It wasn’t Syracuse’s day, that’s for sure. After the Orange’s 9th play from scrimmage they lost quarterback Eric Dungey to a mysterious back issue after just crossing mid-field and trying to climb back from an early 10-0 deficit. Although considered the better passer, Syracuse’s backup quarterback did not fare well and was harassed for the remainder of the game. Notre Dame’s offense had its moments but never really found its stride. That inconsistency wouldn’t matter as the Irish cruised to a 36-3 victory in the Shamrock Series.
Let’s review the 11th win of 2018.
Stats Package
| STAT | IRISH | CUSE |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 36 | 3 |
| Yards | 463 | 234 |
| Passing | 292 | 115 |
| Rushing | 171 | 119 |
| 1st Downs | 23 | 16 |
| 3rd/4th Conversions | 7/17 | 6/18 |
| Yards Per Play | 6.3 | 3.2 |
| Turnovers | 2 | 2 |
PASSING OFFENSE
What would you do as defensive coordinator against Notre Dame? I’d play tight coverage and flood passing lanes with 7 or 8 players. For whatever reason (are opponents seduced by Dexter Williams’ long touchdowns runs?) another defense decided it had to shut down Notre Dame’s run game as its primary concern. Yet again, Ian Book carved up the secondary in response.
In his first start since missing the last game with injury, Book was strong at times but plenty rusty for his lofty standards. I thought there was a lack of sharpness that is usually present and it resulted in (gasp!) 14 incompletions. Book’s previous game-high for incompletions was 12 in his last outing versus Northwestern.
May I suggest the offense is throwing the ball a bit too much? I know Syracuse was asking for it at times but the offense is officially passing to open up the run on the whole with Book at quarterback. For example, Notre Dame passed on 22 of its first 34 plays from scrimmage against Syracuse. Book had 37 passing attempts without throwing a ball in the 3rd quarter!
RUSHING OFFENSE
Syracuse’s offense wasn’t doing much in this game and yet they were out-rushing Notre Dame for most of the afternoon. It wasn’t a great performance for the Irish following last week’s dominance over Florida State.
The touchdown runs from Dexter (32 yards) and Armstrong (9 yards) in addition to Wimbush’s late 35-yard scamper ultimately colored this performance in the stat book by the final whistle but it was a humbling afternoon for the most part. Outside of the 2 long runs above, the Irish ran for 110 yards on 30 carries.
Irish Running Success
Williams – 6 of 13 (46.1%)
Wimbush – 3 of 4 (75.0%)
Armstrong – 2 of 3 (66.6%)
Book – 1 of 4 (25.0%)
Finke – 1 of 2 (50.0%)
Jones – 1 of 6 (16.6%)
TOTAL – 14 of 32 (43.7%)
We’ll probably see this when the going gets tough as it should probably be Dexter Williams shouldering the majority of the load. Tony Jones got a lot of early work against Syracuse and it wasn’t very effective while Jafar Armstrong apparently isn’t quite healthy enough to get more carries.
The offense was an abysmal 3 of 7 on touchdowns in the red zone otherwise this game would’ve been a massive blowout. It seemed more like a bit of bad luck more than anything. There was a false start on one drive, a holding call on the next, and a third where Finke slipped right in front of the goal line before Book’s foot was stepped on leading to an interception.
On the final plays of these 4 non-touchdown drives in the red zone there were 7 passes and 7 rushes for 16 yards. Arguably, the offense just has to be a little sharper and execute a little more cleanly and they would’ve been fine.
PASSING DEFENSE
My goodness poor Syracuse. First off, let’s hope Eric Dungey is okay after leaving with what must have been a scary injury. It’s never a good sign when you can’t figure out what happened but the player is in a lot of obvious pain.
The Orange closed out this game with a pair of drives totaling 29 plays largely against backups. Before these drives, their offense had 39 passing yards. Thirty nine. Syracuse was not ready for Notre Dame’s defense.
In a bit of a Jedi mind trick–despite Syracuse averaging a healthy 216 rushing yards per game–Kelly mentioned post-game that Lea & Co. were intent on shutting down the Orange perimeter passing game. Yup, it worked!
