Brian Kelly opens up on why he left Notre Dame for LSU
Brian Kelly's surprise decision to leave Notre Dame for LSU stunned the college football world this offseason. Now we have an idea of why he made that move.
Speaking with the Associated Press, Kelly said he felt dissatisfied with how Notre Dame was handling its football program in a number of key areas.
"I felt like I did everything that I could at Notre Dame and they felt like they did everything they could for me," Kelly said.
"I felt like we had both got to a point where this is what they could do, right? This is what I did. And we couldn't get past that. Okay? And so here we are."
Kelly said he made frequent requests to Notre Dame to increase their resource investment into the football team and to make improvements around the athletic center, but that the school never followed up on them.
The coach specifically noted the difference between the athlete resource center at Notre Dame and the one at LSU, with the latter having its own nutrition center with a dining hall and on-campus chef dedicated solely for the football program and its players.
Kelly said he asked Notre Dame to make similar changes, but those requests were denied.
"I felt like that what I was look for was student-athlete centered," Kelly said. "And I was pushing for more for the student-athlete. And I wanted to see that piece. And we didn't seem to be on the same path as to how that was going to get accomplished."
Notre Dame and its fans may take Kelly's comments with a grain of salt, and instead point to the 10-year, $95 million contract that LSU offered the head coach as the primary motivation for his leaving South Bend.
Kelly's decision to take the LSU job seemed abrupt, especially after having notably said he wouldn't leave the program unless a "fairy godmother" came along to lure him away with a $250 million check.
He won't be getting that much, but it was enough to swap the Irish for a traditional Southern football power with a strong recruiting base, and as Kelly tells it, a state of the art nutritional center.
Whether he can translate those facilities into wins in the uber-competitive SEC West, time will tell.
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