SOUTH BEND, Ind. - Granted, it was only two years ago, but today it seems like such a long time ago.

Brady Quinn was capping his record-setting career at Notre Dame, but still, replacements, a good number of them, were in place, and the quarterback depth problems present during the Tyrone Willingham years and the early years of the Charlie Weis Era were likely a thing of the past.

One of four quarterbacks — be it Evan Sharpley, Demetrius Jones, Zach Frazer or the incoming Jimmy Clausen — would take over for Quinn, with the others rounding out the depth chart.

That, however, hasn’t been the way it’s worked out.

Following spring practice 2007, Frazer left Notre Dame and is now at Connecticut. Jones started ND’s 2007 opener but lasted less than a half and eventually transferred to Cincinnati. Clausen is now the starter with Sharpley his top backup.

But depth is once again a concern.

If Sharpley, a left-handed hitting corner infielder on the ND baseball team, bypasses a fifth year of eligibility in 2009, the depth chart next year would include only two scholarship players — Clausen and current freshman Dayne Crist. And that seems an awful lot like 2005, when behind Quinn it was...it was...

“Who was the No. 2 the first year,” Weis wondered, before being reminded that it actually was David Wolke, now at Western Kentucky. “So the dropoff from Brady to David the first year was such a huge dropoff that you just held your breath.”

The dropoff next season, if it is from Clausen to Crist, wouldn’t be anywhere near as steep, but beyond Crist it’s slim. Listed behind him is another freshman, walk-on Nate Montana, who has good genes (you may have heard of his dad, who had an OK career at Notre Dame and enjoyed moderate success in the NFL), but was a backup in high school.

Couple that with the fact that Notre Dame isn’t expected to sign a QB in the recruiting class of 2009 — signing a third straight standout following Clausen and Crist would have been difficult — and it might behoove Weis and his coaches to adopt “Keep Jimmy Healthy” as the 2009 slogan.

It also likely would behoove the ND staff to add two quarterbacks in the 2010 class, something Weis did in 2006 with Jones and Frazer. The key, however, is to make sure their skill sets aren’t exactly the same, so when the depth chart is analyzed, the one looking the furthest up doesn’t decide to look elsewhere.

“Because if you take exactly the same thing, then you’re going to get into the same situation that we had before, where you have a run of quarterbacks and they all want to be the starter and they all end up going somewhere else,” Weis said.

Expect the Irish to target one pro-style quarterback in the mold of Clausen and Crist, and another who either has some running skills or could transition to another position.

One name to keep an eye on is Seattle-area standout Jake Heaps, who already has been offered by Notre Dame. Another is Nick Montana, another of Joe’s sons, who plays at Oaks Christian School in Westlake Village, Calif., the same school that produced Clausen. The younger Montana already holds a Stanford offer.

While it would be nice to land a standout every year, it isn’t practical with only one ball. USC has established the model, for the most part spacing its standout QBs, starting with Carson Palmer and going through Matt Leinart, John David Booty and now Mark Sanchez. Matt Barkley, this year's top quarterback, arrives next year.

It’s a lineage Weis would like to someday establish.

“I’m not in the business of bringing guys in to encourage them to go somewhere else,” he said. “You’re bringing them in here to groom them to be the quarterback here.”

Lineman picks Northwestern
Chicago-area offensive tackle Pat Ward, an Irish target, recently selected Northwestern. Notre Dame’s top offensive line target for the class of 2009 remains North Carolina standout Xavier Nixon.

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