Irish defense vs. Syracuse’s passing game
Syracuse allowed 6 sacks and had only 115 yards on 35 passing attempts. If you’re averaging 3.28 yards per attempt through the air you’re going to have a really rough time reviewing film with your coaching staff. In this light, Syracuse may have been lucky that Dungey left the game because he is not supposed to be a great passer and things could’ve gotten medieval ugly.
RUSHING DEFENSE
No doubt, Syracuse got theirs on the ground. The Irish left themselves a little vulnerable in run defense and it led to the Orange having success on 7 of their first 8 carries, plus a healthy 13 successful runs in the first half.
Even if Dungey would’ve struggled mightily through the air you have to wonder how the Syracuse run game would’ve responded if he remained in the game and used his wheels.
Orange Rushing Success
Neal – 9 of 18 (50.0%)
Strickland – 5 of 8 (62.5%)
Howard – 1 of 3 (33.3%)
Dungey – 2 of 2 (100.0%)
DeVito – 1 of 1 (100.0%)
TOTAL – 18 of 32 (56.2%)
The big thing for the Irish defense is despite allowing over 50% successful runs they were never really hurt badly on the ground. The longest carry for the Orange was merely 14 yards and the Irish tackled really well on the afternoon.
SPECIAL TEAMS
This was one of those games where someone could point to and say that special teams usually don’t matter. The Orange had the No. 1 special teams unit according to S&P and nobody cares.
Congratulations to Syracuse kicking a 28-yard field goal with a few seconds left. Their star kicker also missed from a laughable 23 yards while Yoon made all 3 of his field goals but missed one PAT.
TURNING POINT
Syracuse began the 2nd quarter with their 2nd interception of the game yet the game was still in doubt with under 6 minutes remaining in the half as the Irish held on to a strong but not completely dominant 13-0 lead.
Notre Dame had punted and then watched the Book interception on their previous 2 drives. Then on the following drive for Syracuse, quarterback Tommy DeVito connected on a 17-yard pass into Irish territory. Two plays later, safety Alohi Gilman made the play of the game on an insane interception.
On the very next snap, Jafar Armstrong ran in untouched on a slick play-call from Chip Long. The game was effectively over after this as the Syracuse offense showed no signs of being able to string together multiple touchdown drives.
3 STARS
1 S Alohi Gilman – 2 incredible interceptions and 8 tackles, plus the game ball from Brian Kelly.
2 DT Kurt Hinish – His most impactful game of his career with 1.5 sacks.
3 Chase Claypool – On the receiving end of 98 yards and 1 big touchdown.
FINAL NOTES
This was kind of close to being a 52-3 score line, and while the red zone problems were frustrating, this was still a major butt-whooping. Through 3 quarters, the Orange had 107 total yards.
Notre Dame being +3.1 in YPP differential is going to be lauded by the advanced stats. There isn’t much room for improvement for the Irish defense but it’s possible this game moves them up the national rankings a couple spots. Syracuse’s total yardage was their 3rd fewest of the Babers-era and their 3 point was the 2nd fewest since they were shutout by Clemson in 2016.
Don’t be seduced by a great performance suddenly making these Shamrock Series uniforms more digestible. Dressing up like a baseball team is not okay.
The college football season almost moves way too fast. We now have 2 or maybe 3(!) games remaining. This was only Ian Book’s 7th start of the season and what I would give to see 15 more games with him and this defense.
The season finale in Los Angeles looks even more appealing as an early start on the West Coast today saw USC fall to a lowly UCLA team. The Trojans have now lost to 4 unranked teams and won’t go to a bowl if the Irish win next weekend.
The Irish are 11-0 and were MILES better than the #12 ranked team in the country today, who never stood a chance. That is all.
!indeed
A very fruity title. I like this Babers guy. It seems like he tries to force the other team to play against his strengths vs trying to exploit his weaknesses. I liked his interview after the game too.
11-0, what more can you say, but Fire Kelly!!
What more can you say? How about Fire Jack too?! Were 11-0, fire everyone!!!
The comments from Babers I saw were very classy. Even his explanation of kicking the sad FG–you want points for your team, but he knew it was way over and no reason to keep trying on 4th downs and risk getting his or our guys hurt.
I said some mean things last night about him kicking those field goals at the end. In the light of day, though, that was absolutely the right thing for him to do for his team, particularly when the odds of winning the game with a touchdown on the drive were 0.0%.
But it was also right that he got boo’d like crazy for it.
