Today we’ll fire up a second half preview of Notre Dame opponents, as the Irish wipe copious amounts of delicious, delicious cheeseburger grease from their faces. We already took a look at how 2017 stacks up statistically against other good-to-great years in the modern era, and revisited our preseason predictions on everything from wins to starting safeties to grit. Now, with the USC game mere days away, we’ll look at the road ahead for the Irish and what it might hold. The first half of the schedule wasn’t quite as easy as it seemed preseason, thanks mostly to the emergence of Michigan State, but even so, it was clearly easier than the second half “should” be. We’ll review each opponent and consider how the Irish might fare against them.
As a reference point, we’ll start with the S&P+ rankings for each opponent on the schedule. I would normally include FEI rankings as well, but those haven’t been updated for games from this past weekend yet and don’t have separate offense/defense rankings available yet either. FEI, which places a premium on efficient drives, likes Navy a little better because of its offense, and S&P+, which places a premium on explosiveness, likes Stanford a little better because of its offense. Broadly speaking, though, the two metrics track pretty closely to each other, so S&P+ is enough for now.
| Opponent | S&P+ | S&P+ Off | S&P+ Def |
| Temple | 100th | 121st | 52nd |
| Georgia | 5th | 21st | 10th |
| BC | 104th | 119th | 70th |
| MSU | 20th | 78th | 9th |
| Miami (OH) | 79th | 93rd | 63rd |
| UNC | 88th | 82nd | 82nd |
| USC | 17th | 18th | 31st |
| NC State | 23rd | 15th | 53rd |
| Wake Forest | 29th | 72nd | 14th |
| Miami | 11th | 11th | 17th |
| Navy | 57rd | 23rd | 94th |
| Stanford | 15th | 6th | 47th |
Some interesting notes to take from these numbers:
- The average S&P+ ranking of our first half opponents is 66.0, while the average S&P+ ranking of second half opponents is 25.3.
- We’ve already seen the two toughest defenses on the schedule; we were stifled by one and obliterated the other, so, uh, I don’t know what to make of that.
- Stanford and NC State, according to defensive S&P+ at least, are approximate defensive peers of Temple. Ruminate on that for a bit.
- Conversely, Stanford, Miami, USC, and NC State are all higher-ranked offensively than anyone we’ve seen so far.
Also, some counting stats notes:
- We’ve already seen three top 20 pass efficiency defenses – Michigan State (4th), Boston College (12th), and Georgia (18th). Georgia dropped from 6th last week, basically due to two plays in the Mizzou game. Which highlights the dangers of counting stats.
- Wake Forest (14th) is the toughest remaining, with Miami (32nd) and USC (36th) on the right side of decent as well.
- On the other hand, Stanford (67th), NC State (73rd), and Navy (114th) are decidedly on the wrong side of decent.
- NC State (7th) has the highest-ranked run defense remaining on the schedule (by average yards allowed per game), with a laaaaarge gap to Wake Forest (49th).
- Stanford (100th) has the lowest-ranked run defense remaining, allowing an average of 195 yards per game. They’re 113th in yards per carry allowed at 5.0. Not yer pappy’s Stanford squad.
- Navy (1st) and Stanford’s (15th) rushing offensives are impressive, but so is Georgia’s (9th) and we know what happened to them. Miami (37th) is the only other current top 50 team we’ll see.
- Wake Forest (25th) has the highest pass efficiency offense ranking on our remaining schedule, with NC State (26th) right behind. Georgia (13th) has the highest ranking of all opponents.
If you’re looking at that run defense rankings against the advanced stats defense rankings and wondering what’s going on with NC State, they’ve been effective against the run but sliced up by the pass. It’s fair to wonder if Notre Dame will be able to take advantage of that, of course. On the other hand, they also haven’t faced a murderer’s row of rushing offenses. Really we don’t quite know what to make of them at this point, but in all likelihood they’re pretty good.
There are some silver linings in there – primarily that the NC State and Stanford defenses haven’t been as strong as many Irish fans expected – but it’s pretty clear that if we make it to ten wins this year we’ll have earned it.
