Sabel's Haus

Brian Kelly's weekly press conference was about an hour ago, and as soon as it was opened up for questions the Notre Dame inquiries came rolling in. Kelly did not say one way or the other if he would or wouldn't take the Irish gig. He didn't say whether he had been contacted by ND and said that this week he and the entire team were focused on winning a Big East championship.

He said that the team wasn't distracted by the rumors either, which is exactly the opposite of what tight end Ben Guidugli said.

"I guess it's a distraction when we gotta answer the questions, that's when it becomes a distraction," Guidugli said.

Guidugli said he would rather the coach tell the players what is going on instead of not saying anything at all about the Notre Dame job speculation.

"He hasn't address it. I guess that doesn't help the issue when there's a lot of speculation he's not telling us anything one way or the other," Guidugli said. "I would rather him tell us what's going on, either way, just be honest about it.

"Not saying something is saying a lot I feel like. I don't think were really happy about that that he hasn't addressed it but there's nothing that we can really do."

When I asked how a coaching change may affect his future with the team Guidugli said he didn't know but didn't think he would want to leave before his final year at UC.

Senior linebacker Andre Revels felt that the team couldn't afford to let the ND job distract the team.

"If that's a concern of any player on this team, they need to go ahead and get off this team because we need to focus on Pittsburgh and get this win.

MY TAKE: If Notre Dame offers the job to Kelly, he is gone without looking back. He could have put all the rumors to rest by saying that he wasn't interested in the job. He hasn't done that, which I take as leaving the door open when the job is offered to him.

He wants that job. You can tell. By not commenting on it Kelly is also getting the upper hand on UC who may offer Kelly a big contract in the very near future to force his hand a little bit. It will be very interesting how it all plays out. Some people are saying that Notre Dame isn't even interested in Kelly. I can't see that being true but the Irish may have candidates above Kelly on their list of Weis' successor.

-Brian Kelly announced on his radio show tonight that Tony Pike will not play against Syracuse. Kelly did allow that Pike could play in an "emergency situation" which would be highly unlikely. UC has three quarterbacks with experience either in blowouts this year or years past. Zach Collaros will start Saturday against the 3-4 Orange.

The Heisman campaign has officially started for Tony Pike.

Unfortunately, Pike won’t be playing football at the University of Cincinnati next season: Heisman Trophy or not.

UC may end up being without head coach Brian Kelly, if it's not careful.

Rumors are flying about whether Kelly will leave the Bearcats after the season for another school, Notre Dame being the most talked about.

Kelly probably wouldn’t leave Cincinnati for a lower-level SEC or PAC-10 school so Notre Dame would probably be UC’s biggest threat to take him away.

Irish head coach, Charlie Weis, could be one more painstaking loss to an inferior team away from getting the ax at the historic school.

That’s where Kelly comes in.

Who knows? Maybe Notre Dame doesn’t lose another game this season and Weis keeps his job. Then UC keeps Kelly for at least one more year.

Realistically, though, Notre Dame will lose another game and will cut the cord on Weis.

Then, Notre Dame’s powers that be throw $10 million on the table for Kelly and he leaves UC without a second thought.

To that I say, match it.

Easier said than done, I know.

Still, UC has to find some way to come up with the money and whatever else it is that Kelly may want.

Raise ticket prices, raise concession stand prices, sell plasma, have a bake sale. I don’t care what it is; just do something.

With the success of this team, fans will still come to Nippert even if ticket prices go up a few bucks.

I realize $5 extra per ticket won’t equal the millions of dollars it will take to keep Kelly around but the big wigs at UC need to find some way to make the money.

If UC is to continue producing a top-10 football program, it will have to start acting like one and Kelly might be more inclined to stay at UC if it offers him the same amount of money.

Besides, Kelly should want to become the first legendary coach at UC instead of just another one of the many at Notre Dame.

The Irish fans expect to win national championships. A UC football championship would be unheard of in Cincinnati, but Kelly has the chance to do it.

After all, another national title at Notre Dame is another notch in the bedpost. Kelly would become another one of the great coaches at Notre Dame.

A national title at UC and Kelly will have officially transformed the entire program. He would be a legend in Cincinnati. The kind of legend that has buildings named after him 30 years from now.

After all it would be the first football title at this school as opposed to the 13 national championships at Notre Dame.

We have to find a way to keep Kelly at UC.

Signs at games, Web sites, Twitter messages and everything in between.

Guerrilla advertising type stuff. If he doesn’t know he’s wanted in Cincinnati by the students and fans, he may go to Notre Dame anyway.

If we can’t find a way to keep him here, UC will still be considered a stepping-stone school for coaches to get to the next level.

We need a coach like Bobby Bowden at Florida State or Joe Paterno at Penn State – a coach who wants to be at UC for the long haul.

And if Kelly does leave, we could be right back to where the program was just four years ago. A 4-7 team that’s mediocre at best.

I don’t see why Kelly would want to coach Notre Dame anyway. He has done so much to build the UC program and has gotten them so close to the national championship (that was weird to type).

If he goes to Notre Dame, he’ll just have to rebuild that team.

So, I say we start the ‘Please stay, BK’ chant.

UC has the right coach. It just needs to find a way to keep him.