Print Edition of The Observer for Friday, November 13, 2020

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Volume 55, Issue 38 | Friday, NOVEMBER 13, 2020 | ndsmcobserver.com

Courtesy of Carlos Fabrega

First years Valeria Espinel, left, and Olivia Laura Rojas pose for a photo earlier this semester. Friends describe the two girls as “inseparable” best friends that did everything together. The two are remembered by the community for their love of life and dedication to their friends and family.

‘They were inseparable’ Notre Dame remembers Valeria Espinel for her kindness, liveliness

By MARIAH RUSH Managing Editor

To Valeria Espinel’s friends, it seemed like she had an unlimited amount of time. That she could do everything productive for school and more and still have time to be there for her friends. Almost like she was working with an extra few hours more than anyone else.

People say freshman year of college is hard. That it’s hard to find a balance between meeting new friends, doing school work and adjusting to a new environment — adding in a pandemic can’t make it any easier. time here.”

But somehow it seemed as if Valeria found the time to “meet everyone” in the Latino community within just two months of starting college, get ahead in school and plan for internships as just a freshman. Her friends say she made more friends than they ever thought possible in two months.

A native of Guayaquil, Ecuador, Valeria lived in Badin Hall until she was killed in a car accident in October, along with her best friend Olivia Laura Rojas.

According to Badin Hall rector Sr. Susan Sisko, Valeria always “bounced down the hallways.”

Valeria’s Badin Hall resident assistant, Grace Kaiser, said she “had an effortless confidence and liveliness” that anyone could sense after meeting her.

“Val used to give me and everyone in our section these sweets called Dulces de Leche that she brought for us from Ecuador. She would leave a whole stack of them in the candy bowl outside of my room for all to share. Before the campus-wide prayer service, we as a Badin community had a short service for Valeria at the Grotto. Pretty much our entire dorm community and even some off-campus see VALERIA PAGE 3

Friends, community reflect on Olivia Laura Rojas’ spirit, compassion

By SERENA ZACHARIAS and MARIA LUISA PAUL Notre Dame News Editor and News Writer

Olivia Laura Rojas had a special talent for bringing people together. Those who knew her remember her as someone who lived life passionately, formed strong relationships easily and remained loyal to every friend she made along the way.

Although she was only a first-year student, Olivia’s friends said the tight-knit Latino community at Notre Dame all knew of her.

“She was a leader, that type of girl that everyone kind of knows and everyone wants to know,” said junior Juliana Salvatierra Moreno, who knew Olivia when both were children.

Olivia was born Oct. 15, 2001, and hailed from Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia.

On campus, she lived in Cavanaugh Hall and planned to study in the Mendoza College of Business before she

and two others were struck by a car Oct. 24 on Ironwood Road. Olivia and another first-year, Valeria Espinel, both died in the accident.

People who knew Olivia said she was outgoing and made friends quickly, and she often inf luenced the people she met for the better.

First year Gaby del Rosario met both Olivia and Valeria through an admitted students group chat, and the three quickly became close through all-night Zoom calls and daily messages.

“One night the three of us, along with two other boys from Panama, stayed up until 5 a.m. talking to each other. We just had an instant and natural friendship,” del Rosario said.

Del Rosario said before she met the two girls she was rather shy and quiet, but they really helped her come out of her comfort zone.

“It’s crazy to think that I’m see OLIVIA PAGE 3

2

ndsmcobserver.com P.O. Box 779, Notre Dame, IN 46556 024 South Dining Hall, Notre Dame, IN 46556 Editor-in-Chief Maria Leontaras Managing Editor Mariah Rush

NEWS

The observer | FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2020 | ndsmcobserver.com

Asst. Managing Editor: Maeve Filbin Asst. Managing Editor: Claire Rafford Asst. Managing Editor: Sara Schlecht

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Saint Mary’s announces interim vice president for mission Observer Staff Report Editor’s Note: A version of this story was published online Nov. 11.