Let’s check in on how each remaining opponent has done so far against what our preseason expectations were.
#11 USC
They have a good number of questions marks, though, as they return just 10 starters total from last year’s team; they’ll have talent, as always, but they won’t have much experience.
We questioned USC’s ability to replace three starters on the offensive line and all four team captains without some growing pains. They had a quality win over Stanford in their second game, but let mediocre Texas and Cal teams hang with them and lost to Washington State in Pullman for just the third time ever. They also were a two-point conversion away from losing to Utah last weekend. Not surprisingly, offensive line troubles have been a prominent theme all season; in addition to the three starters lost to normal attrition, they’ve lost a couple more in-season to injuries and the unit hasn’t been able to get on track. Their run defense has been average, which is perhaps good news for Irish fans. They’re dangerous, but beatable.
#16 NC State
The Wolfpack lost top RB Matthew Hayes, who accounted for over half their rushing yards last year, but return QB Ryan Finley and his top four receiving targets… The defense returns nine starters overall
[, including elite DE Bradley Chubb]. Things in Raleigh seem primed for HC Dave Doeren to break through the 7/8 win barrier, but can he pull it off in a division with Clemson, Florida State, and Louisville?Well, Doeren is 2 for 2 so far, as the Pack already knocked off Florida State and Louisville; those are impressive wins for a team with a rep of failing to get over the hump. Chubb has been as advertised, with 6.5 sacks and 13 TFLs already, but the defense as a whole hasn’t been quite as sharp as expected. If the Notre Dame offensive line can handle Chubb and bookend Kentavius Street like they did Harold Landry, this game should be very manageable. If the Irish handle them the way they did Lorenzo Carter and Davin Bellamy, it’s probably going to be a long day. NC State just smothered a moribund Pitt team that lost QB Max Browne for the season last week; this week, they’re off before traveling to South Bend. I don’t love that they have a week off before us, or that they come right after the USC game, but it’s good to get them at home at least.
Wake Forest
They seem like a pretty good bet to regress, which could possibly warm up Dave Clawson’s seat a bit.
Yeah, so maybe I’m not always right… That opinion was based on the fact that they returned a lot of guys from a putrid offense, and lost a lot of guys – plus Mike Elko – from a very effective defense. Six games in, they’re 4-2 and both sides of the ball have looked better than expected. I’m not willing to concede just yet, though; they started last year 5-1 and went 2-5 down the stretch, and I think something similar could happen this year. They’ll probably be underdogs at least five times in their last six games – at Georgia Tech, vs. Louisville, at Notre Dame, vs. NC State, and vs. Duke. The other game, at 4-2 Syracuse, is no gimme either. If they can stay competitive, will it be enough to garner interest in Clawson from higher-profile schools? Would Wake Forest be crazy enough to warm up the seat of a guy who can consistently win six to seven games in that dead end job?
#8 Miami
They also return six starters in a very good front seven[, and] they return their top RB and most of their top receivers… They need to get their offensive line situation sorted out quickly or it won’t matter who the quarterback is [who replaces three-year starter Brad Kaaya].
The Canes’ passing game was lights out against Toledo, but ranged from good to meh in their other four games, with the most meh coming in their near-loss to Florida State. Their running game has been very good, but they just lost leading rusher Mark Walton for the season. They just squeaked past Georgia Tech in a bit of a miracle win – a 28-yard tipped reception on 4th and 10 led to the winning field goal as time expired. It was feast or famine for their offense, as they alternated between impressive drives and, well, pretty sad drives.
The good news for them is that they have two eminently winnable games coming up – vs. Syracuse and at North Carolina – to get things sorted out. The bad news is that immediately after that, they host #14 Virginia Tech and #13 Notre Dame. If everyone holds serve, there’s a chance Miami would face two consecutive top-ten matchups. This game easily scares me more than any other left on the schedule – Miami probably has the most athletic front seven we’ll see other than Georgia, it’s on the road, and they could be on a roll when we face them. No easy task indeed.
