Week one ND opponent rankings 1. Cincinnati 2. USC 3. Virginia Tech 4. Virginia 5. Florida St 6. North Carolina 7. Wisconsin 8. Purdue 9. Georgia Tech 10. Stanford 11. Navy 12. Toledo Still not sure what I think of Florida St but North Carolina and Wisconsin seem way overrated. I think Mertz going ham his first college start might be the worst thing to happen to them.
Just imagine a world where Mertz sucks game one last year, they put the brakes on him, poor Jack sticks around to run that offense, and we trot out Pyne against FSU… yikes.
My grandpa called me yesterday to ask what "stream on peacock" is and if I could walk him through how to set it up. After about 5 minutes of me trying to figure out where to even start he jumps in with "do I need the internet for this? I'm not sure if I have the internet at my house." Then mercifully he gave up and said he would just go to the bar to watch it.
Not only do I think Cincy is the best team on our schedule, they also might be a matchup nightmare with Ridder at quarterback. We need to be a lot cleaner in the front 7 in that game. Miles better, honestly.
Finding a bar may be an issue unless it’s ND centric. They are charging ridiculous money for Peacock in a commercial setting.
I told him to call to make sure they would have it, but he lives in Toledo so I'm sure they will. Plus my grandpa eats dinner at this place like 5 days a week so even if they weren't planning on it they'll probably do it for him. But I'm not ruling out me getting a phone call 20 minutes before kickoff with all the same questions.
The optimist in me chalks it up to first game, night game, big stage jitters. The defense was in the right spots but simply missed tackles. That, you can improve. I think Freeman learned his lesson week one. I know when your playing AAC opponents and you’re better defensively than they are offensively you can hit cruise control when you get up 20. As someone else said, welcome to big time college football. The pessimist sees a team that might waste the best defensive prospect ND has had since Jaylon because we don’t have fits for the scheme he wants to run.
They were at home and didn't. ND should have beat FSU by three scores on the road. I watched UW play and nothing about them impressed me. Maybe they have fixable stuff just like ND, but I feel like you are giving them too much credit while not acknowledging ND can do the exact same things. ND had a bad line game, no running game, bad tackling, piss poor coaching and still scored 5 touchdowns and forced three turnovers. I get where you’re coming from but I can be this negative this early. Give me a couple weeks.
I know this isn’t last year’s team where we had a great OL, and while I don’t truly know what the rest of the season holds, we all went into panic mode after Duke as well. We had a brand new defense installed, a brand new OL, a new QB, a couple injuries, and we were playing on the road. At times we looked dominant, but the change to a 3 down set is really what fucked us up after getting up by 18. Let’s see what the season holds before assuming we’ll suck now.
Ok it’s Tuesday which means it’s a new game week and time to look ahead to Saturday and it’s pressing questions, chief among them: who got a tailgate for Mallett?
Your hospitality is as regular and dependable as the totally undeserved ticket price increase. $180 for Toledo is fucking ridiculous
Cincy would have played Navy in the AAC, so he can't be that confused by the triple option, right? Right??
First time playing in front of a juiced crowd for all our guys in over a year as well. I'm not taking anything too meaningful from that game. If the D struggles against Toledo, then it's panic time
This might sound dumb, but he was probably one of the top 3-4 players I don’t think we could have afford to lose to a big injury like this. First, because of his on field performance, but second for off-field. With all the recruiting he was doing and the example of a true freshman stepping in etc, if that all goes away with him healing and probably being bummed/upset, that’s a huge blow
Carmody didn't play bad, he had that one fuck up and thats why everyone thinks he was shit, but he really settled in
Hard to really argue but my god USC looked terrible. They were up 13-7 in the 4th qt at home vs San Jose state.