I don’t think its so awful of him to want points for his team, but if you’re going to break the shutout, it seems like you should do it the honest way. Also seems better for your team morale. “Guys we’re either going to get in the end zone or die trying.” I think it sends a better message to your own guys. Do you really want to break the shutout on a technicality? Do you really want to destroy the no hitter that you have no chance of winning anyway via a bunt? And if hes so worried about injuring his guys, why did he drive down all that way? Why not just start kneeling it? YOU PLAY TO WIN THE GAMES. Hehe not sure how that fits in, but I was on a roll.
Would anyone even be talking about the field goal if their first drive got shut down at the 20-yard line and that ended up being the only points they scored all day? Scoring points is scoring points, there is no “honest way” to do it.
I think there is an honest way – if you’re down 21-0 with 5 minutes to go, you still have a chance, so if you kick a field goal there for the sake of scoring points, that’s kind of garbage. If you kick a field goal down 36 with under a minute to go, you have no chance, so kicking for the sake of scoring is fine.
At the end of the day, if you want to shut some out you don’t put them in the position to score. If they do, it’s on you.
Definitely. I mean from NDs perspective, if you want to preserve the shutout, preserve the shutout. If we wanted a shutout, we should have played better D that drive. And for me, I mean hey we kept them out of the end zone. Thats every bit as good as if the scoreboard read zero when time ran out.
But if you’re trying to prevent the shutout and you’re that close to the end zone, seems kind of cheap to me to kick it. I mean if were going to spoil the shut out, let’s do it by getting in the end zone. It’s right there anyway. Let’s have the 11 guys who’ve been battling all game claw those 7 points out (one of which would actually be scored by a kicker but I digress). Dont have some clean jersey guy with a one bar face mask do it.
Can we all agree that
1) Dino’s one of the good guys and he has his reasons (injuries, NCAA record)
2) Shutouts are for egos (except for 37-0)
Always rephrase.
A. I have no problem with Dino generally or how he handled his business Saturday.
B. Not concerned with 36-3 vs 36-0, but we need something to discuss when there’s essentially nothing to complain about. I guess we could complain about unis….
Unis were trash. But if we play like that all the time in trash uniforms, well, trash uniforms are fine by me.
The best thing I can say about the uniforms is that when the camera was really zoomed out, you couldn’t really see the pinstripes, and then they just looked like below average uniforms, rather than the pile of garbage that they actually were.
You know, I actually thought the unis looked pretty good, with two caveats. A. It is not ok fo impersonate any other team much less a baseball team. And B. No golden domes. If you put a metallic green or navy NY on our normal helmets, I think that may have been a look I could get behind. Two huge caveats but still.
If he’s worried about injuries, why not take a knee on the previous 3 plays? (note that I don’t really care that he kicked, but that’s a silly reason)
The play clock was off after the second down play. They could have let the time expire, but instead ran up to the line and threw incomplete to stop the clock in time to kick the field goal.
Dino didn’t want to be shut out. Which is a fine explanation. The worried about the players thing doesn’t wash when the last two plays were optional.
Thank you. The proffered explanation is so silly it cant be the real reason.
If we ruin the Michigan revenge tour and keep USC out of a bowl game in the same season we make the playoffs…man it can’t get much better than that (outside of a National Championship).
This defense is mean. I hope everybody can stay healthy into the postseason; they’re really feeding off each other right now. That was a fun game from the defense.
ESPN had a graphic to hype the OSU-UM game next week. It showed Michigan was 3-0 on their revenge tour. I guess we don’t count?
Because we didn’t play them last year, so it’s not a specific loss from last year they were trying to avenge. I guess we’d be added if we met in the playoffs.
Well they scored a touchdown at Notre Dame stadium for the first time since 2010, so in their minds it basically counts as a victory.
Also, Michigan has the better loss. You can’t argue with that.
I don’t understand why they’d hype that game. FOX is broadcasting it
They are doing Gameday from there still, I believe
Again, the question remains. Why are they doing Gameday from there? They passed over ND/Cuse which was inarguably the most intriguing game on the entire schedule in favor of UCF/Cincy because being on UCF’s campus would equate to a bigger population on the set. Wouldnt more people be in LA than in Columbus?