Navy
They lost seven starters on offense, including QB Will Worth and three offensive linemen. The defense returns a lot of experience but, similar to Wake Forest’s offensive returners, that might not mean much… If [new QB1] Zach Abey can step up, the Middies should be fine. If not, it could be a very long season.
Navy is 12th in offensive S&P+, and leads the nation with over 400 rush yards per game. For the most part, Abey has indeed stepped up and the offense is humming. About that defense, though… They rank 105th in S&P+ defense, 82nd in rushing defense, and 118th in pass efficiency defense. Any way you slice it, they’re bad. They just dropped a close game to a decent Memphis squad who ran pretty well on them; they had a brutal passing day, as Abey went just 1-for-7 for 20 yards and two picks. Given how Notre Dame’s rushing game is performing at a historic pace right now and how Elko controlled the academy option at Wake, I like our chances to turn this game into a track meet. And the faster it gets, the more favorable it is to us.
#22 Stanford
Speedy RB Bryce Love is a different style of runner than [#8 overall draft pick Christian] McCaffrey but should be a capable replacement. Replacing [#3 overall pick Solomon] Thomas, however, is a taller order.
Love has been more than capable, as he leads all qualifiers in yards and yards per carry by a substantial margin. He also leads the nation in 50+ yard runs with 8, is tied for the lead in 60+ yard runs with 5, and is tied for second in 70+ yard runs with 1. Josh Adams, who has 32 fewer carries, is just behind him with 6 50+ runs, is the guy tied with him for 60+ runs, and is the guy ahead of him with 2 70+ yard runs. But that’s not important right now, because there’s an East Coast bias I need to tell you about…
Anyway, Love has been electric, no doubt. The biggest question mark for him is how he’ll hold up to the workload David Shaw has given him – he topped his offensive touches from last season in just six games. The biggest question mark for Stanford overall is that the defense has not replaced Thomas as easily as the offense replaced McCaffrey; therein lies their most significant vulnerability. They just pummeled Oregon and should do the same to suddenly coachless Oregon State. That’s followed by a very difficult back-to-back at #15 Washington State and vs. #12 Washington. Will they yield 80+ points to Evergreen State opponents for the second straight year? They then get Cal at home in the Big Game before hosting the Irish to close out the regular season; depending on which Cal shows up, that might not be a gimme either.
How healthy will Notre Dame be this late in the season, especially coming right off the Navy game? How ragged might Stanford’s defense be? Will Brandon Wimbush have worked out his major kinks as a passer? Will Love have anything left in the tank? Plenty of fascinating storylines for the regular season finale.
Handicapping Scenarios
11-1
This seems like a pipe dream at the moment, as it would require a perfect close through arguably the toughest second-half schedule in the country. If Notre Dame can pull it off, it could be worth a playoff spot – but even I won’t seriously talk playoffs unless we get to Navy weekend unscathed. If we do, I’m booking airfare to Atlanta.
10-2
This was my preseason prediction; while that included a 6-0 start, I was also much more concerned about USC then than I am now. I’ll stick with this prediction and keep what I had as the second loss, a close one on the road to Miami. To land here, the Irish will have to take care of business against Wake Forest and Navy and go 3-1 against USC, Miami, NC State, and Stanford. Won’t be easy, but very doable.
9-3
The most likely path to 9-3 would be, again, taking care of Wake and Navy but only going 2-2 against USC, Miami, NC State, and Stanford. That’s very possible, but I think getting USC and NC State at home combined with Stanford’s defensive struggles this year make it less likely. I would be mildly disappointed with 9-3, however we get there.
8-4
Here’s where things get muddier. If Notre Dame drops either the Wake or Navy game – which I see as exceedingly unlikely – and goes 2-2 against the “big four,” here we are. If they beat both weak teams and go 1-3 against the big four, here we are. I have us losing to Miami, as noted, but I just can’t see us losing two of three to USC, NC State, and Stanford. I actually think Stanford’s defense will be badly overmatched, and if we can figure out how to contain Love that game could get ugly. Which means, for me at least, we would have to drop both USC and NC State to get here, and I don’t see that either. Could it happen? Sure. Will it happen? Highly doubtful. I’d be very disappointed with 8-4.
