Official Notre Dame Football Thread

[Sharkweather]

Welcome to the 0-2 club. ND and UGA, wasting top 20 recruiting classes since 2008.

 

[CCBrink]

I feel really bad for ND fans.

 

[FirstTimer]

Another game of over 500 yards of total offense completely ruined by turnovers.

 

[NAHSTE]

I feel really bad for ND fans.

Why?

 

[FirstTimer]

Michigan




The Good

-Michael Floyd. Look for a lot of him here this season. He completely dominated Michigan's secondary. Kelly did a great job of moving him around to create mismatches. I especially liked moving him into the slot on 3rd downs and down in the red zone on the TJ Jones touchdown reception. Giving Floyd the ability to work from the inside out on the football field and run drags really takes up a lot of attention and creates orotundities for others and it also allows him matched up on safeties. You can't ask for anything more than what Floyd has been giving this team. His 29 yard catch on the 2nd and 30 was amazing.

-Cierre Wood. Wood is starting to look like the real deal as a running back. He has been showing great patience, burst and decision making on runs. The one fumble aside Wood did everything right last night. The difference in Wood from this time last year is astonishing and his progress from the last few games last year has been an incredibly pleasant development.

-Tommy Rees(minus three plays). Rees threw two horrible interceptions, and had a very costly and very forehead smacking fumble. Other than that he played a tremendous football game. His composure and decision making on the last drive was tremendous. His accuracy on the pass over the middle to Eifert in the 4th quarter was truly amazing. The kid has "it". It's cliche, I know, but I don't know how else to describe it. If Rees can ever eliminate the boneheaded mistakes that have cost him early on I really believe he can be a Kellen Moore type player on this offense. He's not overly athletic and he doesn't have any real dominant physical tools, but he has superb accuracy, he's a great leader, and he controls the offense extremely well.

-The offensive line. Short yardage was bad, but I will cover that later. The line kept Rees clean all night. Michigan did nothing pressure wise when they didn't blitz, and even when Michigan did blitz they picked it up well enough to allow him the time to get rid of the ball. The line also did a great job opening nice running lanes for Wood and Jonas Gray to run through. They were blasting Michigan in the trenches. Through two games this line has yet to yield a sack that I can recall.

-Theo Riddick. After absolutely awful season opener Riddick responded with a very nice game. He was very solid on the kick return game, didn't drop any passes, and had two touchdown catches. It was a very nice bounce back game for a player that really needed on.

-The Uniforms for Notre Dame. Loved them. Sadly they were tainted in a loss, but they were still a really great look.

The Bad

-Turnovers. Every publication keeps listing five, due to the fumble on the final kickoff, but I will only really recognize the first four when I think of this game. Even still, that's far too many. Of those four, three of them were inside the Michigan 30. We have consistently taken points off the board the last two weeks in close ball games. That has to end. Wood's fumble was a bit of a freak play and maybe a lapse in concentration. The two Rees interceptions were bad decisions by a young quarterback that are correctable. The Rees fumble was a freak play. However, I mentioned last season that Rees seems to have really small hands and may want to look into wearing gloves. More than likely it won't happen but it should be worth a look as there are a lot of times during the game I really question how good of a grip he has on the football. These are all correctable errors, but they have to get corrected now. As it stands you've have two straight games of over 500 yards of total offense that have been wasted and lost two close games while leaving a lot of points out on the field due to turnovers.

-The defensive backfield(sans Robert Blanton). Zeke Motta, Harrison Smith, and Gary Gray all played really bad football games. Gary Gray alone deserves a mention in "The Ugly" for his play last night. Denard Robinson threw jump ball after jump ball, some in to double coverage and the only person to make a play all night was Blanton. Gray had an interception on a poorly thrown screen pass early in the ball game but that's not enough to cancel out the embarrassing display he put on for the rest of the game. Motta also had an interception, but even still he almost dropped that one and seemed to be trailing coverages all night. The front seven did their job and made Denard Robinson throw some really bad balls into bad places, and most of the time the Irish defense let him get away with it. Robinson was some competent, not even great or good, just competent defensive back play from throwing six interceptions.

-Short yardage on 3rd down. A major issue in the Weis era has once again come up, however I put the issues we saw last night on Brian Kelly. On 3rd and short putting Rees under center, against a blitzing defense is a horrible move. We tipped our hand as to what we were going to do each time we did that. Michigan doesn't have to respect the quick pass in those situations because Rees isn't very good dropping from under center and he's short so Michigan can get their hands up in the passing lanes during the blitzes. Michigan was selling out on the run 100% in those situations and sent more people than we could block. It would be bad enough if we saw it once or twice but four times in those 3rd and short situations we came out in single back under center and were turned away. Kelly refused to adjust his play calling and thinking and it killed drives.


