Brian Kelly has made history at Notre Dame already by leading the Irish to an undefeated season, but he's not done writing the record books yet.
Kelly made school history once again on Wednesday, becoming the first head coach from Notre Dame to win the Associated Press college football coach of the year award after the Irish finished 12-0 in 2012.
"When you're talking about the coach of the year, there's so many things that go into it," Kelly said, according to the Associated Press. "I know it's an individual award and it goes to one guy, but the feelings that I get from it is you're building the right staff, that you've got the right players and to me that is a validation of the program. That you put together the right business plan."
The award has been given since 1998 and Kelly received 25 votes from the Associated Press panel, while Penn State's Bill O'Brien (14 votes) finished second with Stanford's David Shaw (4), Texas A&M's Kevin Sumlin (3), Kansas State's Bill Snyder (2) and Alabama's Nick Saban (1) also receiving votes.
The last time the Irish played for the national title was 1988 and the team had the best regular-season since 2006 when Notre Dame went 10-3 and lost in the Sugar Bowl. Last season Les Miles of LSU won the award, while Chip Kelly of Oregon won it in 2010.
Kelly was hired by Notre Dame in 2010 after a successful run at Cincinnati and went 8-5 over the past two seasons before breaking out this year. Last season the team played in the Champs Sports Bowl and lost 18-14 to Florida State. Kelly made changes to his staff this season and made a point to spend more time with players.
"That's why I got into this. I want to develop 18 to 21 year olds. My development as the head coach at Notre Dame this year has been about getting back to why you would want to coach college players," said Kelly. You want to learn about them; you want to know their strengths and weaknesses; you want to help them with leadership skills; you want to help them when they're not feeling confident in their ability. For me, that is why it's been the most enjoyable year as the head coach at Notre Dame, is that I got a chance to spend more time with my team."
Kelly has won at every job he has been at and began his coaching career as an assistant at Grand Valley State. He started off as a defensive assistant before ascending to the head coaching position where he won two Division II championships. His success at the school got him noticed by Central Michigan, where he was hired as head coach following the 2003 season.
After coaching at Central Michigan, Kelly turned around a Cincinnati Bearcats program and went 34-6 from 2006 to 2009 while playing in two BCS bowl games.
The head coaching job at Notre Dame is a big step up from all three of his previous jobs and one that lives on the national stage.
"I think the job tends to distract you," Kelly said earlier this week. "There are a lot of things that pull you away from the primary reason why you want to be head coach of Notre Dame, and that is graduate your players and play for a national championship. Now, to do that you have to have the pulse of your football team and you've got to have relationships with your players. If you're already going around the country doing other things other than working with your football team, it's hard to have the pulse of your team."
While at Cincinnati, Kelly coached a high-powered offense, but changed his style a bit after coming to South Bend. The addition of Chuck Martin, who worked with Kelly at Grand Valley, as offensive coordinator has helped Kelly get his message across to his quarterbacks and his team.
"We conduct the game differently," Martin said. "We set out how we thought this team could win with the personnel we had and with the young quarterback. Most people say 'OK, you're going to play the young guy, you're playing for the future.' We just went 12-0 with the young guy and he got yanked four times. The rest of the world wants 12-0 with no warts. We have plenty of warts. Somehow we're 12-0. Just goes to show the job (Kelly) did that we made it work week in and week out with what we have."
This season Notre Dame was ranked first-overall in scoring defense and gained over 400 total yards on offense per game. Kelly used both Everett Golson and Tommy Rees at quarterback this season, with Golson taking hold of the job late in the year.
The sophomore was essential in the final win over USC, throwing for 217 yards and rushing nine times for 47 yards. Over the final five games of the season he threw for seven touchdowns and just one interception.
The Irish will next play on Jan. 7 in Miami for the Discover BCS National Championship against Alabama.
