The moment is captured forever.

With the Irish trailing 13-0 in the 2011 season-opener against South Florida, sophomore wide receiver T.J. Jones ran what Brian Kelly perceived to be the wrong route.

The Bulls’ DeDe Lattimore made the interception, the Irish trailed 16-0 at halftime, the game was delayed for hours due to stormy weather, and the Irish fell 23-20 to a South Florida team that would finish 5-7.

Screaming at the top of his lungs, Kelly’s face literally looked purple in the pictures that captured his out-of-control rant toward Jones. It wasn’t a good look, and yet Kelly continued his bombastic sideline demeanor.

There was the incident three years back at Temple involving former Irish wide receiver and current strength and conditioning coach David Grimes in which Kelly got physical.

It took five more years and a 4-8 season to prompt significant change. Adjustments were made on the coaching staff, including the firing of Brian VanGorder four games into the ’16 season. A different person would head-up the offense, defense, special teams and strength and conditioning when the 2017 season began.

Relationships needed to be mended. It was determined – via a message delivered by the leadership among the players, led by offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey – that Kelly needed to spend more time with the players.

So Kelly let offensive coordinator Chip Long and defensive coordinator Mike Elko handle their business while he dialed back his bombastic tone, communicated information instead of yelling it, and observed and listened instead of overreacting.

Kelly hasn’t removed all of the emotion from his game. He’ll still let an official know when he believes a wrong call has been made. He’ll forcefully try to get his message across to a player who has made a mistake, particularly if it’s the quarterback.

But most of the time, Kelly looks as it he’s measuring the situation, not trying to solve it with emotion.

“Our team responds better if I’m able to interact with them, be there, and lead them,” said Kelly Tuesday. “If I’m confident and I’m in a good position for them, they feed off that.

“Just maturing and being a better football coach.”

The results offer proof. Since that 4-8 season in 2016, the Irish have won 17 of their last 20 games – 10-3, including a Citrus Bowl victory over LSU last year, and 7-0 so far in 2018 heading to San Diego to play Navy.

Kelly also came to some conclusions regarding the image he presented as a representative of Notre Dame.

“Notre Dame is unique,” Kelly said. “You’re always on TV. You can still be an emotional coach. You can still have a fiery side to you. But at Notre Dame, it’s a lot more difficult to do because there’s a camera on you the whole time.”

A vast majority of the time now, when the camera scans the Notre Dame sideline and settles on the Irish head coach, he’s standing there with arms folded, headset on, thinking and listening as opposed to emotional outbursts.

“I had to make a conscious decision,” Kelly said. “If I were at a different place, I could still have that and still lead. But you can’t do it here. It’s not good.”

The results have been very good.