MVP Claypool: 'He's got it'
A sold-out crowd in front of him and the event drawing to its conclusion, Chase Claypool kept his cool.
Of course he did.
In fact, Notre Dame’s scintillating senior wide receiver cracked a joke.
“I never knew something like this was possible; not because I didn’t think I could do it, but because I didn’t think Canadians qualified for this award,” Claypool, from Abbotsford, British Columbia, told the overflow crowd inside the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center.
He had just been named Notre Dame’s Monogram Club MVP in the 99th iteration of the end-of-season awards program and been featured in a rousing highlight montage from the Fighting Irish’s 10-2 campaign, one that secured this senior class’ place in history.
They’re the first group of Notre Dame players to post three-straight seasons of double-digit wins since 1991-93. Claypool had many key moments throughout the season, but perhaps none was more significant than his pair of fourth-down catches to sustain hope in the Irish’s 21-20, come-from-behind win November 2 at home against Virginia Tech.
“Notre Dame’s got bright lights, and he doesn’t shy away from those big moments,” Brian Kelly said on stage of Claypool. “When the bigger moments are there, that’s when he rises to the occasion.
“That’s why he is destined for greater things when he leaves here.”
With one more game to play for Notre Dame December 28 against Iowa State in the Camping World Bowl, Claypool already is secured on a pair of remarkable Irish lists: he shares 10th-place for single-season touchdown catches, after hauling in 12 this year, and resides in the same spot for career scoring receptions with 18. He’s tied for the program benchmark in single-game touchdown receptions as well, after posting four last month in the Irish’s plundering of Navy.
“It means the world to me, but this is not why I went through the season,” Claypool told reporters. “I went through the season to be with my teammates and play with my teammates, so this award is a representation of what I’ve been through with them.”
The ability to earn the award is something fifth-year senior wideout Chris Finke likewise remembers seeing very early in Claypool.
“Pretty much right when he started playing ball here, throughout the whole summer we don’t really do a lot of football, so it’s hard to tell what everybody can do,” Finke told Irish Sports Daily. “But after like a week or two, it was like, ‘Chase Claypool is going to be pretty special.’
“I remember this one play in one-on-ones, he just made this ridiculous catch in the back of the end zone and C.J. Sanders and I looked at each other like, ‘Yeah, he’s got it.’”