Grantland's Michael Weinreb penned a piece on the future of Notre Dame football this past weekend, and the story is worth checking out.

Weinreb revisits the program's history, reminding us that there were, in fact, other dark periods before this one, and he looks at the all-encompassing job it takes to win with the Irish in the present day of college football.

The bigger question, of course, is whether anyone can really get it anymore. This is now the most fallow period in Notre Dame history; the longer it goes on, the more pervasive the sense that Notre Dame football is gone for good, that the Irish may hang around Saturday afternoons on a third-place network desperate for a foothold in the sporting universe, but will never really be relevant to the 21st century. With every Champs Sports Bowl defeat, the notion that a small, independent Midwest Catholic institution with high academic standards can become a national power -- and can recruit nationally -- in a sport weighted toward the South (and toward superconferences) starts to feel less and less tenable.

"Davie and Willingham and Weis all led them to nine- or 10-win seasons," says Lou Somogyi, a senior editor at Blue & Gold Illustrated and a longtime chronicler of Notre Dame football. "But can they get to that 11- or 12- or 13-game thing? It's very hard. The world changes, and sometimes you have to be willing to change with it. Just because that's how you've always done it doesn't mean it's right."

I've seen the piece generate a good amount of discussion so far on the internet, and was curious to hear from you guys on it. Is there more to winning at Notre Dame than just having the right (and, in many ways, perfect) head coach? Drop me a note in the mailbag and I'll run the best responses later on.