On Wednesday afternoon, Saint Mar y’s President Katie Conboy and Sisters of the Holy Cross President Sr. Veronique Wiedower announced in an email that religious studies professor Molly Gower w ill replace Judy Fean and ser ve as the College’s interim v ice president for mission in Januar y 2021.

According to the email, Fean was supposed to retire last year,

but the search was paused due to the College’s hiring freeze at the beginning of the COV ID-19 pandemic.

Fean was named to the position in 2015 after work ing in the Campus Ministr y office for 27 years.

She was the first lay person appointed to the role in the College’s histor y.

Conboy and Wiedower noted Fean’s dedication to the College communit y.

“Over the course of her professiona l career, Judy has embodied the mission of the Sisters of the Holy Cross,” the email said. “At Saint Mar y’s, she

deepened her understanding and lived experience of Blessed Basil Moreau’s educationa l philosophy of engaging the whole person. Judy’s success in her work was a ll about her abilit y to build relationships and to inspire collaborations.”

Gower said she is excited to ta ke on the new role.

“Saint Mar y’s College has a specia l place in the histor y of women in religion,” she said. “I look for ward to collaborating w ith the College communit y and the Sisters to honor that histor y and continue that work.”

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Megan Fahrney | The Observer

Members of Notre Dame’s Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) gathered in front of the Clarke Memorial Fountain to commemorate Veterans Day on Wednesday evening. The officers held a vigil for 24 hours the day before to pay respect to veterans.

Notre Dame tri-military ROTC holds Veterans Day ceremony

By MEGAN FAHRENY News Writer

Editor’s Note: A version of this story was published online Nov. 11.

Facult y, staff, cadets and midshipmen of Notre Dame’s Reser ve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) held the annua l Veterans Day Ceremony at the Clarke Memoria l Fountain on Wednesday. Members of the A rmy, Nav y and A ir Force ROTC participated in the ceremony to honor veterans.

Andrew Brannon, a first-year master’s student and second lieutenant in the Air Force, said the Veterans Day Ceremony is a big part of what they do in ROTC. “It’s thanking the veterans, making sure we’re aware of the sacrifices they’ve [made] and show ing our appropriate respectfulness towards that,” Brannon said.

For 24 hours prior to the ceremony, ROTC members held a v igil, taking shifts standing guard at Clarke Memorial Fountain to pay respects to veterans. The fountain was guarded despite the rain Tuesday night.

“It’s similar to the theme that we have of being respectful, being professional [and] making sure that we

have the proper respect for the veterans during the v igil, regardless of weather and conditions,” said sophomore Pat Campbell, a cadet third class.

The ceremony began w ith remarks on the histor y of Veterans Day, the national anthem and a prayer.

Joe Donnelly, former U.S. Senator of Indiana, was the key note speaker at the ceremony. Donnelly earned both his B.A. and J.D. from Notre Dame. He is now a professor at the Universit y in the department of political science.

Donnelly’s speech emphasized the heroism of our ser v icemen and women and of Notre Dame veterans’ contributions to the armed forces.

He described the importance of the words, “God, Countr y, Notre Dame,” which is inscribed on the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

“It’s so much more than a slogan,” Donnelly said. “It is the code by which we tr y to live our lives.”

Donnelly spoke of Fr. William Corby, a former president of Notre Dame, who ser ved as a Union Army chaplain in the Civ il War. Corby was attached to the Irish Brigade at the Battle of Gett ysburg.

Donnelly then addressed current Notre Dame ROTC members,

affirming the importance of the lessons they learn at Notre Dame in regards to their future deploy ments w ith the militar y.

“We believe in ser v ice [at Notre Dame], … and all of you who are in ROTC epitomize that completely,” Donnelly said.

Notre Dame ROTC gifted Donnelly w ith a plaque in appreciation of his speech.

“I thought [Donnelly’s speech] was really important,” Brannon said. “Especially at a time when our countr y is so div ided. … It was a speech about unit y and what brings us together and celebrating the sacrifices that ever yone’s made so that we can get to where we are today.”

