Charlie Weis has always had an NFL approach and, at the beginning of his tenure in South Bend, perhaps he treated the Notre Dame football team a little too much like a pro team.
Yet it is more coincidental than anything that Weis is now following another recent NFL trend. After wanting to use a featured running back during his first couple of years, Weis is going with a multi-back approach.
“The number of guys that you have in college is so much different than the number of guys you have in the pros,”
Weis said. “You have more people to choose from, which was a little different for me.”
In the NFL, Weis would have at most four running backs. At Notre Dame, he had five halfbacks and a fullback he used in different gameday situations in 2007. Coming into this year, he has a three-pronged attack at halfback.
Junior James Aldridge and sophomores Robert Hughes and Armando Allen will all see time this season – Allen as more of a change-of-pace back and Aldridge and Hughes as more similar-type runners. The multi-back system keeps the players fresher and the coaches with more options.
“It feels good and it makes me play better just from the simple fact that you’ve got to make a play, got to make a play, got to make a play,”
Hughes said. “It’s a good feeling, positive. I’d rather feel like this than know, hands-down, for sure, that I’m the guy because I have no one to push me.”
Aldridge started five games, led Notre Dame in carries (121) and yards (463) last year. Allen started four games, gained 348 yards and had the best yards-per-rush at 4.0. Hughes started one game, yet scored the most touchdowns (4) among the returning backs.
The Irish backs don’t seem to mind sharing playing time.
When Aldridge was a freshman and sophomore at Hazelwood Central High School in St. Louis, he was more of a secondary back to current Michigan State running back A.J. Jimmerson before transferring to Merrillville, where he was the main guy. Allen split time as a junior at Hialeah-Miami Lakes in Florida with Anthony Henderson, who Allen said is playing in a junior college. Allen broke his leg before his senior year and was never a true feature back.
“We split the carries,”
Allen said. “That was fine with me. It’s less wear and tear on the body so I’m fine with that.”
Part of the attraction of using multiple backs for coaches is that if Notre Dame ran nine times on the first series and the back was tired, they don’t have to alter the gameplan. They can insert the next back without a drop-off.
“There’s nothing wrong with that,”
Allen said. “I actually think it’s beneficial, having multiple backs instead of one, it’s very beneficial. That’s a good thing, never a bad thing.”
With a crowded backfield, the potential always exists for fighting over carries. Weis isn’t concerned. He said the three backs are close and that all three know their performances eliminate that situation. Plus, it has worked at many successful college programs and didn’t hurt those players’ NFL draft stock.
USC used LenDale White and Reggie Bush. Arkansas had Darren McFadden and Felix Jones. All four were drafted in the first round of the NFL draft when they left school.
“All three of those guys know that they are going to be involved in what they’re doing,”
Weis said. “Part of your problem is that if they don’t feel like they are involved, they start to fade some, and I don’t think that any of them feel that that’s going to happen this year.”
