Kelly had a meeting last week about the opening with representatives of Notre Dame before Cincinnati’s Big East championship game against Pittsburgh, the Tribune has learned.

Talks progressed well enough that the official announcement Kelly will be Charlie Weis’ replacement could come as early as Friday — any time after Cincinnati’s football banquet Thursday night.

It also was important to Kelly to delay any possible announcement until after he had a chance to talk to his Bearcats in person at Thursday’s season-ending banquet. He informed his players at a team meeting Monday before leaving for New York that he planned to speak with Notre Dame.

None of this should surprise anyone given how college coaches (Bobby Petrino, Rich Rodriguez, Nick Saban, etc.) are always looking for the next big job/payday. Kelly himself ditched Central Michigan right before its bowl game a couple years ago to coach at Cincinnati.

Was it immoral for Kelly to talk to Notre Dame days before Cincinnati’s biggest game of the season? I’ll leave that up to you to decide. Personally, I’m so numb to the way college coaches job hop that I could care less at this point. There’s no loyalty anymore and it doesn’t appear that things are going to change anytime soon.

We’ll just have to wait and see if the Tribune’s report is right that Kelly is bound for South Bend. But all signs point to him being Notre Dame’s next head coach.

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