ATLANTA — Rocco Spindler still remembers the feeling that permeated the air in South Bend, Indiana, during late November in 2021. The Notre Dame offensive lineman — then a freshman — and his teammates had just finished an 11-1 season only to be hit with the news that their head coach, Brian Kelly, was leaving for LSU while they still had an outside shot at making the College Football Playoff.
“There was a lot of uncertainty that whole week,” Spindler said. “We didn’t know who else was leaving, who else was staying.”
As November turned into December, Spindler and the rest of the team found themselves grasping for any semblance of familiarity or comfort. In Marcus Freeman, they found it.
“He was the one guy we all gravitated toward,” Spindler said of the Irish’s then-first-year defensive coordinator.
Naturally, the players who had seen what Freeman could do, who had been coached by him and felt his impact on their game, viewed the idea of Freeman succeeding Kelly as a no-brainer and campaigned for it.
“It was hectic,” said defensive lineman Howard Cross III. “But immediately everybody was like, ‘Why doesn’t Coach Freeman just be the head coach?’ Everybody agreed.”
“Seeing his ability to lead and how he handles certain situations was all we needed,” said defensive lineman Rylie Mills. “I think we all kind of knew what he was capable of.”
The players’ preference was no secret. Spindler remembers upperclassmen who would not be there the following season expressing their desire for Freeman to take over. It didn’t take long for them to get their wish.
a player’s coach@Marcus_Freeman1 | #GoIrish pic.twitter.com/pf9E1OygA8
— Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) December 3, 2021
The video of the team’s reaction to Freeman’s hiring immediately became a touchpoint for the program’s decision. It wasn’t about hiring anyone connected to Notre Dame. As the caption “player’s coach” alongside Freeman being mobbed by players showed, the decision had the potential to start a new era for the program.
“It was absolutely risky to hire somebody at a place like Notre Dame who doesn’t have a track record as a head coach, but he won the job,” former Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick, who hired Freeman, told ESPN. “We had plenty of really attractive candidates, but based on my experience with him, based on what the players told me, and based on a really excellent interview, he distinguished himself.”
In the three years since that…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at www.espn.com – Notre Dame Fighting Irish…