7-5
This would require a shutout against the big four, or at least one loss to Wake or Navy and 1-3 against the big four. There’s no way. And that’s as much analysis as this deserves. 6-6 or 5-7 deserve even less analysis – not happening. Period.
Here’s my ranking of how much the remaining opponents scare me:
-USC (so much talent; if things click they are Dangerous with a capital D)
-Miami (if ND plays mistake-free, I think they can win)
-Stanford (I have a bad feeling about this one…on the road, Shaw, etc.)
-NC State (ND cannot take them lightly, but I think they are beatable)
-Wake (I expect this to be like BC – close at first, then ND cruises)
-Navy (with the ND run game humming this year, I want to see ND run all over them – multiple running backs breaking off 50+ yard runs)
I agree with USC, and I might slot NC State in at second because they have a very strong defensive front, which seems to be the only thing that can slow down ND’s run game.
For whatever reason, I’m not that worried about Miami. We’ve owned them every time we’ve played during my lifetime, they’re barely beating any quality team they face, and they have to take on VT the week before we visit.
I still think we finish 4-2 to end with a 9-3 record and hopefully a bowl win propels us to 10 wins.
I’m not sure that I have an order really, Wake and Navy are 5 and 6, but the other 4 can go in about any order. I would favor ND over all of our remaining opponents for each given game, but I don’t think the consistency will be there such that the best team wins every match.
We’re 12th in S&P
We’re playing 11th, 15th & 17th (which statistically seem like they’d be close to coin flips)
23rd & 29th (which favor us, but are still good enough that they can be trip-up games)
and 57th (which should just be a win).
Therefore I think 4-2 for the remainder is about right as well.
SC and Miami(and I flip the two) are at 2 and 3 in my list. If we lose a game, I’m worried about Wake. They are EXPLOSIVE and play really good defense. Stanford, yes is on the road and we’ve not owned them in a while but if this season gets really interesting, I could see them playing the role SC did back in 2012.
I’m always afraid of Southern Cal because of Pete Carroll, Ty Willingham, and Charlie Weis. I may never feel confident about a Southern Cal game for the rest of my life.
The main thing, as far as I’m concerned, is that we really aren’t sure how this team is going to look against a string of good opponents. Georgia has clearly gotten more in the groove since they played us, and I’m not sure a rematch would be as close. MSU is decent-good, but not in the same ballpark as Southern Cal, Miami, or NCSt. If we can beat the hell out of Southern Cal, I may feel like we can run the table. But for now, I remain cautiously optimistic, emphasis on the cautious.
Also, just because they hate it… Southern Cal.
You get a thumbs up for the last line.
“Even I won’t seriously talk playoffs unless we get to Navy weekend unscathed.”
Until the Irish have two losses I keep an eye on every game that could affect the playoffs and hope for the result that will help the Irish and am willing to wax poetic about why the AP’s banded poll changes based on their preseason know-nothing rankings are stupid. Some years I spend more weeks doing this than others.
I went to the advanced stats page. Can anyone tell me in layman’s terms, what the stats mean? Thanks
We’re pretty good, Michigan sucks.
^^^This 👍. ^^^
https://www.footballstudyhall.com/2014/1/24/5337968/college-football-five-factors
S&P+ measures performance on a per-play basis. It looks at how often you gain (or prevent) a “successful” number of yards on a play, how likely you are to score on a play from a given point on the field, etc. Basically, it tries to capture how good you are at creating or preventing good plays.
FEI, on the other hand, measures on a per-drive basis. Rather than tracking good/bad on individual plays, it looks at things like what percentage of the possible yards you gained on a drive, rate of scoring drives, rate of drives ending in a turnover, etc. It tries to capture how good you are at sustaining or ending drives.