tale of the tape Spoiler (Editor’s note: The entirety of Tale of the Tape will appear in one story during the 2021 season.) “It’s a gritty group. When you’re up 38-20 on the road and you give that lead up, many teams do not get out of there with the victory. Our guys hung in there. We came up with the big stop when we needed it defensively and were able to win it for the first time on the road since we went to overtime. They showed the mettle and the grit necessary. “All in all, we were happy with the win. We know we’ve got a lot of work to get better in Week Two. But we’re excited to be home.” -- Brian Kelly • There was “much ado about something” with first-year offensive coordinator Marcus Freeman turning to a three-down look once the Irish took a 38-20 lead, which assisted Florida State in running its way back into the game before the Irish closed it out with a 41-yard Jonathan Doerer field goal in overtime for a 41-38 season-opening victory. If Notre Dame simply tackles better, there likely isn’t much talk about Notre Dame’s defensive front. The Irish really struggled tackling the football. The commentary provided by ABC/ESPN analyst Greg McElroy about Notre Dame not using a “heavy run set” certainly sparked the fire from critics. McElroy called it out from the outset as the Seminoles gained momentum running the football. One can understand why Freeman would want to employ a 3-3-5 look up by 18 points, expecting Florida State to throw the football, first with Jordan Travis and then McKenzie Milton, who came into the game when Travis had his helmet pop off from a Houston Griffith hit. Sticking with it (while mixing in some four-down looks) after the first touchdown drive rightfully raised some eyebrows. It should be noted that in the drive after the Irish took an 18-point lead, Notre Dame put a three-man line of Jayson Ademilola, Howard Cross III and Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa on the field. But at one point, it was red-shirt freshman Alexander Ehrensberger, Kurt Hinish and Jacob Lacey, which had difficulty. Ten of the 11 plays run by Florida State in the first scoring drive of the comeback were running plays. Notre Dame stopped winning the line of scrimmage, the linebackers had difficulty getting off blocks of unimpeded Florida State offensive linemen, and it suddenly became a game again. • Brian Kelly’s explanation for the approach was this: “When Milton came in, we double-zoned everything. He’s so accurate. We wanted to be in much more of a nickel, three-down, double-zone and you’ve got to be really good in your gaps. We let the ball get outside of us a couple of times. You’ve got to be so good when you’re double-zoning and trying to take away a spread passing game that is pretty good. That’s where we’ve got to get better.” We’ll see moving forward how Freeman adjusts his defense and how he implements his defensive fronts. Declaring him a failure after one game is absurd. Certainly there’s enough video evidence – at least against Florida State – that when the front is undermanned as it was following a mostly dominant first-half defensive performance, the Irish have to adjust, trust their aggression up front, and win one-on-one battles on the back end. • Objection to the notion that Tommy Rees called a poor game. In fact, he not only didn’t call a poor game, he did an excellent job of trying to mix in a rushing attack that was mostly dormant with more of a “push the ball downfield” attitude with Jack Coan at the helm. Most of the opinion against Rees’ play-calling stemmed from a 3rd-and-5 in which a Coan run was stuffed. And yet if you look at the alignment pre-snap, the Irish had two receivers to the right of the formation that ran their defenders off the ball. The Irish had the numbers to run it if the right side of the offensive line, block it and sealed the edge. They didn’t. The notion that Rees became too conservative in the fourth quarter doesn’t take into account efforts to throw the football with Coan under duress. The offense didn’t play well/execute for a couple of series after scoring 21 straight points. There was the brilliant call on a 3rd-and-1 to Kevin Austin Jr. for a 37-yard score and the well-timed, beautifully executed 55-yard screen pass to Kyren Williams on 3rd-and-17 with the memorable image of left guard Zeke Correll sprinting with/ahead of Williams for what would set up a Coan-to-Williams short touchdown toss for a 31-20 lead midway through the third quarter. Immediately after Clarence Lewis’ first career interception, Rees dialed up a nice-24-yard target to Braden Lenzy. Notre Dame scored 21 points in the third quarter. Rees made the proverbial halftime adjustments and stung the Florida State defense, turning a 20-17 deficit into a 38-20 lead. Rees called a good game against the Seminoles with one hand tied behind his back. The knee-jerk reaction to every play that doesn’t work is over the top. • It’s difficult to score 38 points in regulation without a rushing attack. That’s what Rees/Coan did against a Florida State defense that is dramatically improved up front with transfer defensive ends Jermaine Johnson II and Keir Thomas as well as a stout interior defensive line. Florida State’s defensive line proved more impactful than Notre Dame’s defensive line, although the approach after the Irish took a 38-20 lead had much to do with it. How could Florida State improve so much in one year? Thirteen transfers will help do that. Because of grad-transfers and the one-time transfer rule, teams are going to be able to rapidly bolster themselves from