SOUTH BEND, Ind. — A year ago, Jay Hayes was in hot water after sending a pair of tweets critical of Notre Dame's coaching staff. Now, the redshirt sophomore defensive end looks like a key piece for Notre Dame's re-tooled defense.
Hayes, who was admonished by coach Brian Kelly during his redshirt season last year after tweeting “when a coach stops coaching you..that’s when you jus (sic) gotta move on,” said he didn’t feel any frustration earlier this year when he didn’t play a single snap against Duke.
Instead, it was Kelly who was frustrated by Hayes’ lack of playing time. Kelly singled out Hayes as someone who coaches had to play more in the wake of Brian VanGorder’s firing a day after that loss to Duke, and the seventh-year Irish coach followed through on his promise. Hayes played quite a bit last weekend against Syracuse, with the 285-pound Brooklyn native providing a big, physical presence as Notre Dame deployed far more 3-4 fronts that it did under VanGorder.
“I’ve grown so much to a point where I can’t be selfish,” Hayes said of his mentality when he wasn’t playing earlier this year. “I have to help my teammates out, I have to encourage them, I have to be on lookout while they’re on the field and correct what they’re doing, so the best thing I can do is let them know that I’m there for them, let them know I’m watching every series that they’re out and let them know I’m just gonna hold them accountable, and if you’re out there jogging you’re getting cursed out.”
That Hayes didn’t get on the field early in the season was a bit of a surprise, given he took most of Notre Dame’s first-team reps at weakside defensive end during spring and preseason practice and felt he was 100 percent recovered from an August high ankle sprain by Week 3’s game against Michigan State. But he was one of the beneficiaries of Notre Dame’s tweaked defensive scheme, which aims to get a higher volume of players on the field.
“It was very understandable,” Hayes said. “The scheme made players feel very comfortable, so guys were in there playing loose, playing free, running around with a lot of energy.”
The benefit to rotating so many players is keeping everyone fresh for an entire game. Notre Dame’s defense clamped down on Syracuse in the second half last week — granted, Syracuse’s offense has struggled all year after the first quarter — with players crediting that success to a quality-over-quantity approach to the number of snaps they play.
Hayes was a key cog in those efforts to maximize the impacts of some of Notre Dame’s front-line defensive players like defensive end Isaac Rochell (who described Hayes as having a “tremendous” motor). There’s still room to improve, but Notre Dame left MetLife Stadium feeling positive about Hayes’ involvement in the defense and where he can go from here.
“He's got a lot of energy that he brings to the defense, and Jay's a great guy,” offensive lineman Mike McGlinchey said. “He's infectious to the rest of the team. Guys love Jay. He's funny. He brings a lot of life to our football team. And he's the same way on the field. He plays very, very hard. He's a big guy, he rushes hard and he gives guys some fits up front and he'll continue to get better and we need him to continue to get better.”