What Notre Dame OC Mike Denbrock said about Riley Leonard

Briefly, a question Tuesday afternoon sent Notre Dame offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock into a small fit of laughter.

The reporter who asked it referenced Denbrock’s rhetoric that he believed a high-functioning offense would come down the road, but he didn’t know how far down the road. The question, then, was what did he see that led him to believe it’s closer than most think.

“It looks like a long and dusty trail right now,” Denbrock said, laughing.

The veteran offensive coordinator regained his composure and gave a blunt but truthful response.

“No, I mean, listen, there’s signs,” Denbrock said. “There’s just such incredible inconsistency across the board.”

Few places is that inconsistency more pronounced than at the quarterback position, where senior Riley Leonard has struggled through two games in a Notre Dame uniform. The first game, played in a “hornet’s nest” (Denbrock’s words) in College Station, Texas, against Texas A&M was forgivable — especially because the Irish won. The second, at home against Northern Illinois, was not.

Leonard also took an awkward-looking hit at the end of the first half, appearing to favor his left shoulder. Denbrock did not call a designed run play for him from that point forward, despite the quarterback run game being an integral part of Notre Dame’s offense.

On3’s Pete Nakos and Blue & Gold reported that Leonard injured his posterior labrum on his non-throwing shoulder during the game, even though the Duke transfer was not listed on the team’s official injury report. He is, however, expected to play Saturday against Purdue.

Denbrock neither confirmed nor denied Leonard suffered an injury (injury updates come from either head coach Marcus Freeman or the public relations staff, no one else). But he said Leonard’s full arsenal of designed run plays will be available against the Boilermakers.

“I have no indication right now that he can’t be the runner we need him to be,” Denbrock said.

Denbrock also offered an explanation as to why Leonard rushed 7 times in the first quarter but only 4 times after that.

“One, we had too many three-and-outs and didn’t have the ball as much as we needed to,” Denbrock said. “Based on how we executed and what we did, we were our own worst enemy where that was concerned. There was an opportunity that I thought the running backs were hot. I wanted to try to get the ball in their hands a little bit more. And that kind of led to some of the decisions that we made.”

As a passer, though, Denbrock knows Leonard has to improve quickly. It was always going to be a growing process, with the senior signal-caller entering a new offense after missing most of spring practice. But taking a loss to NIU speeds up the timeline.

“The result Saturday, we all know, was absolutely unacceptable on every level,” Denbrock said. “But the reality is — when you look at it, it sounds like an excuse; that’s why I hate to even bring it up — but it’s not an excuse that he’s two games into what we’re asking him to do, and he learns every single snap that he’s out there. Good and bad.”

There was not, however, any indication for Denbrock that injuries would be a factor entering the fall.

“Absolutely no risk, health-wise,” Leonard said. “Health-wise, he had an unbelievable summer. Was running around like a gazelle, jumping and throwing, so going into the season, there was absolutely no reason for concern whatsoever from an injury standpoint.”

Leonard will likely make his third-straight start at 3:30 p.m. ET on Saturday in West Lafayette, Ind., and both he and the Irish have a lot riding on his performance when he does. Denbrock said there are things from a schematic standpoint that he has to do to help his quarterback get better as well.

Whatever they are, Notre Dame fans will see them against Purdue.

“The fact of the matter is, he’s got to be comfortable playing quarterback within this system and the things that we’re asking him to do,” Denbrock said. “That falls on me to make sure that I get that right.”