one season to the next. It will happen at places like Florida State and other traditional rivals that are struggling as playing-time opportunities arise. Mike Norvell is a good football coach. His teams have struggled to put out a consistent defense and that hasn’t changed. Even with the Seminoles’ vastly improved defensive front, Notre Dame scored five touchdowns and led for nearly 28 of the 30 second-half minutes. • Particularly impressive was the way in which Notre Dame’s offense responded to adversity. When Florida State took a 14-7 lead, the Irish went on a 10-play, 46-yard field goal drive, followed by a five-play, 48-yard touchdown drive to take a 17-14 halftime lead. When Florida State struck quickly in the third quarter with a 60-yard scoring toss, Notre Dame answered with four-play, 75-yard touchdown drive, and then added two more scores. The offense bogged down a bit in the fourth quarter, and yet an obvious roughing the punter penalty was reduced to a running into the punter penalty. Had the Irish maintained possession at that point with a little more than 10 minutes remaining, Florida State likely doesn’t go on its 18-0 run. • Jack Coan was everything and more than could have been expected in his Notre Dame debut. He completed 26-of-35 passes (74.2 percent) for 366 yards, four touchdowns and a throwaway interception at the end of regulation. That’s a 14-yard average per completion and 10.4 yards per attempt, which are championship-level passing numbers. Particularly impressive was his on-the-dime 37-yard touchdown toss to Kevin Austin Jr. This game-manager stuff is just a phrase that really doesn’t mean anything. On his scoring toss to Austin, the ball was in the air for 41 yards. He underthrew some passes in the first half, but it wasn’t because he doesn’t have a strong enough arm to get it out there. He just tried to finesse a couple of throws and left them short. He stepped up into some pressure, which he needs to avoid. He doesn’t have a cannon, but he doesn’t need to have one to achieve success in this offense. Just get the ball into the hands of your playmakers. The ball comes off Coan’s hand with ease and the accuracy he showed at Wisconsin was in evidence in his Notre Dame debut. His execution of the 55-yard screen pass to Kyren Williams was perfect. • The sticking point with Coan is his lack of mobility, or rather, his inability to make plays once he’s forced to move around. But we knew that coming in. Notre Dame has sacrificed mobility at the quarterback position for a willingness to grip-it-and-rip-it when he sees an opening. How many times over the previous three seasons did Ian Book hesitate to make a throw? Frequently. Coan won’t do that. He has a good if not great corps of wideouts led by Kevin Austin Jr., whose football prowess is easy to detect. How much better is Coan on screen passes/getting the football to the running backs in the passing game than Book was? Consider that Kyren Williams and Chris Tyree were targeted a combined 10 times in the passing game against Florida State. They caught all 10. • Huge credit to Joe Wilkins Jr. for his magnificent end-of-the-first-half touchdown grab that he wrestled away from much-hyped cornerback Travis Jay. Jay clearly had inside position and Wilkins – using the strength he gained during the off-season that was lauded during August – won the fight that included a blatant pull of the facemask. • As it relates to the performance of Notre Dame’s offensive line, the Irish certainly didn’t get a ton of push against Florida State capable defensive front. That was customary with last year’s veteran group, but will be hard to come by against the better defensive lines on Notre Dame’s schedule. (Note: Among those listed in our First-Rate analysis of top defensive lines were Cincinnati, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Virginia and USC). None of Notre Dame’s starters were immune to mistakes. But freshman left tackle Blake Fisher was pretty darn good throughout most of the first half. He had a holding penalty and a false start, which could be expected playing in that environment for the first time. But for the most part, Fisher was what we had seen in the spring and August. Fisher doesn’t lunge, he doesn’t get outside of the framework of keeping his center of gravity underneath his pads, and he plays under control. We’ll see as the week progresses how long he’ll be out. • Left guard Zeke Correll played better than the perception created during the game. Again, none of Notre Dame’s offensive linemen were stellar. Correll was called for a false start early and had difficulty getting push on Florida State’s talented tackles. He and Fisher were passive on a double-team block against outstanding Seminole defensive end Jermaine Johnson II that turned into a sack. But Correll threw the decisive blocks on Kyren Williams’ long run of seven yards and Chris Tyree’s long run of 12 yards. He and left tackle Michael Carmody led the way on Tyree’s one-yard touchdown run that put Johnson on his back. Correll is active and obviously in pretty good physical condition to run with Williams on the 55-yarder. Carmody has some strength and is game. The Irish can win with him in the lineup for a couple of weeks until Fisher comes back. He did some good things in addition to getting completely buzzed on a sack in which he was late coming out of his stance late. Center Jarrett Patterson has a lot on his plate. He has two smaller-in-stature guards next to him and makes the calls up front. He had the one bad center snap and he, too, had to contend