They’re No. 2! Quinn, Irish picked second in mag’s preseason poll

Notre Dame football fans, don’t sweat it just because the Irish are not listed as the nation’s preseason No. 1 team (Oklahoma is) by Athlon Magazine. Instead, they’re No. 2, which should give coach Charlie Weis another motivational tool in their national championship quest.
Athlon, a Nashville, Tenn.-based national football publication that has been in the poll-picking business since 1967, ranks the Irish at No. 2 behind an offense that editor Mitchell Light calls “one of the best, if not the best, in the country.”
It’s hard to argue when you have Heisman Trophy favorite Brady Quinn at quarterback, All-America receiver Jeff Samardzija (77 catches, 1,249 yards, 15 touchdowns last year), hard-to-tackle running back Darius Walker (1,195 rushing yards), imposing offensive lineman Ryan Harris and a host of other talented players from a 9-3 team.
“And with Weis calling the plays,” Light said, “they’re ahead of the game before they even get to the line of scrimmage.”
The magazine, which will hit newsstands nationwide by late next week, lists Quinn (3,219 yards, 32 touchdowns) as a first-team All-America along with Samardzija. Harris is a second-team All-America along with defensive end Victor Abiamiri and safety Tom Zbikowski.
Concerns about a defense that allowed 24.5 points a game and was manhandled by Ohio State in a 34-20 Fiesta Bowl loss helped keep Notre Dame out of the No. 1 spot.
“It was hard for us to get the Ohio State loss out of our minds,” Light said. “You can’t judge everything on a bowl game, but the defense wasn’t strong all year and they closed on such a poor note.
“They have some holes to fill and they’ll be counting on some young guys in the secondary. Still, that’s not the only reason that kept them from No. 1.”
Unlike recent seasons when USC and Oklahoma were easy No. 1 choices, Light said the magazine’s panel of seven editors struggled before selecting the Sooners.
“This is my seventh year with the magazine and it was the most difficult,” he said. “There isn’t a dominant team on paper. Everybody had warts.
“We had five to seven teams on our board that we thought had a shot at winning it all
Oklahoma struggled last season to an 8-4 record after losing in the national title game the previous two years, and the reasons were many -- tailback Adrian Peterson battled an ankle injury, breaking in new quarterback Rhett Bomar, and rebuilding the defense.
“We love Adrian Peterson,” Light said. “People forget how dominant he was as a freshman. He was running on a gimpy ankle all year. The defense should be outstanding. They’ve got four All-Big 12-caliber defensive ends and eight returning starters. And Bob Stoops is a big-time coach.”
USC was picked third and Ohio State, the likely Big Ten favorite, was picked fourth.
“Ohio State’s offense should be terrific,” Light said, “but they lost nine starters on defense, including all three linebackers. It’s Ohio State so they’ll have good players, but they have some rebuilding to do there.”
Athlon editors waited until after spring practice before working on their top-25 poll.
“Some people might think it’s early, but it won’t be much different than if we’d waited until August,” Light said. “You might have some injuries and academic casualties over the summer, but for the most part we’ve got all the information we need.
“We’ve had good years and bad years doing this. We don’t take ourselves seriously, but we take what we do seriously.”
It’s serious enough for editors to gather in a meeting room, order some pizzas, talk to contributing writers (they have writers who cover every team) and hash out their differences.
“We start at noon and sometimes we’re there until 10 p.m., sometimes we go on to the next day,” Light said.
Come Sept. 2, when Notre Dame opens its season by playing at Georgia Tech, we’ll start seeing how accurate Athlon was.