Notre Dame football: Irish QB Montana determined to make a name for himself

SOUTH BEND - It is so not about the bloodlines anymore. Nate Montana, stuck in a world where he has yet to accomplish - or fail - at something on the football field in which there’s no parenthetical reference to his famous father, has actually had a career to this point that would suggest he’s instead related to Rudy. His window to change all that opened in the days before Notre Dame’s spring practice’s Friday kickoff. That’s when first-year Irish head coach Brian Kelly - a man who is trying to vanquish any references to depth charts this spring - broke rank and told the world he had penciled in the oldest son of Joe Montana at No. 2 ... ish. Suddenly, he was Dayne Crist’s competition. He actually was Plan B, which is much higher on anyone’s pecking order than the 6-foot-4, 210-pound junior-to-be had been in a long, long time. He was Nate Montana. It was also the first time he’s really been in the driver’s seat of his own legacy. “It was a big confidence-booster,” said the walk-on-turned-juco transfer-turned-walk-on. “I live to compete, and that’s what I’m trying to do every day. The coaching is great. You feel like you build on what you did yesterday, like a stepping stone.” Early-enrolling freshman Tommy Rees is stepping too, and in the fall two even more vaunted recruited freshmen, Luke Massa and Andrew Hendrix, join the mix. So Montana knows his experience card comes with an expiration date. He is going to have to blossom to stay floating near the top of the depth chart. Montana is working overtime to do it. In ND’s most recent practice, on Monday, Montana was one of the last players to leave the field - roughly 20 minutes after Kelly had exited. “I feel like I’ve made huge strides since last year,” he said. He had to if he was going to perpetuate the football dream. Montana attended one of the nation’s great prep football powerhouses - Concord (Calif.) De La Salle - his junior and senior high school years after starting out at Cardinal Newman in Santa Rosa, Calif. But the transfer didn’t slingshot him to greatness. Part of that was his own doing. During Montana’s junior year, he tried to push football away, instead putting all his passion into basketball. The shock to him was that he missed football - at all. So his senior year, the pro-style quarterback went out for a team that was nothing like pro-style (veer option) and already had an established quarterback - 5-11, 175-pound Mike MacGillivray - running the run-oriented show. Montana, predictably, landed third on the depth chart and had all of 19 pass attempts (12 completions for 166 yards) and 33 rushing yards (on 17 attempts) with which to dazzle college scouts. Rivals.com listed him as a “no-star” prospect with Louisiana Tech, UCLA, USC and Notre Dame as possible landing spots - all without scholarship offers. Meanwhile, younger brother Nick, who ended up transferring to former ND star Jimmy Clausen’s old high school (Westlake Village Oaks Christian) was evolving into a highly sought-after prospect before settling on Washington over ND and others. Nate, meanwhile, ended up walking on at ND, further invoking who he was related to over who he was. “Sometimes you just want to get away from it and fly under the radar,” Montana said. “But it’s with me. I have to embrace it when I need to. At other times, I try to stay away from it. I want to make my own name too.” His first significant step toward doing so was pushing away an opportunity to be a fourth-stringer with the Irish in 2009, leaving Notre Dame last summer and enrolling at Pasadena City College. There he struggled statistically (31-of-88, 324 yards, 2 TDs and 5 interceptions), but he learned from not wilted under the growing pains. “My dad and my family,” Montana said when asked who convinced him not to hit the escape button on the college football dream after the uneven experience at PCC. “They had the confidence in me. They were so supportive that it gave me confidence in myself. And my dad worked with me.” But the decision to return to Notre Dame and not to try a different path was all his. “It was a tough decision,” he said. “But it seemed like a good opportunity to come back. Good timing. New coaches. And it was a place I felt comfortable. I had friends here. I had a feeling it was going to be a good spot.” Even on the Friday spring break started earlier this month, when Kelly had his team working out in the snow. “It was hard. It was tough, but it was good work,” Montana said. “I liked it. I was just glad to be back.”