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How Weis can justify keeping his job

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Updated Nov 29, 2009 4:56 AM ET
     
 
CFN's Instant Analysis of Stanford's 45-38 win over Notre Dame:

No team had a more exciting season

I'm Charlie Weis (and after eating an entire pecan pie and half a bag of donuts over the last 36 hours, I have the waistline) and I still want to be the head coach at Notre Dame. Sure, I can get canned and get paid a ton while my contract runs out, but I really do like the gig and I want to stay. Here's my sales point. Hasn't it been fun? Yeah, I want to get to the BCS and I want to win national titles, too, but NBC has to be loving the weekly drama, ABC would love to feature us every Saturday night if they could, and yeah, we're 6-6, but no team in America has played a more exciting season. Ten games, 10 games were decided by a touchdown or less, and we had the ball in our hands with a chance to either pull out the win or send it into overtime in all six of our losses. So, basically, if we get a touchdown and Connecticut gets a field goal in the second overtime, and if Clausen connects on that late pass against USC, and if roughly two other big plays go our way, we're 10-2 and in the BCS. I know you can't do it this way and it would mean hitting the parlay, but we really and truly were six plays from playing for the national title. Six plays. Keep me around for one more year. I'll sell Clausen, Tate, and the rest of the gang that we can do magical things with a more experienced team, and if they jump, then Dayne Crist becomes a star, half the team wants him as the starting quarterback, anyway, Michael Floyd wins the Biletnikoff, and with our relatively easy schedule we do go to the BCS. And along the way I'll offer this deal. For every loss I'll give back $1 million to the school's general scholarship fund. It'll be unprecedented and it'll be like that game show with the guy who's afraid of germs. To help boost ratings I'll act like a raging jerkweed, or more of one, to create a villain that everyone roots against but has to pay attention to. NBC will eat it up, Notre Dame football will never be bigger, and yeah, I really do believe I'll probably have to give back no more than $2 million. What's that? You have to take this call? No problem. Tell him to congratulate Tebow for me. — Pete Fiutak

Defensive shortcomings doomed Weis

If you've lived under a rock for the past five years, and don't understand why Charlie Weis is clinging for his coaching life, Saturday's game on the Farm told you everything you need to know. Notre Dame's 45-38 loss to Stanford, its fourth in a row to close the regular season, was a microcosm of Weis' tenure in South Bend. The offense, specifically the passing game, did all it could to get the Irish a victory, yet the defense failed to make stops when it had to. On the Cardinal's final drive for the victory, it went 72 yards in under five minutes without too much resistance. Everyone, including the Irish, knew that RB Toby Gerhart would have the ball in his hands on just about every play, but it didn't make a darn bit of difference. Stanford did whatever it wanted and Notre Dame had no answers, a familiar theme when the Irish have struggled the past few years. If, indeed, Weis has coached his final game at his alma mater, his inability to cobble together the right staff and the right personnel on defense will surely be his undoing. As an offensive coach and a tutor of young quarterbacks, he has a proven track record and a job waiting for him as an assistant, likely in the NFL, when he decides to accept an offer. Winning up to his and the school's expectations, however, requires more than just a fancy aerial attack and a next-level quarterback. Getting to the level of the nation's elite demands the total package. Weis knew very early in his tenure that the Irish were light on the defensive side of the ball, but in five seasons, he just hasn't been able to properly address that shortcoming. — Richard Cirminiello

The case for Gerhart as Heisman winner

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1. Toby Gerhart failed to rush for 100 yards in only two games this season. In each of those games, the Stanford stud still averaged 4.8 yards per carry. Big No. 7 didn't fumble once this year. Unlike Mark Ingram, he completed his halfback option pass this weekend. Gerhart was the leader of a team that gained a bowl bid for the first time in eight seasons, and thrived despite the growing pains of a talented but still-developing freshman quarterback, Andrew Luck. Other Heisman Trophy contenders — like C.J. Spiller and Colt McCoy — disappeared in multiple games this year and looked genuinely bad when they struggled. Gerhart's worst games were few and far between, but even then, the Prince of Palo Alto put together entirely respectable numbers. The Heisman is supposed to be given to the most outstanding player in college football for the whole season; not for three-fourths of the season, not half a season, not the final few weeks of the season when everyone's watching and conference titles are decided. Colt McCoy is an all-time college football legend who deserved the 2008 Heisman, due to consistent heavy lifting for a Texas team that didn't have quite the same horses owned by Oklahoma and Florida. This year, however, McCoy was average in some contests and downright lousy in others; not until late October did Kid Colt find his six-shootin' sharpness. Yes, of course, the political calculus of the Heisman race is undeniable: McCoy enjoys considerable goodwill and leverage. However, if the trophy is going to be awarded on the raw merits of weekly performances, Toby Gerhart has done more than anyone else in the Football Bowl Subdivision this season, with the possible exception of Ndamukong Suh. Heisman voters, you need to make your choices based on 12 games, not six. I don't think you'll do so, but maybe you'll surprise me in two weeks at the Downtown Athletic Club. 2. Jon Tenuta used to be one of the premier defensive coordinators in America. What happened? — Matt Zemek
Tagged: Stanford, Clemson, Texas, Connecticut, Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Alabama

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