Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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Under the Dome meeting room, Elliott meshed with other new staff additions in 2012 en route to a BCS National Championship Game run and a third-ranked 2013 recruiting class. Although he wasn't on campus to share in the celebration of the haul, he played a significant role in bringing in major talent, including fourstar cornerback Cole Luke of Chandler, Ariz. Elliott, 59, received good news two days before Thanksgiving, when his sister Betsy Stough informed him she had been cleared to serve as a transplant donor by doctors. "Our thoughts and prayers are with Bobby and his family," Kelly said. "We know he's going to be fine. He's in great care. All year he administered selfdialysis, and yet never missed a day, was out there coaching and working, and he's just a great man. "He's got great experience. I love having him on the staff, and he'll get through this. It's a tough time right now for him, but I think you're going to see him back. He's a fighter, and I expect to see him back on the field in the spring." According to a SportsIllustrated.com report, Elliott learned of the condition soon after being hired last winter. It was the result of a bone marrow transplant in 1998, when he was diagnosed with a rare form of blood cancer. Elliott was an assistant coach at Iowa, where he played defensive back from 1972-75, at the time. He was so sick he had to step away from coaching and concentrate on an administrative position created for him so that he could maintain medical coverage during his fight. For all intents and purposes, it took him off the high-profile head-coaching fast track. He was believed to be legendary Hawkeyes head coach Hayden Fry's successor. Former Iowa athletics director Bob Bowlsby, now the Big 12 commissioner, told SI.com that Elliott would have been among a small group of candidates. "This is not a sob story," Elliott explained to SI.com as to the motivation of sharing his story in the weeks leading up to the BCS National Championship Game against Alabama. "The plus for me is letting people know that other people with kidney disease or cancer can fight through and make it. That's the only motivation I'd ever have for disclosing this, as it doesn't help me or the team." "He's an incredible man that he's fought through this all season," Kelly told UND. com prior to his Feb. 6 National Signing Day press conference. "We know that he's going to be back; he's going to be stronger for it, and I think he represents all the great things coaches and mentors need to have." An official update from Notre Dame on Elliott's post-surgery status didn't go beyond he's "doing well." "One thing I learned when you get sick or hurt or whatever adversity that happens to you, if you stop fighting, you have no chance," Elliott said. "This world will not stop and wait for you."