Quick-Hitters: Brian Kelly Oct. 29 Press Conference

Notre Dame wide receiver Braden Lenzy won't play Saturday at Georgia Tech or next weekend against Clemson, Brian Kelly said Thursday. His absence could be as long as four weeks, putting Nov. 27 at North Carolina in play as the return date.

“Braden had PRP (platelet-rich plasma), and that’s a Grade 2 injury when we procedure. That usually requires 2-4 weeks for full recovery. That’s what we’re looking for relative to getting him back at the level he needs to be. He has been fighting through a hamstring injury at less than 100 percent. That’s not where you want to be at the position at which he plays and what his skill set is.”

Elsewhere, Kelly said Notre Dame had zero new COVID-19 cases arise from its testing Sunday and Tuesday, the first two rounds of testing since returning from Pittsburgh.

"Obviously, that’s a great sign," Kelly said. "You’re on the road for the first time and in contact with people outside your bubble.”

Here are some other topics he addressed in his Thursday media session.

"We brought up with us this week. He had been making some progress with how he’s dealing with the transition to college. This has never been an issue of lack of ability. We knew Jordan’s ability. There are other things that are important here at the university, and we all know that. He has been focused heavily on making the transition. The things that are really difficult are in the classroom.

“He has made some progress, enough that we brought him up. He’s a talented player. In the rotation? We’ll see how that goes. We all see he has the skill set. Now we’ll have to build that.”

“Jordan is an X receiver. Down the road, could he play W? Certainly. He’s not physically at a position where he can excel at that position. We’d rather have him at a position where he can get more free releases. The W receiver gets a lot more press coverage. As a younger player, you prefer much more free access. He will begin his entry into our two-deep and rotation as an X receiver.”

“We set that standard last week in terms of what was expected of our team. We’re not going to get into comparing scores. That really isn’t what this is about. It’s about our standard of play we didn’t think we were matching and if we wanted to be a championship team, we had to elevate with a sense of urgency. It’s really not about what that looks like from any other perspective than our own. It would be more appropriate to show the difference between the Louisville game and Pittsburgh game.”

“His numbers, physical numbers in terms of volume load, in the weight room, GPS numbers don’t point toward a freshman. They point toward somebody who has a much higher level of conditioning and work volume. It’s not surprising he has handled it quite well. These were important questions for us as we were going into camp. Do we have a true freshman is going to hit the wall five or six games into it, or do we have a guy who we really believe is going to be here the whole year?

"We felt pretty confident this was a guy who was going to get better as the season goes. We are seeing that in a practice sense. You’re not seeing it in games because he’s not getting a ton of work. You’ll see his workload continue to pick up.”

“Jeremiah, where we saw him begin to take that next step was against Georgia. When the caliber of play stepped up, he stepped up to a level where we saw him stand out against the top-performing teams. He brings his best against the best, and I think that’s how you measure great players.”

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