Freshman Annmarie Hack worthy, a cadet fourth class, believes guarding the fountain is a good time for ROTC members to ref lect on what veterans have sacrificed for our countr y and to remember they are falling in that line of dut y.

“It’s really cool to be able to honor the veterans by doing this,” Hack worthy said. “It’s a little thing that we can do for them when they gave it all.”

Contact Megan Fahreny at mfahreny@nd.edu

News

Valeria Continued from page 1

Bullfrogs showed up, which I think is a testament to how loved Valeria is and how much she will be missed,” Kaiser said in an email.

Through Zoom calls, GroupMe messages and Facebook groups, Valeria made friends with fellow first years as soon as she could.

Many of her friends she hung out with every day throughout the semester she made before stepping foot onto Notre Dame’s campus in the fall.

Once she got to campus, Valeria and her friends she’d met in the Notre Dame Latino community would hang out every day.

“We studied a lot together and [did] basically everything [together],” first-year Augusto Simons said. “We were always together with her. She was very close to all of us. She was a great friend. … She had a lot of friends.”

Although her friends said the Latino community at Notre Dame is a very welcoming one, they noted Valeria had a special ability to make friends quicker than anyone else.

First-year Nico Lopez counts Valeria as his first friend at Notre Dame.

“She was friends with everyone. I mean, it’s kind of impressive,” Lopez said. “I was a little bit jealous because she would become best friends with everybody. … Every single day I would meet another person who would say,

Olivia Continued from page 1

a completely different person now, and that’s because of Olivia and Valeria,” del Rosario said. “In a way, with them passing, I feel it’s kind of my duty now within our close group of friends.”

Olivia also taught del Rosario to not allow her self-doubt to hinder her life experiences.

“I remember one time we were FaceTiming with her friends from back home while getting ready to hang out, and Olivia just looked so beautiful, and I felt so bad about myself in comparison and didn’t even want to go out,” del Rosario said. “She and her friends started consoling me, and then Olivia shared a life lesson from her mom. She said, ‘You don’t have to think about your weight or about how you look.

You’ll never be this young, so have the time of your life and enjoy every moment.’”

After that particular instance, del Rosario became closer with Olivia’s friends from back home. Throughout the course of their friendship, del Rosario even spoke with Olivia’s relatives over FaceTime calls at Hesburgh Library.

“Olivia just had a really

ndsmcobserver.com | friday, NOVEMBER 13, 2020 | The Observer

3

‘Oh, yeah, you’re friends with Valeria.’”

According to her friends, Valeria put as much work as she did making friends into school as well.

“You can define her, basically, as a work hard, play hard type of person. She was always in every plan she could go to, and she would always seek out to hang out with people and to meet new people and to build new friendships,” Simons said.

“But she was also extremely responsible with school. She was always on top of every class, she would help us with our classes we were having trouble with, she was very responsible with all her homework. She was like the perfect student, basically, because she was a very all-around person.”

With that seemingly unlimited resource of time, Valeria pushed everyone around her to be better.

“She was one of the most well-rounded people I’ve ever known. It was like she had an unlimited resource or resource of time, … like she had so much time, but she had the same time as us. She got so much done in the same time as we did. And she helped us catch that pace and become better versions of ourselves,” Lopez said.

First-year Lorena Colon, who became friends with Valeria before they arrived on campus, echoed Lopez’s sentiments.

“She just made everyone feel good. And she would never bring anyone down. She really cared about all her friends,

and finding that balance between studies and having fun.

I think she didn’t want to sacrifice like one for the other,” Colon, her roommate, added.

“She would always push you to be a better version of yourself.”

One of her friends, first-year Juan Alvaro, remembers when Valeria would go out of her way to remind him to do his work.

