When Chris Ash was hired as Notre Dame’s next defensive coordinator he was quick to point out he wasn’t looking to change how the Irish defense operated under Al Golden because of the success that defense had.

As Notre Dame fall camp began, Irish head coach Marcus Freeman said Ash isn’t stepping into Al Golden’s shoes and that this is Ash’s defense and Ash must do what he feels is best to give the defense success because they want the defense to elevate not just stay where it’s at.

On Saturday, Ash bridged the gap between both his previous declaration and the one Freeman said Thursday because Ash believes what he wants and what Notre Dame already has are one in the same.

“This is the Notre Dame defense,” Ash explained. “There are certain things that are important with playing defense at Notre Dame. It has nothing to do with scheme. It has everything to do with the mindset of the players. If they show up and play fast, they play violent and they compete consistently—they are fundamentally sound, they are situationally aware then we are going to go at it, compete and do the best we can every single day. That’s the Notre Dame defense. In terms of scheme, it’s all about concepts. The concepts that I like are the same things they’ve had in this package and that’s really where it’s at.”

Notre Dame’s defense had incredible success last season, leading the Irish to the national championship game. That resulted in Al Golden becoming the defensive coordinator of the Cincinnati Bengals in the NFL.

Ash previously served as co-defensive coordinator at Ohio State before becoming head coach at Rutgers from 2016 to 2019. Since then he’s spent the majority of his time in the NFL as a defensive backs coach.

Ash says the returning Irish players are confident in what they are doing and have a belief in themselves that allows them to be successful. Naturally there’s been an adjustment period for Ash and the players to get to know each other better. He says it’s a process that starts with relationships between him and the players.

“I’m trying to be really intentional about building a relationship with the guys and I think they are doing the same with me,” Ash says. “I think we are a lot further along than typically you’d be for a first time coach. It starts with getting the guys to know that I care about them, that they can trust me and that we can make them better.”

Ash says they will carve out specific roles for players at the end of training camp but right now it’s about the players competing and the coaches evaluating.

“We want to become consistent,” Ash said of one of his biggest goals of training camp. “We have a play style we want to play with and we want to do it consistently, day after day so it shows up on Saturdays for games. I really like where we are at right now.”

On the Depth of the Notre Dame Defense
“The players need to earn the right to play but we want to play as many players as we possibly can. That has to do one of our strengths—is our depth, our ability to rotate, keep guys fresh and fight through injuries. So far we are rotating a lot of guys in practice and they are all competing, want that opportunity to start but at the end of the day, we are going to have a lot of guys that are good enough to start and we are going to play a lot of guys.”

On sophomore cornerback Leonard Moore
“He’s still young. I forget that at times. Someone was asking about a play from last year, ‘what year were you?’ and he was a freshman and I was like, ‘yeah he was a freshman.’ But out here, it’s like he’s a 5th year senior. The way he goes about handling his business in the meetings, the extra work he puts in—he’s here early, stays late—one of the first ones out here on the practice field. He’s always trying to do things at a high level. He is still young so he has a lot of room to improve but boy does he compete.”

On the Linebackers
“They are mature beyond their years but they’ve all played. We have a lot of guys that played last year. That’s the benefit of where we are at right now and the type of season these guys had last year. I don’t know that we are missing a beat. They learned a lot from a guy like Jack Kiser about how to lead, how to take care of yourself, how to go out and compete every single day. They’ve taken the torch and are running with it. They are the leaders of our defense. They have a great competitive spirit and they’ve done a great job communicating, getting guys lined up and making adjustments. I can’t say enough good things about them.”

On Safety Tae Johnson
“He’s a tremendous athlete that has a nose for the ball. He’s always around the ball, has great ball skills and will get his hands on the ball. He has great range—he can run sideline to sideline—and he’s not afraid to hit. He’s still a young pup as well that is learning every single day but the sky is the limit for him.”

Notre Dame opens it season at Miami on Sunday, August 31st. We will preview things on the season premiere of Notre Dame Federal Credit Union’s Irish Football Fix Monday, August 25th at 7pm on Pulse FM.