John Latina is out and Frank Verducci is in as Notre Dame offensive line coach.
Nobody can accuse head coach Charlie Weis of wasting time. Latina resigned Wednesday to "pursue other opportunities," according to a Notre Dame news release. Verducci, who has spent eight of the last 10 years in the NFL, was hired at the same time.
Verducci spent the last two years with the Cleveland Browns as their offensive assistant coach. Before that he worked with Buffalo, Dallas and Cincinnati, mostly as an offensive line coach. He also was an assistant coach for 19 years in college with stops at Iowa, Northwestern, Northern Illinois, Maryland and Colorado State. Verducci was considered one of the nation's top recruiters while at Iowa by national recruiting analysts Tom Lemming and Allen Wallace.
Frank provides an excellent background on both the offensive line and run game, having coached in professional football and at the Division I level,
Weis said in a university release.
His experience will be an asset to both our players and our staff.
Verducci will have veteran talent to work with. Notre Dame returns four offensive line starters. Also back is Paul Duncan, the 2007 starter who missed last season with an injury.
With a combined 100 career starts, the Irish will have one of the nation's most experienced lines.
Notre Dame is the one college job I pursued,
Verducci said. It is the only school I considered leaving the NFL for. I'm looking forward to developing the talent we have here.
Latina took much of the heat for Notre Dame's offensive line struggles the last three years. The Irish gave up an NCAA-record 58 sacks in 2007. They had their three worst rushing attacks ever in 2006, 2007 and 2008.
He's the third Irish coach to leave since the season ended. The others are offensive coordinator Mike Hayworth (now the Miami of Ohio head coach) and defensive line coach Jappy Oliver (also resigned to "pursue other opportunities").
Weis will apparently take over as offensive coordinator. He's looking for a running backs coach to replace Hayworth and is still interviewing defensive line coaching candidates.