So if you look at the two of them together, you start to get a more comprehensive picture of where a team’s strengths and weaknesses are. Looking at the components helps you drill down further – for example, we’re 5th in FEI Offense, 1st in S&P+ Rushing, and 76th in S&P+ Passing. So our per-play rushing has been excellent and per-play passing has been subpar, but overall we’ve effectively moved the ball down the field. Duh, right? But that’s only “duh” because we’ve all watched our team and we more or less know where the strengths and weaknesses lie. We haven’t watched the other 129 programs in FBS, which is where the stats can fill in some color.
Am I the only one who’s really not nervous at all about the USC game? By no means am I implying a blowout win for the Irish, but I do think we’ll walk away with a 10 to 14 point victory. I’ve watched the Trojans barely hang on to beat a mediocre Texas team at the Coliseum and get upended in Pullman by a Washington State team that isn’t as good as advertised (Cougs were steamrolled by 34 in Berkeley last Friday night). Sure, USC always has tremendous skill position talent, but it seems the team is extremely inconsistent, sloppy at times and hasn’t been helped by Sam Darnold regressing from his impressive 2016 campaign.
If we get inconsistent Darnold, I have no worries at all. If we get locked in good-game Darnold it could be a dog fight.
That’s what I’ll be closely monitoring on Saturday night. You’d think a QB of Darnold’s caliber would always be locked in, especially for marquee games. However, he didn’t look great in the national spotlight against Texas, and I believe ND has a much better defense than that of the Longhorns.
Based on these “facts,” USC scares me:
— They always seem to land the 5/high-4 star kids we want
— They’re a rival we haven’t consistently beaten since Holtz was around; other than ’12, it seems like we only win when they’re absolutely sucking
— Seems like Darnold can be The Truth if he wants to
— Their skill players are F-A-S-T and our defense is sound but no starters in our secondary are out there winning foot races on the reg; just Crawford & Pride have legit speed but they aren’t every-down guys. D Hayes & Okwara might run down a QB or RB here & there but that won’t be happening this weekend.
Let me share some other facts…
– USC has committed 16 turnovers in 6 games – 9 interceptions and 7 fumbles. Perhaps most distressingly for them, five of those fumbles have been by Darnold, all in the last three games. So by himself he’s accounted for 14 of their 16 turnovers.
– USC ranks 61st in rush defense; they gave up 6.5 yards per carry to a Stanford offense that’s averaging 50 fewer rush yards per game than Notre Dame.
– They lost true freshman starting DT Marlon Tuipuloto for the season a couple of weeks ago. Starting DT Josh Fatu is currently going through the concussion protocol after being in a car accident the other day. Contributing reserve DT (and former 5*) Kenny Bigelow just quit football after too many injuries and will be a student assistant for the rest of the year. They just took the redshirt off true freshman Brandon Pili, who if Fatu can’t go will be the only DT available against us who was on the preseason depth chart.
– Adoree Jackson is gone, and in any case Scott Booker isn’t running our special teams anymore.
– Ronald Jones is no faster than Sony Michel, Mecole Hardman, or D’Andre Swift. In fact Hardman and Swift are probably faster than Jones.
– I know [generic SC skill position player] is often a higher-rated recruit than [generic ND defender], but I encourage you to check in on their skill position performance this year outside of Jones and Stephen Carr, who is questionable for our game with plantar fascitis. It’s good, not great.
And one more subjective thing… I’ve watched them some this year. They’re soft. Punch them in the mouth early and they won’t respond. So yeah, I still feel pretty good.
You said some very appealing stuff before the UGA game that I listened to and believed in. This is me now:
Well… In my defense, I was half right on the Georgia game. I said I thought we’d be able to move the ball and we’d be able to stop them, and we *were* able to stop them. So the glass is half full, of course…
Also in my defense, they turned out to be much better on offense than anyone thought they’d be – 21st in S&P+ Offense and, even more surprisingly, 12th in S&P+ Passing. If I was assessing them six or seven games into this season my optimism would’ve been much more muted.
The biggest reason I’m confident about this game is that I don’t think USC will be able to consistently stop our running game. If it actually plays out that way, say good night, Traveler.