The college-football-related atmosphere in Columbus will be approximately a bajillion times more exciting than in LA this weekend. Angelenos aren’t going to roll out of bed at 4:30 in the morning for a 5-6 team.
They’ve done a fair number of non-ESPN/ABC games this year – OU/Texas, Bama-LSU, Michigan-ND, Wazzu-Oregon, Florida-Georgia.
They’d 100% have done OU @ WVU if it wasn’t a Friday game, but going to OSU-UM (another de facto elimination game, and determining who makes the B1G title game) makes sense. Far more people will watch that than our game, and second would probably be the Iron Bowl (also not on ESPN)
After 2016, I said on this here website that BK needed to win 20 regular season games over the next two years to make keeping him worth it. I thought there was approximately no chance of that (and, in retrospect, that was probably an unfair standard). But he did it anyways. I was wrong. Mea culpa.
The Yankees averaged 5.52 runs per game inside Yankee Stadium, so it’s pretty good to hold a football team to fewer.
This game felt like the maybe the most disappointing 33-point win possible (excluding an injury filled game).
But, 11-0. Would hope that ND can learn from last year’s mistakes made against USC and beat them by 50 this year.
It’s the number 12 team in the country. A disappointing 33 point win is when you are playing the Citadel.
SBNation called it something along the lines of “the most dominant 33-point loss in college football history”
The snaps on place kicks were a problem all game. Need to get that fixed.
This game was not as close as the score. I hope Dungey is OK but, I’m not surprised he didn’t finish the game. Most QB’s that face this defense are sore come Sunday.
I don’t think I noticed it at the time, and I don’t remember them showing a lot of replays of that rushing TD. But is that just a good old fashioned trap out of strong left I? In the gif the play is sort of already happening when it cuts to it, so it’s a bit hard to tell.
I believe it was.
This play really shows how Long upgrades our offense. We’ve run a similar play for years, but it was losing effectiveness. The 2 RB formation, putting Jafar close to the line, the fake pitch, and most importantly, the rapid exchange makes a lethal combination.
That fake pitch/quick hand off was SO perfectly timed. Ting a beauty
That play immediately reminded my of a play from Holtz’s book. Reggie Brooks, lined up as tailback, starts running left. The linebackers immediately flow to their right. But instead of pitching it to him, Mirer immediately hands it off to Bettis who runs just off the QB’s left hip and then behind the pursuing linebackers.
It looks like when the committee rankings show convenes Tuesday night and they show who is ranked 3rd and 4th, Herbie is going to have to come up with something new to say other than “Michigan is playing better than Notre Dame lately.”
They should focus on three one-loss conference champions vying for one spot or the underwhelming Big10. Plenty to work with, IMO.
But NOTRE DAME!! gets eyeballs to watch and people to argue, because more people hate us. No one really cares that much if you’re arguing “Michigan defense vs. Oklahoma with all the offense but no defense, who should get in?” But people will tune in to hear ND badmouthed and downplayed.
Last night was a big middle finger to that garbage.
I can’t wait to see how they spin the fact the impenetrable scUM defense gave up 20 points to a bad Indiana team. The same IU team that exploded for 24 against Rutgers.
“They’re talented enough to win against IU while staying fully focused on beating OSU next week”
I basically nailed it: “If the Wolverines seemed a little sluggish, who could really blame them? Next week is the kind of game Jim Harbaugh and Michigan have been pointing toward since he was hired in December 2014. Given that, Indiana was a mere nuisance, and the Wolverines played that way until finally pulling away in the third quarter.”
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/25306015/college-football-power-rankings-statement-wins-washington-state-ucf
So foreign but so fantastic to be on the other side of one of these late season top 15 beatdowns. I really would like to know the last time ND beat a top 15 by 3+ scores in November/postseason play. 93?
Slowly exorcising those demons from SoCal, Stanford. Oregon State, Ohio State, LSU, Bama….probably missing some.
Dang it, I guess 2010 Utah narrowly qualifies, but it doesn’t feel like it should.
Maybe I’ll change my criteria to top 12 to better fit my narrative. Moving targets always works for ESPN!
Jerry Tillery specifically needs to do some exorcising. I hope he remembers his last trip out there and separates JT Daniel’s soul from his body. Like whoa Jerry, we meant the exorcising thing figuratively and Daniel’s isn’t possessed anyway and Tillerys all, the power of Clark compels you!!!
