Whether you like it or not, ... you're a national figure after five games at Notre Dame.

If you can hang in games by staying close defensively, then good things can happen.

I became a head football coach when I was 27 years old at Miami of Ohio.

The game is not won by a pep talk on Saturday. It's won by preparation of your club from Monday until game time. If they're not ready on Saturday, you're not going to get them ready by trying to inspire them with a dog-eat-dog sermon on that day.

One of the reasons I never went into pro football was because I wanted my kids to grow up around an academic environment. And that's exactly what we did.

The burdens of being a head coach are different from being an assistant. If I had been an assistant coach for awhile, then become a head coach, I probably would have lasted longer.