The Ugly

-The broadcast crew. The gushing over Denard Robinson was just too much. I'm sorry, but while Brent Musberger it typically clueless and I didn't expect much more from him Herbstreit is a smart enough guy that he should have been able to jump in and point out that it wasn't so much what Robinson was doing but what the Notre Dame defensive backs weren't doing that lead to Robinson's night passing the ball. As usual for a Musberger lead broadcast there were numerous issues in identifying players and analyzing the "why" and "how" of the game but Herbstreit, who I usually enjoy, had an off night as well with some player identifying issues. I joked that maybe the long day in Ann Arbor may have involved some over indulgence at the tailgate parties.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Another head scratching game. The way we have lost these last two games is so antithetical to what a Brian Kelly coached team is supposed to be it has left me in a definite quandary. Boneheaded and flukey turnovers, bad penalties, mental errors, etc. I stand by what I said last week in that if this team can eliminate the boneheaded errors that we are capable of being a really good football team but for the second straight week we outplay a team for pretty much the entire game yet shoot ourselves in the foot and lose the game. It has to end. The most frustrating thing right now has to be is that anyone and everyone can see this Notre Dame team is really capable of some very good thing. We are no longer being outcoached, outmanned, outplayed, or outathleted. We are beating ourselves. It's one level of frustration to watch a team that just flat out isn't good enough to compete with teams to struggle and be mediocre. It's an entirely different level to watch a team who is clearly the best team on the field and capable of being a very good football team outplay teams and lose because we turn the ball over or make mental errors in coverage.

Right now looking at the schedule this team can go anywhere from 10-2 to 8-4. Assuming the mental errors get fixed and the turnover problem is rectified I can see this team winning 9-10 games even while starting off with these two losses. 9-3 is still realistic to me with the third loss coming to Stanford to end the season. I'll be picking Notre Dame in every game from here on out until that game and they should still be favored in all their upcoming games. I'm still very optimistic about this team turning it around in the areas we need to in order to win. We did it at the end of last season and can do it again now. Nothing we have done to lose the last two games is beyond correction and I trust Brian Kelly to get this team back on point and play the type of football he has taught for his entire career and the type of football his teams have always played.

Go Irish. Beat Spartans.

 

[NAHSTE]

-The broadcast crew. The gushing over Denard Robinson was just too much.

I muted it shortly after Musberger finished off his final Denard dicksuckathon by dubbing him "THE MOST EXCITING PLAYER IN THE COUNTRY."

:facepalm:

Those guys are usually pretty bad but they were especially so last night.

 

[FirstTimer]

I remember a specific play where they were saying Cario Calabreesay got a tackle when Denard pulled the ball out and ran for five yards.

Yep, that was one. Cabrese killed the running back..who didn't have the ball.

Musberger is always bad...but Herbstreit is better than a lot of the shit he was doing last night. He's usually quick to call out BS but instead jumped on the Robinson dick sucking train.

 

[Colonel Angus]

Loved the Michigan jerseys last night.

 

[ram29jackson]

0-2 fight on Irish, fight on

 

[ram29jackson]

We aren't USC.

nope, ND is much worse actually. Fighting / fight on, play on words, same thing LOL

 

[ram29jackson]

I am sure I have said something to this affect before, but i dont hate ND. I root against them at times because they have been a good team and are college football history. but if they start becomeing a top 60-80 team it wont be fun anymore. I want them to be good, i dont want them to suck. They dont have the same pull they did a long time ago. Plus if they are legit about being an honest school,( high academics no funny money for players) that definitely hurts them ever being successful again.

 

[padman59]

Ragone is done for the year with another knee injury. His blocking was pretty good while he was in during the Michigan game too.

Welch and Golic are expected to be able to participate in practices this week.

 

[j.hen]

Looks like Darrin Walls might see a significant amount of playing time this week. Kelvin Hayden is still learning the system and Chris Owens is hurt.

 

[padman59]

First off, prayers to the Shembo family. A brain aneurysm is some serious stuff. I haven't seen an update since before kickoff, but I hope Shembo's dad pulls through.

Quick thoughts:

-RJ Blanton is easily the best corner on the team. He does everything right from staying with his man in coverage to playing the ball to stepping up in run support and on quick screens.
-Harrison Smith had a good game down the stretch. He had a great plays near the end.
-Turnovers were still there, but the difference today is that the ND defense was able to manufacture some of their own. This still needs to be fixed going forward.
-Another strong day running the ball from the offense in the first half. Credit to MSU for making adjustments at the half.
-ND's offense in the second half was pretty bad. Some odd playcalling at times mixed with MSU's run defense held the Irish in check for the most part.
-Lynch is looking much improved from the first game. He was especially good rushing the passer late in the game. In fact, most of the true frosh in the game seemed to make plays during the game.
-Nice to see a kick returned for a TD. However, the kick coverage, punter, and punt return left something to desire.
-Even with the lost yardage from Cousins added back, ND held the Spartans to under 50 yards rushing. Fantastic job against the run today.
-LOL at Brindza's cleats.

In the end, I'm glad to finally see a win, but there is still a lot of room for improvement for the Irish.

 

[Buzzman]

I have a question for ND fans. Do you ever get tired of your announcers during a home game? They are literally two of the worst I have ever had to listen too.

 

[FirstTimer]

Robert Blanton, Aaron Lynch, Lois Nix, Harrison Smith: :wub:

 

[FirstTimer]

I have a question for ND fans. Do you ever get tired of your announcers during a home game? They are literally two of the worst I have ever had to listen too.

Tom Hammond has sucked for years. Mike Mayock is the fucking shit.

GTFO.

 

[padman59]

I have a question for ND fans. Do you ever get tired of your announcers during a home game? They are literally two of the worst I have ever had to listen too.

I like Mayock. Hammond can fall off a cliff as far as I'm concerned.

 

[FirstTimer]

Oh yeah and fuck the MSU player that went after Ishaq Williams' head at the end of the Blanton INT return.

 

[Cornelius]

I'm an OSU fan first, MSU fan second, and now an adopted ND fan because of BK. Glad to see BK pull this one out though. Dude's a good coach.