Brian Kelly addresses ‘execution’ quote following Notre Dame win at Florida State

Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly was not happy with the execution his team showed in the season opener against Florida State. After a 41-38 overtime win, the veteran coach spoke with ABC sideline reporter Katie George about the game. Kelly jokingly said his team deserved to be “executed,” drawing immediate backlash on social media.

During the postgame press conference, Kelly had the incident brought to his attention and addressed the moment with reporters. The Athletic’s Matt Fortuna posted Kelly’s response on social media.

“I was kidding,” Kelly said lightheartedly during his postgame press conference.” It was tongue in cheek. It wasn’t funny? It’s an old John McKay quote that he used after the game, so I was talking and making a joke about it. Why? It was taken serious? Are you people crazy?”

He continued: “I was stealing one of his old quotes and being funny. I guess nobody likes to be funny anymore. So yeah, if you want to take me to town on that, please do.”

‘Execution’ comments

The original ‘execution’ comments were given immediately following the game by Brian Kelly on live television as part of the ABC broadcast. The Notre Dame coach wanted to emphasize the need to execute better.

“Yeah, I’m in favor of execution,” Kelly said. “Maybe our entire team needs to be executed after tonight. We just didn’t execute well and I will say this Florida State played extremely well.”

He continued: “The two-quarterback system they have. They created all kinds of problems. We’ve got some work to do. I like our team, I like our players. I love their commitment and the way they fought. We’re gritty but we got a lot of work to do. It’s nice to go back and do the work after a win. It was hard.”

When Kelly detailed exactly what problems were on defense, big plays were his primary concern as Notre Dame gave up nearly as many 60-yard plays as it has in the past three seasons. Overall, Kelly said he will walk away from the game glad for the win but with lots more work to do.

“Clearly, the big plays have to be eliminated on defense and we’ve got to execute a little better on third-down,” Kelly said on the sideline. “We had too many third-down situations and we had that lull there in the fourth quarter. Look it’s the first game. We’re happy we got the victory but if we want to be a playoff team and compete for a championship. We gotta get a lot better and we gotta get a lot better soon.”