with 310-pound nose tackle Fabien Lovett and 338-pound nose tackle Robert Cooper. We need to stop referencing Cain Madden as “the All-American right guard.” He was an All-American Group of 5 guard who is taking a huge step up in competition. He didn’t exert the push one might have expected and didn’t play with the aggression that he will as he gets his feet wet. Right tackle Josh Lugg was too frequently tentative and stiff off the right edge. We’re still looking for the nimbler, light-on-his-feet Lugg from the 2019 season when he started five games in place of injured Robert Hainsey. Lugg wasn’t bending his knees and establishing a strong base, choosing instead to reach for blocks without the bend. He is capable of moving his feet better than he did against Florida State. • The perception of Notre Dame’s linebacker play was tainted by the three-man fronts in the second half that made it difficult to get off blocks. The Notre Dame linebackers didn’t tackle particularly well at times. Drew White was aggressive as a frequent up-the-middle blitzer and tone-setter for the defense, but even he was lost n space a few times. For making his first career start in his most extensive action by far, JD Bertrand was active with a team-leading 11 tackles and a team-leading six unassisted stops. After one game, I don’t think the issue at inside linebacker is a lack of athleticism per se. (Insert stereotype.) Bertrand and White are aggressive and instinctive. They are proactive linebackers who play in attack mode. Bertrand was always better than Shayne Simon. He had three less tackles in one start than Simon had in eight starts/11 games last year! • We were a bit surprised by how much Isaiah Pryor played at Rover over Jack Kiser, but less surprised after seeing his performance against the Seminoles. He put early pressure on Jordan Travis in the end zone and was used strategically on Florida State’s bunched receiver formations to help blow up the operation. He was credited with just three tackles, but he had two quarterback pressures, including one on a 4th-and-2 that led to Clarence Lewis’ interception. Pryor played a very active game inside the box and out. • Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea culpa as it relates to defensive end Isaiah Foskey. Somehow, we didn’t see Foskey playing impactful football in the spring or in the two full practices open to the media in August. While it’s conceivable that he simply didn’t play well during the brief viewings afforded to us, it’s statistically unlikely. But there’s a new narrative as it relates to Foskey. He was light on his feet, active, violent and a real presence at a variety of spots along Notre Dame’s defensive front. He had eight tackles and a pair of sacks. Offensive lines must account for him. Freeman even employed him in the middle of the second rung in the 3-3-5 look. If that’s the Foskey we can expect moving forward, he’s going to be a weapon for Freeman. • It’s difficult not to gush at the skills of safety Kyle Hamilton. There’s not much we can add that wasn’t seen on his two interceptions, including the second pick in which he started from the opposite hash and deceived Jordan Travis into thinking Hamilton was not in the play. As long as Hamilton is on the field, he’s in the play, although Travis did a good job of looking him off on the 60-yard pass play to start the third quarter. As for the celebration penalty after his second interception, it just can’t happen on the opposing team’s sideline. They’re going to throw flags for taunting. It’s the rule in college. He won’t have to worry about it on the next level. It doesn’t matter how freakishly great he is as a player. He can’t do that. Brian Kelly joked that he would have taken his helmet off, too, if he could make a play like that. But Hamilton has an obligation to his teammates. Kelly said Hamilton immediately came to him after the penalty and said his actions were not representative of a Notre Dame captain. Hamilton is a level-headed stud. He won’t make the same mistake again. • The Houston Griffith we saw against Florida State was the best version of Houston Griffith that we’ve seen in a Notre Dame uniform, which comes with clarifiers. He had eight tackles and the pressure on Travis that brought McKenzie Milton into the game. Griffith was more physical than we’ve seen at any point in his career. But he’s still a player that opponents are going to target with Hamilton swooping down on the action most of the time. Thought he would be able to keep up with Florida State wide receiver Ja’Khi Douglas. He has a long way to go before he is considered an asset in the Irish defense. • Cornerback Cam Hart had his moments for a player making his first start. He is a work in progress. He showed some physicality early against running back Jashaun Corbin. If that’s the version of DJ Brown that we’re going to see in 2021, Freeman is going to have a difficult time taking Griffith off the field. Brown made a nice play on a tackle for loss, but he ran by Jordan Travis on the touchdown pass to Andrew Parchment. His tackling skills remain suspect at best. Game and practice footage to come to that conclusion is ample. • This is a good time for tight end Michael Mayer and all the hype around his ability to be put in perspective. He is an exceptional talent. He will lead the team in receptions after his 13-target, nine-catch, 120-yard performance, including the early 41-yard touchdown reception. He’s too easy of an option for even Kevin Austin Jr. or Kyren Williams to surpass him. But in the best interest of