Notre Dame Football: Defensive assistant, Terry Joseph, to leave the Irish for Texas Longhorns

It’s a big news day for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Just hours after Notre Dame announced the hiring of Marcus Freeman as the new defensive coordinator, Football Scoop is reporting that safeties coach Terry Joseph will join the new staff with the Texas Longhorns.

Joseph came to Notre Dame in the winter of 2018 to coach the safety position. Mike Elko just left for the defensive coordinator job with the Texas A&M Aggies, and after Notre Dame hired Clark Lea to take over the DC job — they needed someone to fill Elko’s role on the backend of the defense. Before Joseph joined the Irish, he was with the North Carolina Tar Heels for one year and at Texas A&M in the three years prior.

When an outside hire of a coordinator position is filled, there is usually one or more moves made to bring in a coach that the new coordinator wants. For Freeman, he already gets a reunion with cornerbacks coach Mike Mickens. Now the new Irish DC will have a say in who coaches the safeties — although I don’t have any names at the moment.

This is a busy time for Notre Dame and all of college football, so things may move quickly (or slowly) over the course of the next couple of weeks.