Brian Kelly shares which of his Notre Dame teams he thought was the best
Former Notre Dame and current LSU head coach Brian Kelly‘s teams accomplished a lot from 2010-21, and the Irish are now one of college football’s most stable programs.
But which team did Kelly think was his best? Well, it’s complicated.
“The most talented offensive team was 2015,” Kelly said on a recent episode of Varsity House Podcast, which is hosted by former Irish defensive back Shaun Crawford. “That team was explosive.”
Kelly’s 2015 offense averaged 34.2 points and 444.9 yards per game. The former number ranked 34th in the country, while the latter was 32nd. The Irish went 10-3 that season.
DeShone Kizer was Notre Dame’s starting signal-caller for most of the year after Malik Zaire suffered a broken ankle in the program’s second game of the season at Virginia. Kizer amassed 2,884 yards, 21 touchdowns and 10 interceptions with a 63 percent completion percentage. The ultimate second-round NFL Draft selection also had 134 carries for 520 yards and 10 rushing touchdowns.
Catching many of those passes was 2016 No. 21 overall NFL Draft pick Will Fuller. The wideout had 62 receptions for 1,258 yards and 14 touchdowns in 2015, an average of 20.3 yards per catch. Fuller’s longest play of the year came on an 81-yard score against Ohio State in a Fiesta Bowl loss.
C.J. Prosise and Josh Adams were the Irish’s top-two running backs in 2015. Prosise had 156 carries for 1,032 yards and 11 touchdowns, while Adams carried the ball 117 times for 835 yards and six scores of his own.
Further, the Irish offensive line was stacked in 2015. Not only were Mike McGlinchey, Ronnie Stanley and Quenton Nelson first-round NFL Draft selections, they have had immense success in the pros. Second-rounder Nick Martin was also a member of that Irish offensive line.
Defensively, however, Kelly had a different team in mind.
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“I think that the 2012 defense was amazing,” the now-LSU head coach said.
The 2012 group, anchored by Heisman runner-up and linebacker Manti Te’o, allowed 12.8 points per contest and made the 2012 BCS National Championship. They lost 42-14 to Alabama to end the year, but it was a remarkable year for Kelly and that defense, all things considered. Te’o led the team with 111 tackles, and eight players had 50+ stops. Over the next two NFL Drafts, a total of eight Irish defensemen would be taken.
While that defense was not able to bring home a title, it surely was dominant through a 12-0 regular season until that January night.
Kelly added he coached a number of incredible defensive players who were not on that 2012 team but warrant recognition. Linebacker Jaylon Smith and safety Kyle Hamilton were a couple of examples he provided.
“You put that group together, you got a shot,” Kelly said.
Interestingly, Kelly’s last few teams at Notre Dame were statistically on par — at least in terms of scoring offense — with the 2015 offense. Coincidentally, the average points scored by the Irish offense per game from 2017-21 was exactly 34.2. The lowest number over those five years was 31.4 (2018), while the highest was 36.8 (2019).