“Something really special she used to do for me is that I’m very prone to falling behind in classes, especially Moreau. So after she found out [that] I started to fall behind in Moreau for the second time, she would always remind me even though her Moreau wasn’t the same day as mine,” he said. “She would always text me Monday nights and be like, ‘Hey, do your Moreau.’”

Valeria met her best friend Olivia prior to arriving at Notre Dame, and by all accounts, they were inseparable.

“They were always together,” Simons said. “It was very common to hear in the sentence, ‘Valeria and Olivia.’ They came together, basically. Like they were always together.”

“Every single picture, it was Valeria and Olivia. Everything they did, they did together. It was very impressive for us how they became so close through Zoom and how they really made such a strong friendship,” Lopez added.

Many of Valeria’s Notre Dame friends were able to meet her friends and family from home in Ecuador through video chats, and Valeria remained extremely close with her parents and three younger

brothers while at school.

“I think we could all agree that she brought up part of Ecuador with her, and we all got to live a little bit of it through her,” Alvaro said.

After Valeria’s death, friends from Ecuador wrote and sang an original song for her called “Little Miss Perfect” that now has over 8,000 views in an Instagram post.

The song professes Valeria “always cared for everyone else,” and she “never let life bring [her] down, those were the things she lived by.”

According to the song, Valeria was called “little miss perfect” growing up.

Although she only was enrolled at Notre Dame for a short time, Valeria made it clear to her friends that she loved Notre Dame.

“I remember that she talked to me about her decision making, and she was accepted into a large number of selective institutions. But she never flinched about choosing Notre Dame because she felt like it was going to be the place where she will not only become a better student, which she already was, but she would become a better person,” Lopez said. “I think that she was striving more to become a better person more than a better student because she was already an amazing student.

She was pushing her academics even farther. But Notre Dame does a very good job of forming you as a person. And I think that she really felt connected to that.”

Her friends remember her as

always taking advantage of every opportunity in life and for her quirks, some of the things that made Valeria, Valeria — an obsession with tuna, her baking business she began in quarantine and being a selfadmitted easy crier are just a few. But above all, they remember Valeria as being so happy with the life she’d made for herself in the Notre Dame community.

“She was the happiest here that she’s been in her life. She was constantly telling us that she was very happy here and that Notre Dame was everything that she ever wanted and more. And her parents knew that, her friends knew that,” Lopez said. “I think that we all thank the Notre Dame community as a whole for having given Valeria such an amazing place to be, even if it was not for the longest of times.”

Following Valeria’s death, her friends found agreement in one specific thing about her life, something they want to emulate going forward in their own lives.

“When I was talking about this with our friends,” Colon said. “The one thing we agreed on is that she definitely enjoyed her time here and lived as fully as she could, even though it was a very short amount of time. That’s what we were talking about. We were like, ‘We should try to live as fully as she did.’ Because she really did make the most out of her time here.”

special way of getting people together,” del Rosario said.

“She always brought everyone she cared about together. I think that’s why if you ask anybody who knew her, they will tell her she was an incredibly beloved person.

Del Rosario said Olivia worked to prioritize her friends even when she was busy with her own work because she wanted to make sure each of them knew how important they were to her.

“I told Olivia I was not eating because I didn’t like going to the dining hall alone, and she told me that from then on she would make sure we would eat together every day. Literally every single day at 11:30 a.m. I would get a text from her saying, ‘Meet you at North Dining Hall.’ She was truly always there for me,” del Rosario said.

Olivia was also close friends with Valeria, who died in the same car crash, and junior Camila Antelo Iriarte said Olivia often made it clear how important Valeria was to her.

Antelo Iriarte mentioned the work Olivia put in to celebrate Valeria’s birthday earlier in the semester, buying a cake for het and organizing a gathering outside on Library Lawn.

“I’ve never seen someone so excited for another person’s

birthday,” Antelo Iriarte said.

“She was just so concentrated on making a day better for another person.”

While she loved her friends, Olivia was also close with her family, particularly her mother. Antelo Iriarte said she was shocked to hear how much Olivia told her mom.

