Eric Hansen

SOUTH BEND, Ind. - The news that Nick Tausch had booted four field goals in four attempts Saturday, ranging from 20 to 51 yards, gave Notre Dame head football coach Charlie Weis the warm-and-fuzzies.

Temporarily, anyway.

Tausch, a 6-foot-1, 180-pounder from Texas, is Notre Dame’s kicker of the future, not its present. And his four field goals came against Plano East High School, not Stanford. The Dallas Jesuit High senior verbally committed to Notre Dame last June in an adrenaline-filled/patience-free moment, considering he had never set foot on the Notre Dame campus.

It might have been an adrenaline-filled/patience-free moment that led Weis and Notre Dame to find themselves in their current kicking predicament, which is that the Irish have missed six of seven field goal attempts this season, including two last Saturday against Stanford that fueled a Cardinal near-comeback from three touchdowns down.

Weis reopened the field goal kicking competition between junior Ryan Burkhart and incumbent sophomore Brandon Walker Monday after Walker’s career accuracy rate skidded to 7-of-19. In previous competitions between the two, Walker had won every one of them, and by wide margins. Ditto this time around so Walker remains ND's placekicker when the Irish (4-1) visit 22nd-ranked North Carolina (4-1) Saturday.

Perhaps all this could have been avoided. In the summer of 2005, Weis was recruiting the nation’s No. 1 kicking prospect Kai Forbath of Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, Calif. Reportedly, Forbath wasn’t ready to make a commitment when the Irish coaching staff wanted one, so they hopped on Burkhart, the nation’s No. 14 prospect at that position from nearby NorthWood High School. Burkhart committed on the spot on Sept. 5 of that year, choosing ND over Illinois, Purdue, Indiana and Ball State.

Forbath committed soon thereafter to UCLA. After redshirting his freshman season when incumbent Justin Medlock was going 28-of-32 on field goals, Forbath went 25-of-30 in 2007 with a long of 51. He is 6-of-8 this season.

Weis had Burkhart penciled in to be the No. 1 kicker in 2006, but walk-on Carl Gioia beat him out and went 8-for-13 with limited range. Gioia also missed five extra points that year. That tells you how much Burkhart struggled to make kicks in practice.

In 2007, Walker beat out Burkhart and went 6-for-12 in field goals, but Weis declined to try a 41-yarder late in regulation in an eventual triple-overtime upset loss to Navy, because he wasn’t confident Walker could make it. An attempted fourth-down conversion ended in a sack.

In fact, Weis elected to go for the first down an FBS-leading 35 times in 2007 in part because of the kicking situation and made it a modest 19 times. He may be faced with a similar decision this season many times moving forward this season. In fact, he almost went for the first down instead of trying the second field goal against Stanford Saturday.

“You only can hang so long on this,” Weis said “We're fortunate it hasn't cost us more than what it's cost us already.”

Weis has won 70 percent of his games (7-3) that were determined by seven points or fewer. If the field goal situation isn’t cleared up, it figures to show up negatively in the next five-game stretch. The Sagarin computer ratings deem Notre Dame the 38th-best team in the country. Four of its next five opponents are all in the same stratosphere (No. 22 North Carolina, No. 46 Pittsburgh, No. 34 Boston College and No. 45 Navy). Washington, coached by former Irish mentor Tyrone Willingham, is the exception at No. 108.

Weis could have signed a kicker in this year’s freshman class, but didn’t consider recruiting one. Another option vanished when promising walk-on Nate Whitaker walked off this spring and re-enrolled at Stanford.

Former Irish kicker Nicholas Setta, currently one of the best field goal kickers and punters in the Canadian Football League, suggested that perhaps working with one of ND’s former standout kickers might help the current ones.

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“There’s only so much a coach can help you with,” Setta said.

Setta worked with former ND standout and longtime NFL kicker John Carney to work his way out of slumps.

“He was always so positive,” Setta said. “Whether I missed the kick or hit it, he’d say, ‘You’re killing the ball.’ After a while, you start to believe it. So much of the kicking game is confidence and mental stuff.

“I remember when my dad was coaching me growing up, and I’d miss a kick and I’d try to explain all the intricacies of what I was trying to do with the kick. And the best advice he gave me was, ‘Son, just be aggressive. Go kick the crap out of the ball.’ And that’s true. I think it’s good advice for golfers as well: Don’t think too much.

“You’re only as good or bad as your last kick. So if you make a 50-yarder, act like you’ve been there before. And if you miss a 30-yarder, act like you’ve been there before too.”

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