players have continued to graduate (Notre Dame’s football team scored a 96 in the latest NCAA Graduation Success Rate survey, tied for first with Duke among Bowl Subdivision programs), and there have been few off-field problems that embarrassed the program.
But the bottom line for coaches is winning games, and at Notre Dame, it’s winning big games and competing for national titles.
Weis has represented the university well as a proud alum, but he didn’t get it done on the field, and it is time for the Irish to move on.