“Olivia could tell her mom everything. She was her best friend,” Antelo Iriarte said.

“She had such a beautiful relationship with her mom.”

In addition to being a loving friend, daughter and sister, Olivia’s friends described her as confident and very sure of herself. She always seemed to be encouraging her friends to believe in themselves.

Sophomore Isabella Cardenal first met Olivia in July when she invited her to have dinner with a couple of friends.

Cardenal said she was surprised to see how confidently Olivia walked up to them and interacted with their group.

Though Olivia exuded self-assurance, Cardenal said she was surprised to find out that this was not the case.

“Apparently she was feeling very bad, and she was scared to go to eat and whatever. But she appeared as if she was very confident, very sure of what she was doing, and I admired her.

I admire that a lot,” Cardenal said.

Despite Olivia’s outgoing and confident nature, sophomore Manuela Trigo, who had known Olivia since they were young, said Olivia would never shy away from being direct.

“Olivia was so straightforward. She could say anything to your face, but it was great because she wasn’t the type of person who would say something behind your back without telling you anything,” Trigo said. “No, she would just march towards you and tell you what she thought. It was so hilarious.”

Though Trigo knew Olivia as a child, the two became closer friends after they began school at Notre Dame. Though their friendship was cut short, Trigo said Olivia taught her that the greatest friendships are not always the longest.

Olivia enjoyed documenting her life, often recording TikToks and sharing snippets of her life through Instagram, which Salvatierra Moreno said was important to her.

“She was obsessed with taking pictures, but that’s nice because at the end of the day, we have so many memories of her concrete in pictures because of how many pictures she took of herself,” Salvatierra Moreno

said.

Cardenal and Olivia bonded over TikTok dances, filming videos together constantly.

“There was one specific song that I knew a TikTok dance to, and she also knew it. So every time that they played the song, we would run towards each other, and she would put her phone and we filmed. I don’t really do TikToks — I just did them with her,” Cardenal said.

Although she died young, Trigo said Olivia was a “free spirit” who loved being surrounded by people.

“She would always enjoy every single moment. When we would chat through WhatsApp, she would send five minute voice notes and pictures just laughing,” Trigo said.

Olivia’s friends thought she made the most out of her life, engaging with every person she encountered and taking advantage of the opportunities Notre Dame had to offer.

“She lived her life as if it was literally the last day that she was going to live it,” Cardenal said. “She had no regrets. She didn’t overthink things. She was like what’s done is done.”

Contact Mariah Rush at mrush@nd.edu

Contact Serena Zacharias at szachari@nd.edu and Maria Luisa Paul at mpaulran@nd.edu

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The observer | Friday, november 13, 2020 | ndsmcobserver.com

JACKIE JUNCO and ALLISON THORNTON | The Observer

Black eyes and lofty expectations can’t stop Liam Eichenberg and Notre Dame’s offensive line

By HAYDEN ADAMS Sports Editor

The general view of offensive line play is that it’s best to not be flashy. Typically, the best sign that an offensive lineman is doing a good job is if no one is talking about him, because that means he hasn’t messed up.

One Notre Dame offensive lineman who has gotten some flak for messing up is Liam Eichenberg. Although he didn’t earn a nickname like his predecessor at left tackle, Mike ‘McFlinchey,” false start penalties seemed to ail the nowgraduate student early on in his career and even into last season.

“I mean, yeah, the majority of false starts last season was because we’re on a clap cadence,” Eichenberg said. “It’s the first time, so it was kind of difficult to time off, I guess you could say.”

But don’t take that quote as Eichenberg making excuses. It’s not in his nature. He wouldn’t even let a black eye that looked swollen shut keep him out of this year’s game against Florida State.

“Yeah, my teammates, they just kind of looked at me like, ‘Oh my god.’ I really didn’t realize how bad it was until I got in the locker room,” Eichenberg said of the incident.

