Instant Reaction | Freeman Adds Al Washington to Staff

Marcus Freeman didn’t wait long to replace Mike Elston. He went right out and landed a coach he is very familiar with in Al Washington.

He was most recently on the Ohio State staff for three seasons where he was brought in to coach linebackers by Ryan Day. Day had previously worked with him at Boston College. Prior to OSU, he was at Michigan where he was brought on to coach linebackers by defensive coordinator Don Brown, who was also on staff with Washington at Boston College.

Freeman worked with Washington at Cincinnati back in 2017 where he was the defensive line coach for one season and had been the D-line coach at BC before that. He was a three-year starter at defensive tackle for BC as well, so in no way is this going to be a fish out of water situation for him making the transition back.

Though he has coached linebackers and running backs as well, he has six years experience coaching the defensive line and Freeman saw it first hand while he was a defensive coordinator. The fact that Freeman, Brown, and Day all thought so highly of him says a lot about how he’s viewed by the coaches he has worked with in the past.

Washington has coached great players at Michigan (Devin Bush) and Ohio State (Pete Werner, Baron Browning), but I know no Notre Dame fan is going to care about that. They’re going to want to know about him as a defensive line coach because they don’t want to see a drop off from the level of play Elston had his group playing at.

Based on some of the things he did while coaching D-line, especially at Boston College, the expectations should be that the strong play up front is going to continue. The 2016 BC front four was nasty. The defense finished 8th in adjusted sack rate, 19th in Stuff Rate, and defensive end Harold Landry broke their single season sack record with 16.5.

Landry produced a ridiculous 34 total Havoc plays and the combined Havoc plays for the top-four defensive ends for BC was 74.5.

Landry would have never even ended up at BC if were not for Washington, which leads us back to him as a recruiter. This story by Adam Kurkjian of the Associated Press highlighted how his persistence kept Landry in the class despite several other high-profile programs trying to flip him.

Washington, now an assistant defensive line coach at the University of Cincinnati, wasn’t about to let Landry get away that easily. So Washington got in his car, dialed his phone and drove.

“First I had to get a hold of him because he didn’t want to talk to me,” Washington said. “I’m persistent. I finally talk to him and we’re on the phone for about three hours. I’m driving around the city. At that time, I’m with BC, but there’s nooks and crannies in the city. So I’m driving around the city. I’m lost and I don’t have GPS on because I use my phone. I’m over by places I had no idea where the hell I’m at. And I’m fogging up the windows. We’re just going back and forth.”

The back and forth went on, and Washington even continued the pitch to Landry’s parents. Finally, Landry took the phone back. “Coach, can I ask you a question?” Washington remembers Landry saying. “I said, ‘Yeah.’ He said, ‘Coach, can I re-commit?’ I said, ‘You never de-committed in the first place!’ ”

Washington has coached and recruited at every level of college football, but for Notre Dame and what they want to accomplish, the focus will be on him recruiting at the highest level. He’s proven he can land elite talent at Michigan and Ohio State and this is one area where I believe it can be a big upgrade over Elston.

He landed several top-100 prospects at linebacker for OSU, including Sonny Styles‍, and played a role in recruiting studs at other positions like running back TreVeyon Henderson, defensive end Jack Sawyer, and cornerback Jordan Hancock.

And if you listen to him talk about his recruiting philosophy, it not only sounds genuine, but very similar to the approach that has made Freeman so successful.

There is no such thing as a home run hire in college football, but when I’m looking at the boxes that should be checked for the type of coach Notre Dame would need to replace Elston, there isn’t a box that I don’t see filled by Washington. This is an exciting hire for Freeman and the program and it absolutely takes the sting away from losing a respected coach like Elston.