Im with you. I’ve seen them play Big 12 style defense this year and make so many boneheaded mistakes offensively. I think the line for this game is correct and ND wins by at least 4
I will always assume a loss to USC until the clock has ticked down to zero and we have more than a TD lead. I don’t know how many consecutive years we would need to beat them for me to stop feeling that way.
I am in a weird place. Intellectually, I understand that we are good to quite good (check this ranking out! https://thepowerrank.com/college-football/bowl-subdivision-rankings/). But emotionally, I have absolutely no confidence in us, and would be quite happy with 9-3.
I’ve emotionally prepared myself for 7-5 because Notre Dame.
The answer is 11. Because that’s the streak we had going when I was a student, and I pretty much just assumed we were going to beat those pretty boys from Southern Cal until we finally didn’t my junior year. I had field passes for the game from doing the color guard, and I still console myself for the loss by saying at least I got to knock over the Song Girls’ gatorade cups (and, of course, be close enough to the Song Girls to do so).
I’ve been a 9-3 guy for 2017 for about 12 months now, however I’m leaning more towards even 10-2 because of how well the offense has played and put up points (even without passing presence) and the defense being a lot stronger than anticipated.
My list of feared games in order would be: USC (next is always worst, and I’ve long thought of this one being a season-defining game), Miami, NCSt, Stanford.
Worried about NcSt as an emotional letdown following a win OR loss from SC, because of 30 years of conditioning as a Notre Dame fan.
I’d be ecstatic with a win Saturday, but fearing what could be. When’s the last time Kelly beat a team in the #10-15 range? Seems like an awful long time. They’ve been so close but seem to lose to good teams like that (see UGA game this year). Would rock to be on the right end of this one, and hopefully the opportunity will be there.
“When’s the last time Kelly beat a team in the #10-15 range? ”
September 19, 2015 – Georgia Tech (# 14 at the time)
October 4, 2014 – Stanford (# 14 at the time)
They also finished #16 and #11 respectively.
Huh? 2015 Georgia Tech went 3-9. 2014 Stanford went 8-5. Neither were ranked at the end of the year, and neither are particularly impressive wins.
Arizona State finished the 2013 season at #14 in the BCS Standings (and lost their bowl game). Michigan State finished 3rd (HA!).
In retrospect, the Michigan State game is, probably by far, the most impressive of the Kelly era. It just didn’t seem so at the time.
I googled 2015 and 2014 AP polls. And they had those rankings. I bet that I ended up looking at the final ones in Jan, so actually the 204 and 2013 seasons. Which also makes sense why those teams were ranked highly, and now I remember us being excited about that GT win and then them being garbage.
“We’ve already seen the two toughest defenses on the schedule; we were stifled by one and obliterated the other, so, uh, I don’t know what to make of that.”
I suspect this was primarily a result of Michigan St. being -3 in the turnover margin for our game, whereas Georgia was even… (the margin of victory difference of the two games just happens to be exactly 3 touchdowns ironically). No defense plays up to its normal standards when the offense keeps giving up possessions and field position.
Right, so all we have to do is be +3 on turnovers for all the rest of our games. Let’s do this!
With Martini likely to be out this weekend, Coney clearly starts, but who’s coming off the bench then?
New walk on Moe Schmidt.
Coach’s son. Real student of the game
Coach on the field. Real gym rat.
Quicker than fast.
Just the right amount of sand in his pants.
BK said we would see more of Stepherson against USC. Looks like he found “the traits” at the most opportune time.
The timing could not be better for a Stepherson breakout game.
National Championship game would garner zero complaints from me.
I realize this won’t be a revelation to anyone here, but I love Mike Elko’s defense. It seems like the perfect revolution for today’s college offenses. The spread seems like it’s about spreading out defenses and creating space for athletes to do what athletes do. Elko’s defense seems like the perfect counter to that. Smaller, quick, athletic linebackers(including an even smaller, quicker, more athletic hybrid safety/linebacker) all put in a position to use their athleticism to perform in space.
It all seems like common sense once you think through it, but someone had to break out of the mold and find that match to spread offenses. Elko did that. I’m very impressed by this guy.