Eichenberg said that the biggest issue was not an inability to see, but the difficulty of getting his contact lens in, an endeavor which he said took a full quarter to accomplish. Despite that, he reiterated that he was “just happy to be out there.” And for the grit and determination he showed in playing through that injury, Eichenberg was awarded Barstool Sports’ ‘Football Guy of the Week’ honors.

That’s the kind of mentality that now has Eichenberg poised to be a possible Day 1 NFL Draft selection following this season. He’s cleaned up the mistakes and is playing the best football of his career — just as Notre Dame’s offensive line is making believers of those who saw their 2019 performance as lacking when compared to past Irish line play. Eichenberg credited the veteran nature of the group, one that returned 129 career starts combined among this year’s starters, as a large factor in their success this time around.

But despite the attention the Irish line is getting on a national scale, Eichenberg is largely not interested in the accolades.

He has been going about his business, and doing so in impressive fashion. He’s continuing a trend of outstanding play at the left tackle position as established by former Irish standouts Zack Martin, Ronnie

Stanley and Mike McGlinchey, a standard of play that ultimately led him to join the Irish under former offensive line coach Harry Hiestand back in 2016.

Eichenberg credits those individuals for leading by example in their desire to represent the blue and gold.

“All those guys I met, it was just kind of like they’d do anything for this program and especially for each other on the offensive line. So, I mean, when I got injured, there was no thought in my mind that was like, ‘I want to stay out for the whole game.’ Like, my first thought was, ‘I need to go back in the game,’” he said of his swollen eye against Florida State.

Another part of that drive to be on the field is Eichenberg’s de facto sworn duty to protect the man standing behind him. Whether it’s making sure Ian Book isn’t getting sacked or defending the third-year, graduate student starter under center against his harshest critics, Eichenberg is ready and willing.

“There’s a lot of people who doubt Book … it’s not great to see,” he said. “… it just sucks because, you know, I see how hard he works every single day, and in the offseason, in the film room, on the field, in the weight room. The amount of time he’s

dedicated and sacrificed to help this football team win and for us to take the next step in the right direction. And I mean, I think Ian’s the best quarterback in the country. I’ll say that every single day. I think he’s the best leader on our team. So I believe in him and the offensive line 100% believes in him.”

Book should feel comfortable playing behind a teammate who not only has such faith in him, but one with the capability of blocking two pass rushers simultaneously as he did against Pittsburgh three weeks ago.

Suffice to say that Eichenberg has played no small part in developing a stellar Notre Dame offensive line, one that has consistently been rated the top line in the country by Pro Football Focus. They even managed to maintain that ranking by a solid margin following a duel with former-No. 1 Clemson’s vaunted defensive front.

Expectations were high for the unit coming into the season. After the Florida State game, Eichenberg credited those expectations as an effective motivating factor. “[Notre Dame mental performance coach] Dr. [Amber] Selking always talks about how pressure is a privilege. So that’s kind of where we take it.”

They’re now taking that mindset into a date with Boston

College on the road. Indicative of the mentality that head coach Brian Kelly has instilled in the Notre Dame program, Eichenberg was quick to put the win over Clemson behind him, and he was effusive in praising their next opponent.

“We need to play BC. BC’s a great team,” he said. “They’re a great defense … they’re a stout, tough, physical defense. So, I mean, it’s not going to be a walk in the park. I mean, it’s like every game, you know, you got to get out there and you got to play physical, you got to make your blocks. And, you know, anybody can win. So we’re looking forward to it.”

For a position group that just helped produce more than 200 yards rushing against Clemson for the first time since Alabama did it on Jan. 9, 2017, one might worry this line could begin to rest on its laurels against a 5-3 Boston College team. But with Eichenberg and a group pushing (no pun intended) for the Joe Moore Award and a national championship, the grind doesn’t stop.

“Obviously, we need to improve on a lot of things… there’s always room to improve, but I think we’re going in the right direction. We just need to keep going.”

Contact Hayden Adams at hadams3@nd.edu