SOUTH BEND, Ind. — In a 10-minute interview session with local reporters after Thursday’s eighth practice of spring for Notre Dame football, running backs coach Deland McCullough answered more questions about players who didn’t take running back reps in practice that morning than ones who did.
That’s because the top of Notre Dame’s running backs depth chart doesn’t have many questions after both Audric Estimé and Logan Diggs proved to be reliable and productive last season as sophomores.
There doesn’t seem to be much concern about a lower-leg injury that’s kept Diggs sidelined for most of the spring. Diggs, who rushed 165 times for 821 yards and four touchdowns last season, told reporters Thursday that he should be practicing next week and available to play in the Blue-Gold Game on April 22.
His absence has given Estimé plenty of opportunities to show how he’s improved from a season in which he averaged nearly six yards per carry with 920 yards and 11 touchdowns. That started with Estimé trimming his 6-foot, 227-pound frame of body fat by cutting down on his fast-food intake. The results have been noticeable.
“He's more twitchy,” McCullough said. “He’s more explosive. That's very evident. It gave him another step that we really can see.
“Audric, I meet with him very often just about how he can improve his game and some of those things. Coming into January, that was something that we talked with the nutritionist about: just trimming him down a little bit.”
With Diggs sidelined, sophomore-to-be Jadarian Price still recovering from last summer’s torn Achilles tendon and senior-to-be Chris Tyree working at wide receiver this spring, Gi’Bran Payne has been elevated to a higher level in the final semester of his freshman year. At this point last year, Payne had yet to commit to Notre Dame following a release from his National Letter of Intent with Indiana.
“I wanted to see this spring,” McCullough said, “Gi’Bran show that he can be a guy that we can plug in there and not lose anything as far as effectiveness, attention to detail, discipline, dependability, and all those different things.
“During these camp live situations, he had two very long runs. Really good in pass protection, really good route runner, sure hands, different things like that.”
By the time preseason camp starts, Price, the breakout performer at the position last spring, will be ready to contribute. He said Thursday he expects to be 100% this summer.
“I'm very optimistic about him,” McCullough said. “We’ve seen from a front row seat of what he did during the spring last year and it was really, really, really good. He'll be starting to reintegrate into everything we have going on. Feeling confident that by the time we get in June he'll be a full participant. We kind of go from there.
“But skill set, the guy’s put together. He’s smart, fast, explosive. He has all of the competencies you want at that position. And the thing is if you go off one year ago, he showed it on a really high level. So yes, he hasn't been physically doing things, but he's continuing to be locked into what we're doing mentally. I'm excited to get him back out on the physical part.”
Price (5-10, 203), Payne (5-9, 204) and four-star running back signee Jeremiyah Love (6-1, 188) will have a chance to push for playing time in the fall.
“Logan and Audric, they set the tone just because of their productivity last year,” McCullough said. “So, OK, you have to look at them. But those guys know there are other dudes who want to play. Ain't nobody just bowing down and saying, ‘OK, you guys are just it.’ They know they have to continue to enhance their game. That's the beauty of this situation. Everybody is trying to grow every day.”
Last season, McCullough had mapped out in his mind a way to play four running backs, but the rotation stayed at three with Estimé, Diggs and Tyree following Price’s injury. Despite so much production returning from last season, he’s not ready to limit himself on numbers.
“I'm giving every guy an opportunity,” McCullough said. “It's up to the dudes who are ready and prepared, which they all should be, to seize it and run with it. Then it's up to us as coaches to figure out how to play them.”
Processing Chris Tyree’s position switch
In early January, McCullough laid out for Tyree the advantages of spending more time as a wide receiver this year. When offensive coordinator Tommy Rees left for Alabama, McCullough was a bit worried that the new coordinator would limit Tyree to one position, but the elevation of tight ends coach Gerad Parker to the role made the transition easy.
“Chris, when we had that conversation, he was all on it,” McCullough said. “I said, ‘Man, look at what you can do here. You look at the NFL part of it.’ I said, ‘Man, there are some things you can do,’ and I’ve talked to a bunch of NFL guys when those conversations are what they are. But I think he's shown what he can do as an outside guy.
“Natural route runner, really, really good hands, explosive in space guy. And rather than as a running back, trying to create those scenarios, I said, ‘Shoot, why don’t we just put him out there?’ He's already out there. You don't have to come up with packages. You just run our offense. You put him out, and he's just a receiver.”
The 5-10, 192-pound Tyree has 229 carries for 1,162 yards and eight touchdowns on his Notre Dame résumé, and those totals likely won’t stop there. His experience will allow the Irish to use him in different ways. McCullough won’t even have to beg wide receivers coach Chansi Stuckey for permission.
“The options remain of just bringing him into the backfield and just go ahead and go from there,” McCullough said. “I know he was excited about that.
“Coach Stuckey’s done a great job with him. Chris has done a good job of showing he can be an effective guy, just not a gadget guy at receiver. Like, ‘I can go out here and play the receiver position.’ It's going to make Notre Dame better, and that's going to help him too.”
Picking apart pass protection
Pro Football Focus didn’t think very highly of the pass-blocking efforts of Notre Dame’s running backs last season. Estimé’s 31.8 pass-blocking grade was the highest of ND’s running backs ahead of Tyree (28.5) and Diggs (6.0). For the sake of context, All-America left tackle Joe Alt’s pass-blocking grade was 81.7 last season.
In 73 pass-blocking opportunities, Notre Dame’s running backs allowed three sacks, nine pressures, four hurries and two hits, according to PFF evaluators.
McCullough didn’t paint as bleak of a picture of the backs’ performances from last season. By his count, the running back allowed two sacks last season. Yet it’s an area he’s perpetually pushing for improvement.
“The way I look at sacks is was it a recognition sack?” McCullough said. “If you’re just missing guys, we have problems. Like, ‘OK, I went this way and some guy came and just hit the quarterback.’ We have major problems there. We didn't have any of those.
“So you have more technical, fundamental things. If you say of all the times we took on guys, how many guys got by? That percent is very low. I'm saying 50 times we engaged a guy, two or three times somebody got by. OK. It's not OK, but in the grand scheme of it, that's not terrible.
“You want to continue to put guys out there who can win at the point of attack. That's the thing. That's why Audric was mainly our third-down guy. Logan has done it successfully. Gi’Bran will be able to do that well. JD [Price], don't know. We haven’t gotten to that point. Physically, he looks like he can. But you have to get out there and do it.”
New title recognition
In the offseason, McCullough was promoted to run game coordinator in addition to his running backs coach responsibilities. It almost certainly came with a raise, but McCullough said it hasn’t changed much in his day-to-day work.
“Nothing changed with that,” McCullough said. “It’s cool. I appreciate everything that came with that, but at the end of the day, nothing really changed for me. Just getting my guys ready to play and being the positive contributor in the coaching staff and putting together a plan.”
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