SOUTH BEND − We are all Notre Dame football redshirt sophomore offensive lineman Joe Otting.
Few know what it’s like to do what Otting does in his day job as the starting center for the No. 12 Irish. Be it the calls, the collisions or the competition, the closest we get to what Otting experiences each time he sends the football to quarterback CJ Carr is what we see on the TV. Or in the stands. Or from the press box.
Otting is a big routine guy, be it during the week when he’s balancing the books and the blocking schemes or trying to wish away the endless hours before a night kickoff. He’s set in his routine ways. That’s why they’re routine.
That’s where all relate, be it the mother with four kids and on the go from sunrise to sunset, the father who works two jobs, the college student with an overload of courses, empty nesters with so much space that it’s scary or recent retirees with little to do.
Even newborns, though they don’t know it yet, understood Otting as he prepared to make his first career start in mid-October against Notre Dame’s biggest rival, USC. Stepping in for starter Ashton Craig, who was lost for the season against North Carolina State with a left knee injury, required Otting to work through lunch and after dinner and every free minute in between.
More time at the Gug to watch film. More time with offensive line coach Joe Rudolph to check the checks. More time on the practice field with the other four starters to find rhythm and a routine. More football in one week than he may have done in his first three seasons.
More meant less of something Otting cherishes.
Sleep.
“Man, it was tough,” he admitted. “I’m a big nap person (who isn’t?). I couldn’t take any naps. My heart was pounding. It was a good week. I was mostly excited to get out there, get back with my fellas.”
Asking the 6-foot-4, 308-pounder from Topeka, Kansas to do what was needed against USC was an impossible request. The center is the leader of the most important group on the football field. He’s the captain of the O-Line ship. It takes months of reps just to be OK. Otting had less than a week to memorize everything he needed to memorize for Notre Dame’s biggest rivalry game, in prime time and on the biggest stage he’s ever been on.
How long did it take him to take it all in and feel confident to do his job?
“I’d say from the first snap,” he said. “You’re out there with your boys, there’s nothing better you could ask for, to be able to get going quick in the USC game. It was awesome. It was pretty electric.”
Blocking for a tailback like Jeremiyah Love helps. Otting provided a key second-level seal on USC linebacker Desman Stephens as Love ripped off a 63-yard run on the second Irish play from scrimmage. Two plays later, the Irish were in the end zone, again on a Love run and again thanks to an Otting block. That series set the table for him and for the Irish.
“It was pretty damn awesome,” Otting said. “When Ashton went down, I was ready to step in. I was ready to go. Next man up mentality. That’s how we go around here.”
Easy to say, but tough to do, especially along the offensive line. Barring injury, guys in Otting’s backup role don’t get a chance to play until they must play. Unlike every other position besides quarterback, there’s not a rotation of six, seven, eight guys on the O-Line. It’s not one play here or another key down there. It’s the same five dudes today and tomorrow and next week and next month.
When Craig went down late against North Carolina State, Otting had zero time to think what it all meant. Just step in and go.
“It is tough (but) that’s what we’re born to do,” he said. “That’s how we get after it around here.”
Carr saw Otting work in that North Carolina State game and knew the offensive line would be in good hands. Otting made all the right calls and all the right reads at a time when he should have been trying not to vomit. An offensive line that was just starting to hit its collective stride before Craig went down maintained that cohesiveness against USC.
How cohesive? How about 306 rush yards, 442 total yards and 34 points in a 10-point win?
“Joe has been unbelievable for us and has been consistent,” Carr said. “I think that’s the best way to describe him. He’s shown up every single day. We know Joe can do it.”
Otting also knows. That leap from backup to starter wasn’t a big deal. Otting admitted being a starter and all it entailed was kind of what he expected. He waited for the chance, he kept working and when it was time to deliver, he delivered. There’s always something to fine-tune, be it the checks or the communication. Something. Everything.
Otting’s sleep cycle was disturbed in the days leading into USC. As Saturday night became Sunday morning after that win, sleep came easily.
“Like that,” Otting said. “It was great.”
Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at tnoie@sbtinfo.com
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Don’t sleep on what this Notre Dame football offensive lineman did in his first start
Reporting by Tom Noie, South Bend Tribune / South Bend Tribune
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