Mayer, the “best tight end in the country” talk needs to be tabled. Clearly, his abilities are as freakish offensively as Kyle Hamilton’s are defensively. But the two drops were critical mistakes. One would have gained a first down and likely given Notre Dame an early two-score lead. The second drop would have put Jonathan Doerer in field-goal range (52-to-54ish yards) to win the game in regulation. Mayer had some difficulty staying on blocks. At 251 pounds, jumping over defenders makes highlight films. But he needs to keep his feet on the ground and plow through defenders. Put the hype on hold. Just play the game the way it’s supposed to be played and all of his skills will blossom. Stay grounded and everything will fall into place. • It takes one route to recognize that Kevin Austin Jr. has a skillset that no other wideout on the roster possesses. At 6-foot-2, he plays and looks longer than that. Watching him during pre-game, when he puts a foot in the ground and comes back on the football, it looks different than his peers. Austin caught four passes for 91 yards, including the 37-yard score. He also flashed his unique skillset in the red zone when he stutter-stepped cornerback Travis Jay into a 16-yard gain. He was targeted seven times. He needs/deserves at least that many every time out. There are 50-to-60 receptions in his game. There would be more were if not for Mayer and the passing game to the running backs. • Two-red zone entries, two touchdowns. Good start, although there were some drives just outside the red zone that fizzled…A less-than-impactful debut by Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa at defensive end. The capable MTA is a work in progress…Never heard of a player suffering two different Achilles injuries in successive years. Horrible break for Paul Moala…Walk-ons on special teams: Senior linebacker Adam Shibley (46) and sophomore running back Sam Assaf (38)… • Don’t understand why you don’t give Chris Tyree a shot to win the game with 40 seconds in regulation by allowing him to return the kickoff. The first play from scrimmage after his fair catch was a four-yard turnout route to Mayer that used seven seconds. Use those seven seconds on a kick return in case the fastest player on the team breaks one. A 40-yard return puts you one first down away from field-goal range…George Takacs played a nice behind-the-scenes role as a blocker…Good teammate: Freshman offensive guard Rocco Spindler applying a cold towel to the back of Zeke Correll’s neck… 15COMMENTS • Right or wrong, think about all the calls that went against Notre Dame. There were the obvious three: The overruled fumbled kick return caused by TaRiq Bracy to start the second half. The uncalled roughing the punter penalty. The McKenzie Milton fumble-turned-incompletion. There was also what would have been a fumble return for a touchdown by Isaiah Foskey, but Travis’ knee was down. There was the fumble by Florida State deep in their own territory that Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa and Jack Kiser somehow didn’t come up with. There were several occasions when this game could have gotten away from the Seminoles… • I generally like Joe Tessitore as an announcer. His passion and enthusiasm for his job is difficult to match. The over-dramatization is a little wearying…The operation of Jonathan Doerer’s game-winning field goal was almost a split-second too long…Did you hear Brian Kelly say Monday that the next two offensive linemen up after Michael Carmody replaced injured Blake Fisher are Tosh Baker and freshman Joe Alt?...In my 40th year of covering Notre Dame football, I’ll never understand the people who insist on being miserable during every Notre Dame game and try to make everyone around them miserable. That makes you a miserable human being…Here’s what I have to say about Brian Kelly’s “execution” comment.
ISD update on Fisher is even worse. If this is the case just shelve him for the season Spoiler Spoke to multiple people about Notre Dame offensive lineman Blake Fisher's injury and I believe the knee injury is worse than Brian Kelly let on following the win at Florida State. I do know it wasn't an ACL injury, so that's good news, but the bad news is I believe Fisher will have surgery later this week to fix an MCL issue and a meniscus issue. The timeframe I was given for his return was about 8 weeks. Could be more or could less, so a return in 2021 for Fisher is still up in the air. Fisher's injury happened on the touchdown play to Joe Wilkins Jr. as a FSU defender fell into his leg. Brian Kelly will speak on Thursday at noon and will likely be able to provide a timeline and further details.
When we got up 18, I said out loud “alright, now let’s just get out without major injury,” turns out I was wildly off on all accounts.
Separately, I’m usually not the biggest fan of Driskell because he gets out over his skis on some topics and doesn’t have the self awareness to understand it. That said, I generally think his Xs and Os knowledge is pretty solid. His newest YouTube feature - Upon Further Review - is basically a film study of the previous game and he does a solid job with it. Granted, it’s 2.5 hours long which gives him the opportunity to go wayyyyy overboard on a few topics (ie. kick returns, or lack thereof), but it’s still solid.
I was listening to their instant reaction to the game yesterday, and Driskell had them cranking out podcast content past 3 AM. You could tell Vince was wondering what in his life had brought him to that moment, podcasting through the late hours of the night.