Eric Hansen

SOUTH BEND, Ind. - On the very night Notre Dame was extended and accepted a bid to the Sheraton Hawaii Bowl, the news that Irish head football coach Charlie Weis had extended and been taken up on a scholarship offer to a long snapper trickled onto the Internet.

That both events generated about the same amount of shoulder-shrugging says much less about the net worth of either and volumes about what Weis’ aura looks like to his fan base these days.

There certainly were plenty of contradictions and dangling details to pick at regarding Notre Dame’s ultimate bowl destination, once you get past the breathtaking weather and scenery and the classy people of Honolulu.

Where Weis stands, though, as he tries to follow up a makeover of his coaching approach with an equally dramatic fix of his reputation, is one step above limbo, which ironically is where he spent the early part of last week.

Now he’s headed to paradise, sort of, where his 6-6 Irish football team will play host Hawaii (7-6) on Christmas Eve (8 p.m. EST). That’s after, for varying reasons, the Irish slipped through the hands of a Gator Bowl matchup with Clemson (7-5), a Sun Bowl matchup with Oregon State (8-4) an Emerald Bowl matchup with Miami (7-5) and a Texas Bowl matchup with Rice (9-3).

In the coming days, Irish fans will get their fill about such things as what an okina is (the apostrophe-looking thing in the Hawaiian spelling of Hawai’i), how to pronounce Warriors running back Bryce Kalau`oka`a`ea’s okina-laden name and the fact Hawaii offensive coordinator Ron Lee and defensive coordinator Cal Lee are brothers.

What really matters, though, is what Notre Dame and Weis do with this opportunity. If the soon-to-be fifth-year Irish coach is going to begin mitigating, if not reversing, the doubts and criticism that envelope him, it will start in Honolulu.

Even though the Sagarin computer rating views this as a battle between the nation’s 58th-best college football team (ND) and No. 85 (Hawaii), winning is a big deal in the long view of the program.

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Perceptual wars are important and breaking an NCAA-record nine-game losing streak would be one less weighty issue the Irish carry into a 2009 season that is likely BCS-or-bust for Weis.

To this Weis must add a strong finish to recruiting, verbal commitments from long snappers not withstanding. There needs to be minimal hemorrhaging and he needs to add at least one marquee defensive player -- a player like Manti Te’o, who just happens to be the premier linebacker prospect in the country, whose name just happens to have an okina and whose high school is conveniently only seven miles from Aloha Stadium, site of the Hawaii Bowl.

The third step of the Weis perceptual reversal plan is for meaningful changes to be made to the coaching staff. The fourth step is for lots of positive story lines to emerge in spring practice -- like quarterback Jimmy Clausen having some kind of epiphany, like a young defensive line surprise, like tight end Mike Ragone coming back from a season-ending knee injury, like the offensive line looking like the old Lou Holtz/Joe Moore models.

The choice to launch this all in Hawaii is a curious one. Athletic director Jack Swarbrick made the decision once ND’s late-season swoon and the Rutgers/Louisville verdict knocked ND out of the Big East bowl lineup and into squatter status with five legitimate but flawed options. He did have the blessing of university president Rev. John I. Jenkins and significant input from Weis.

Some of the criteria that factored into past ND bowl choices, back before there was the extensive web of conference alignments, did not come into play this time.

For example, the Irish did not choose to play the highest-ranked team available to them. That would have been Ball State (12-1, No. 37 Sagarin rating) in the Motor City Bowl. In fact, Buffalo (8-5, 55th in Sagarin) in the International and Rice (9-3, 61st) in the Texas were higher rated as well. Louisiana Tech (7-5, 96th), in the Independence, was the only team that was not.

The Irish powers-that-be also selected the game closest to their exam schedule (Dec. 15-19), the one that had the best chance of offending their Catholic fan base (Christmas Eve) and the one their fans theoretically had the hardest time affording to go to.

Weis’ comments about the bowl selection were delivered in a prepared statement and read as such: "We're very excited about heading out west to play in the Sheraton Hawaii Bowl. This is a great opportunity for our team to face a quality opponent in their backyard, and we'll need to be ready. I know the extra practices this month will really benefit our team, and we look forward to ending this season on a good note.”

With a modest bowl payout of $750,000 that will produce red ink at a time when Jenkins warned the university would be tightening its economic belt, going to a bowl at all raised plenty of eyebrows on campus.

It simply comes down to these factors, none of which will find their way into a prepared or unprepared statement from the university:

1. Playing in Hawaii will give Te’o a two-week-long informercial about Notre Dame to look at. And, yes, the kid is that good.

2. The remote location, and expense that goes along with that, is also going to eliminate the gaper factor in the media, outlets covering the game simply hoping to capture a train wreck. The overall media demands will be less, something Weis needs as he tries to catch a second wind.

3. The Notre Dame players are excited about going, a sharp contrast to the 2004 Insight Bowl under interim coach Kent Baer. Weis and the Irish are not looking at this as a reward for the 2008 season, but as the beginning of 2009.

Yes, the Hawaii Bowl, given its past attendance (third-lowest among all bowls last year) and TV ratings (fourth-lowest) may be viewed by some as the long snapper of bowl games. But to Weis, it’s about moving forward. And in his mind, this is the perfect spot to be reborn.  

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