Come again?
Notre Dame opened up the college football season with a 41-38 victory over Florida State University last night, which finished in overtime after the Fighting Irish blew a 38-20 lead at the start of the fourth quarter.
Mike Norvell’s Seminoles mounted a pretty impressive comeback, but ultimately, it wasn’t enough to get the job done.
After the game, Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly was asked about being able to hold off Florida State’s onslaught, and his answer came way out of left field:
“I’m in favor of execution. Maybe our entire team needs to be executed after tonight. We just didn’t execute very well.”
Ummmm, you alright coach?
As it turns out Coach Kelly was just “joking” (oh, thank God), but shocker… nobody got the joke.
He was quoting former Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach John McKay who famously said during the Buc’s inaugural 1976 season that he was “in favor of execution” after being asked his players’ execution on the field.
But apparently, McKay’s quote wasn’t quite as well-known as he thought.
Sounds like Kelly had that one in his back pocket for a while now and jumped the gun. I mean, she didn’t even ask you about execution? Half the battle in “executing” a good joke is knowing when to use it.
He clarified in post game presser:
“Oh, it’s an old John McKay quote, I was kidding. It was tongue-in-cheek. It wasn’t funny?
It’s old John McKay quote that he used after a game. I was talking and making a joke about it. It was taken serious? Are you people crazy?”
