Te'o helps pen Notre Dame's resurgence

• Linebacker leads Irish to 4-0 record and No. 10 ranking
• Team prepares to face Miami at Solider Field Saturday
• Te'o passed up NFL for senior season

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- He is carefully considering how best to frame the concept. Font is important. So is size. And color. Kerning mustn't be overlooked, either.

A dozen other subtleties of context also factor into the decision when you're trying to effectively deliver a message.

"AVOID THE NOISE."

Manti Te'o goes big and bold. He is breaking one of the rules of typography he only recently learned — "You never go all caps," he says — but believes the exception is important. At 4-0, Notre Dame is off to its best start since 2002, and there is buzz around America's most polarizing program.

The Fighting Irish play old foe Miami (Fla.) on Saturday at Chicago's Soldier Field, and the hype is beginning to escalate, which is why the senior linebacker and team captain is considering how best to communicate to his teammates, and to everyone, a very important warning. Is Notre Dame back?

"We're close," he says. "We're on our way. But obviously, we're not there. All the attention that's on us now, it's cool. Everything is nice, but that can be very dangerous."

If Te'o is correct, if the Irish are on their way back, he's among the biggest reasons. Despite a difficult few weeks in which he's dealt with the deaths of his grandmother and girlfriend, he remains Notre Dame's emotional leader and brightest star. When sending messages, he more often chooses subtle than bold.

i DREAM

DREAMS

BECAUSE OF you

Graphic Design 2, the history and use of typography, is one of two classes Te'o is taking in this, his final semester before graduating in December.

He completed the aforementioned assignment — a six-word biography — a couple of weeks ago. Set against a black background, most of the characters were blue and capitalized — "a very strong statement," according to Anne Berry, the professor. The personal pronouns were white and in lower case, reflecting "something that is a little more accessible and human and organic."

Meet the catalyst for Notre Dame's resurgence. At linebacker, Te'o is a 6-2, 255-pound wrecking ball. A probable high NFL draft pick in April, an All-American, perhaps even a Heisman Trophy candidate. In Berry's studio on the other side of campus, he is an eager, engaged learner.

"If I didn't know he was a football star at Notre Dame," Berry says, "I would have no idea."

Everyone knows, of course, which makes the juxtaposition so intriguing. The football star is known around campus as a regular student, outgoing and friendly and, well, when Brian Kelly says, "There isn't a better representative" of Notre Dame, the coach means not just the football team but the school.

"He brings back the ideal of having faith in others," Kelly says. "We live in a cynical society, and everyone is quick to point a finger, and it's always to blame. He's that example of, you can have faith in a person."

Another year at Notre Dame

By now, the story is familiar to many. How one of the nation's top recruits chose Notre Dame over Southern California because, Te'o says, of a message from God. How a Mormon from Hawaii somehow not only has found a home at a Catholic university bit has come to embody its ideals. How after last season, he chose to return for his senior season rather than enter the NFL draft, saying "There's more to life than football." But sure, there's also football. It's probably not too much to suggest that Notre Dame is dreaming dreams because of Te'o. Just don't suggest it to Te'o.

"I don't like the spotlight like that," he says, and he seems slightly embarrassed when, during a short walk across campus, a maintenance worker stops his cart, pulls a magazine from a plastic bag — he has obviously been hoping to see Te'o — and asks the cover boy for an autograph.

"We've got a whole crew going up to Chicago, man," the worker says, referring to Saturday's game.

A little later, Te'o sits quietly in an office in the Guglielmino Athletics Complex, watching video of Miami's offense. It is a daily routine, after class and before practice. Te'o lifts weights, then grabs lunch and the remote control. Fast-forward. Rewind. Fast-forward. Rewind. Fast-forward. Rewind. He is paying attention to small details, looking for tendencies.

Kelly pops into the office, and wants to know about Te'o's quick trip home to Hawaii last weekend when Notre Dame was idle. Here's some more context to fill out that six-word autobiography: Te'o turned in the project Sept. 17. Six days earlier his grandmother died, and a few hours after that his girlfriend succumbed to leukemia.

When Berry says the message communicated in the project evokes Te'o's strong ties to and feelings for family and his Samoan culture, there's an added poignancy. There's extra meaning when Kelly asks: "What's up, big dog? You all right?"

Te'o says it was important to get home for his grandmother's funeral, and he enjoyed seeing his family and friends. But he was also eager to return to campus, to get back to what he calls "my Notre Dame family." He calls their support "humbling, a great blessing for me." And while he says the pain remains jagged, outwardly it's as if nothing has happened.

"I can't imagine how he's been able to blend his academics with football and the responsibilities of being a great teammate and leader with the tragedy he has dealt with off the field," Kelly says. "Sometimes, you just don't try to explain it."

Michigan madness

Watching the video again, Te'o is suddenly startled. In the final minute, Miami throws a long touchdown pass to beat North Carolina State.

"Oh my gosh," Te'o says. "Thirty seconds left? That's horrible. I know how that feels. Michigan. That's the worst feeling in the world."

He is flashing back to last season, to a loss he cannot forget. Denard Robinson's touchdown pass with two seconds left drove him during the offseason. After one particularly difficult summer conditioning workout, Te'o gathered his teammates.

"You feel that pain? You hurting? You tired? That pain is gonna be gone in a couple of minutes," he told them. "But that Michigan game? That pain never goes away."

Not even, he says, after Notre Dame's victory against the Wolverines Sept. 22.

It remains a cautionary tale and at least a small reason he returned instead of going to the NFL. There was much more involved, including the fact — this would be cliché, except anecdotal evidence seems to back the claim — that he loves the college experience. Not just football, but campus life.

"There's no such thing as a second chance at a senior year," says Te'o, who has three interceptions and leads a unit that ranks third in the nation in scoring defense at nine points a game.

But he also came back "to finish what I started" on the field, which brings us back to messages sent and contemplated.

Behind Te'o's leadership, Notre Dame is on pace to reach a BCS bowl for the first time since the 2006 season.

With two-thirds of the season remaining, Te'o doesn't want to fast-forward beyond Miami, even though he knows it's automatic, anytime Notre Dame is on a winning streak. Sure, the Irish are close, but "this is a crucial moment in our season," and he warns the Irish must be "very careful. Be very, very, very, very careful."

If they get there, there'll be no need for all caps.

"I wouldn't have to use Bodoni font or Helvetica," Te'o says. "Everybody would know Notre Dame football is back."

Until then, the Irish will dream dreams because of Te'o.