Notre Dame’s running back room is already one of the best, if not the best in the nation. Led by Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price — who have combined for 614 yards and 11 touchdowns — the Irish backs have looked unstoppable through four games.
But under running backs coach Ja'Juan Seider, the best backfield in America is only going to keep getting better.
A big reason behind that is since Love and Price can physically dominate opponents, their mental side of the game is only going to get sharper. Both backs are hard to stop to begin with, but if they combine that with an elite knowledge of the game — they’ll become unstoppable.
“Every kid always has room to grow and sometimes the process is a little later for some guys,” Seider said. “Some pick it right away and for some it takes time to develop. What I was so impressed with Jadarian was every day, he was a sponge. Every day, there was a notepad and a pen, taking notes and asking good questions. His thing was, ‘Coach, I want to be the smartest running back in the country. So teach me to understand the angles and why we’re aiming this way and why we’re blocking it this way so I can understand where blocks are going to fit so I can replace these guys when they’re not in the gap.’
“That’s what you’re seeing not just from him, but also from JLove, too. Now we’re really starting to evolve into complete running backs.”
With Love specifically, it’s clear he is on another level than most other backs. The junior is an incredibly physical runner, but at the same time has the opportunity on many runs to break one loose. One of the biggest lessons Seider is trying to instill in Love is that sometimes, the five yard run is just as big as a 30 yard run.
“My biggest thing for him is coaching him to not worry about hitting the home run every play and that’s a hard thing because you have to be careful as a coach,” Seider said. “You don’t want to handcuff him because he has a gift. But also trying to teach him doing a common play can also be an explosive play because if you trust and you ride the wave and get vertical, you’re on the second level and the third level, you’re going to make that guy miss anyway.
“That’s the biggest thing he’s understanding is you don’t have to be Superman and sink my hips and bounce the play over here and then take pride in not having tackles for loss when we can prevent them. That’s where his growth is going right now.”
Seider also knows that there is room for improvement everywhere, even if its small, minute details in Love’s game. With his coaching style, he’s not going to sugarcoat where players can get better, even if everyone else is telling them they’re great.
“I think the most important thing you can do as a coach is to be honest and transparent,” Seider said. “Don’t sugarcoat anything. Tell a kid where he’s at so he can know how to improve. Sometimes, we get to the point where we don’t want to hurt nobody’s feelings because we want to tell them the truth…I was a player. If I was back (as a player), I want to know how I can improve.”
At the end of the day, Seider mirrored in a way the unselfishness that Price and Love have shown through the first four weeks of the season. He doesn’t care if the Irish win because CJ Carr threw for 400 yards or his backs ran for 300.
He just wants to win.
“To me, it’s just taking advantage of your strengths but also taking advantage of areas where they’re uncovered in the run game, the pass game and people understand what do you want to take away?,” Seider said. “Do you want to stop the run? Good, okay, we can throw for 400 yards like we did last week. You want to take that away? We can run it for two or three hundred yards.
“Whatever it takes to win.”
