Everything Notre Dame OC Gino Guidugli before Sun Bowl vs. Oregon State

Notre Dame interim offensive coordinator Gino Guidugli spoke to reporters on Tuesday, three days before the No. 16 Fighting Irish (9-3) take on the No. 19 Oregon State Beavers (8-4) in the Tony The Tiger Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas. Here’s everything Guidugli said in his brief press conference.

Opening statement

“Really excited to be here. Looking forward to the game. Looking forward to the game getting here and seeing a lot of young guys on our team have an opportunity to play in the game.”

On freshman Charles Jagusah starting for Notre Dame at left tackle

“Jags is just like, he’s a huge human being and moves really well for his size. And on top of that, the guy is a true freshman and you teach him, he reps it, he knows it, and he can go execute it. His ability to take information and be able to apply it to the field and make adjustments on the fly is what’s going to make him special.”

On how different the Notre Dame offense will look with opt outs and transfers

“It’s a whole new offense. At the end of the day we got three starters returning and two of those starters have only played three or four games, Billy [Schrauth] and Ashton [Craig], getting their first opportunity to have a start in a game of this magnitude. Gotta go back to the basics. The foundation, the installs, all the day one stuff in training camp. The fortunate thing is you get a lot of time to prepare for a game like this, so you get stuff in. We got really smart kids at Notre Dame. Those guys will go out there and be able to execute. How much can you put in? We’ll be able to do enough, but we’re going to lean on the things that we’re best at.”

On Notre Dame wide receivers Jayden Thomas and Jaden Greathouse

“Those are two of the guys with more experience out there when you look at the rest of the cast outside of those three starters that I mentioned. JT, he’s played in a lot of games. JG was off to a fast start as a freshman starting in Ireland. Those are two guys we’re going to lean on in the pass game and be where they’re supposed to be for Steve [Angeli] and make catches. They’ll be guys you’re going to see a lot of come game day.”

On the whirlwind of the last week for him

“This time of year just becomes totally hectic. You got the portal. You got your high school kids that you’re trying to keep committed. You got coaching changes. You got guys opting out of the bowl game to go pursue their dreams in the NFL. It’s just kind of a hectic time of the year. You just take it one day at a time. The fortunate thing about the way Gerad Parker ran things as offensive coordinator was everybody was involved. It was a collaborative effort for each and every game plan. Going into it, the game plan was mostly in place by the time Gerad took the job at Troy. We’re just continuing to execute that game plan going into the game. We got a lot of guys making their first start, so we want to keep it fairly simple and go out there and play fast.”

On Steve Angeli making his first career start

“He’s shown such a tremendous amount of growth. My experience with him when I got there in February was just trying to evaluate who this kid is and what he’s capable of. The improvements he made from February to this point now, he’s going to have a chance to be a really good player especially if he continues on that trend of being able to make the same improvements he made last year this upcoming year. This is a great opportunity for him to try to springboard that and have the opportunity start and show what he can do.”

On preparing for Angeli’s first start with so many new parts with the Notre Dame offense

“He’s never started before so he don’t know no different. All those guys he’s going to go out there with, it’s not like he had the chance to play with the starters, so those are the guys who for the most part he’d been practicing with. Those guys are equally excited. It means a lot to those guys who are having their first opportunity to start. The motivation is there for those guys to go out there and perform well. I don’t think Steve’s thinking about who’s playing in front of him or outside. He’s just worried about making sure he’s executing the game plan.”

On the pregame walk he makes with Notre Dame quarterbacks

“That came from when I was a player in college. My old quarterbacks coach was Dan Enos. We used to take the field, and to me the process is we start when we come out. So the ball is on the one yard line. We’re going to make sure they understand where the play clocks are inside the stadium. And then we’re going to talk through situation by situation. Ball is on the one, this is the call that you can expect. And now being the one calling the plays, I can give them specifically like, ‘Hey, if we get to this situation this is what you’re going to get.’

“We’ll start coming out. We’ll go to midfield. We’ll talk about third down, third and long, third and medium, third and short. And then we work high red zone. Then we work low red zone. Then we go goal line. We go two-point plays. Just kind of giving those guys the ability to have an expectation of what the call is going to be when they get in those situations and kind of talk through what coverage or pressures we’re talking in those situations.”

On what his time in El Paso has been like

“Food has been great. People have been super nice. I expected it to be a little warmer than what it is, but El Paso has been great. Looking forward to having a couple more days to experience it. Again, we came here for a reason. That’s to play a game. Looking forward to that as well.”