Sept. 01--SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- One thing is clear: Some things are unclear heading into Notre Dame's season opener Saturday against Texas.
For example: Who will call offensive plays for Notre Dame this season?
Irish coach Brian Kelly said Tuesday that he and assistants Mike Denbrock and Mike Sanford would collaborate on those duties but declined to elaborate further, saying only that he would have final say.
"I know you guys want more, but I'm just not going to give you much more," Kelly said. "We're all in unison in how we want the game to unfold.
"Whether it's coming out of Mike or Mike or Brian's lips is really immaterial."
With everyone on the same pages, literally -- Kelly said they would all be working from the same play sheets -- Notre Dame hopes to guide almost-brand-new starting quarterback Malik Zaire to success in what the Irish expect to be a test to open the season.
"If he does exactly what I tell him to do, we should be in really good shape," Kelly said half-jokingly.
Zaire started one game -- the Music City Bowl -- last season.
"We certainly present all of those challenges to him in practice: Drop eight, overload pressures," Kelly said. "But those are just quizzes. The test is when it happens in real time. I don't know that you really know for sure until you get the test."
The study guide for that test also was unclear. Kelly said the Irish had little other than some grainy footage of the Longhorns' spring game to go by in preparation for Saturday's game.
Another thing that is unclear: Texas' quarterback situation. The Longhorns will have two to direct if coach Charlie Strong sticks to his game plan of a two-man system.
Strong, a Notre Dame defensive line coach from 1995-98, appointed junior Tyrone Swoopes the starter but said both Swoopes and redshirt freshman Jerrod Heard would play.
Swoopes took every snap in the Longhorns' final 12 games last season and was 224-for-284 for 2,409 yards, 13 touchdowns and 11 interceptions.
"He didn't sit me down or anything," Swoopes said. "He already said that me and Jerrod were going to play. There was no formal big presentation or anything."
But Strong cautioned that his team, which lost 11 starters, including six on defense, from last season's 6-7 team shouldn't rely too heavily on one or two players.
"I told our guys, 'Let's not ask our quarterbacks to win the game. We don't need them to,' " Strong said.
To win the game, the Longhorns will rely on a quarterback who can throw and run (Swoopes), one who has pushed Swoopes (Heard) and running back Johnathan Gray (2,118 career rushing yards), who moves into the primary role with the school's ninth-leading all-time rusher, Malcolm Brown, gone.
"You have to prepare for both of them," Kelly said of Swoopes and Heard. "We are preparing for a spread offense where tempo is part of it and having two quarterbacks, and one that can run the ball effectively."
And preparing to see things more clearly.
pskrbina@tribpub.com
