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NBC Must Obey Brian Kelly’s Wishes, Too (UPDATE)

When Brian Kelly arrived at Notre Dame, he set out to change a lot about the program, from the style of offense to the mindset of his players. But his most significant change might be to his team’s TV coverage

UPDATE: NBC’s plan is to use five shorter commercial breaks, rather than four longer ones. This way, we suppose, the ad time wouldn’t interrupt the flow of Kelly’s breakneck offensive pace quite so much. We’ll see if this format sticks.

The rest of the original post is as follows.

NBC – with whom, of course Notre Dame has its own TV deal – likes to take long commercial breaks. Kelly’s fast-paced offensive style, unlike Charlie Weis‘ pro set, is not conducive to such breaks. So Kelly and the network had a little chat:

“We’ve talk to NBC about the way we like play game versus how it was played in the past,” Kelly said. “Those conversations have taken place. There is certainly a need for us to address it. We are working with NBC to make certain they get what they need out of it from an advertising standpoint. But also as the network that carries Notre Dame that we are able to do things we need to do as well.”

Of course, it behooves NBC to let Kelly run his program the way that works best for him – the better Notre Dame is, the better the ratings, and everyone’s happy. Kelly said he’s “very confident” the two sides will work something out.

If any issue proves how much a head coach has to deal with besides the game itself, this is it. It’s an “only at Notre Dame” scenario – no other school has a major network TV deal of its own like this – just the kind of thing many wondered how Kelly would handle, since he’s never been at a program this high-profile.

What such doubters have to remember is that Kelly’s part-politician. He lives for smoothly handling situations like this. There’s no doubt he’ll handle this one – just one more reason that, love Notre Dame or hate them, Kelly’s going to make them winners.

H/T Fang’s Bites

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