It’s plausible. Clark does look like Voldemort, so mind control is in play.
Given last night’s win, I wanted to mention a scenario that’s been haunting me for a while. I am certain that, assuming we beat USC, we are in the playoffs. But, here’s my nightmare. Georgia beats Bama in the SEC Conference Championship game. Presumably, that drops Bama to No. 4 in the playoff bracket (I’m not arguing that is the correct choice, but we all know that Bama has to lose twice before it drops completely out of playoff contention). The other three teams currently in the top four would then each move up one spot, assuming none of them lose.
That leaves us playing Michigan in the first round of the playoffs. I hate this scenario. In college football, it always seems that it is really hard to beat a team twice in one year. I also think Michigan would have it over us in terms of intangibles (unlike most people, I think we are a vastly improved team from the one that played Michigan earlier and so I don’t believe Michigan has become a better team than us – I suspect we’d have killed Indiana, who played Michigan tough yesterday). Additionally, even if we were to beat Michigan in the first round, it doesn’t give us as much of a marquee victory as would playing Clemson (against whom I believe we’d have an edge in terms of intangibles).
If Georgia beats Bama, Georgia will, at a minimum, be the 3 seed and play us assuming we beat USC and Clemson wins out. We probably played our way out of the possibility of Georgia jumping us yesterday, but I’m not 100% sure of that and it might require us to pretty soundly beat USC. But, in either case, it wouldn’t really matter as we’d play Georgia regardless of who was the 2 or 3 seeds in that scenario.
The likeliest scenario where we play Michigan is if Clemson loses, not Alabama. If Clemson loses to South Carolina but wins the ACC, the likely playoff rankings would be Bama/ND/Mich/Clem OR Oklahoma, assuming Michigan wins out.
This. If UGA upsets Bama they are in and leapfrog UM, no doubt. It’d be 1. Clemson 2/3 ND and UGA in some order (could see them putting UGA above us, but literally matters only for home/away jersey selections and who gets to play the disrespect card) and 4. Bama. UM would have an argument for the 4th spot for sure but either way, that upset along wouldn’t result in a semifinal against Harbaugh & Co.
I think, but am not sure, that Michigan would get in in that scenario. Likely would depend on how closely/controversially Bama lost as well as how badly Michigan beat Ohio State and Northwestern. However, all structural factors point to Michigan getting in over Bama, both in terms of formally enumerated factors (Michigan would have a conference championship, one of the four things to look at for close teams, whereas Bama would have none of those) and unenumerated factors (the Committee won’t have a playoff with teams from only two conferences if they can reasonably avoid it).
Should we start getting preemptively picked that Michigan is getting more credit for beating a crappy OSU team than we are for destroying a good Syracuse team? I think so. Ramping up anger to warp 5… ENGAGE.
Any time you win a playoff game, it’s a marquee victory, plain and simple.
Confidence raises performance and consistency… I was struck by how Richmond’s finest Jalen Elliott appeared to break with confidence on his interception. This single play captured how the entire team appears to be playing. Most of them appear to be confident in that they move/respond before they think. Even when their actions are errant, they keep their heads up and move on to the next play. I credit both the coaches but also the player leadership/chemistry for this. The 2012 team had a lot of this confidence as well. With this team’s talent and scheme, the ceiling for what they could achieve is exciting.
USC is a wounded animal. If SC gets a sense of confidence combined with their rumored talent, they become much more dangerous.
Are the St. Brown brothers overrated? More specifically, are they immensely talented but lacking in intangibles? I am impressed how Miles Boykin and Chase Claypool make big plays on tough balls, yet EQ appeared to be a more talented (speed) player on the surface. Maybe this question is better for next week. It will be interesting to see how A-R fares against this secondary.
I don’t think you can get too much information about a wideout being overrated as a true freshman. Most WRs take at least a year to develop; off the top of my head I can only think of two in the country that have done a lot this year (Rondale Moore on Purdue and Justin Ross on Clemson). Remember that Will Fuller did basically nothing as a true freshman and then exploded the next year.
Amon-Ra was probably the best position player at the Army All-American Bowl last year, and he’s getting live snaps ahead of other, older five- and high-four stars at USC. So I suspect he’ll end up pretty good. I wouldn’t get too cocky about it if he doesn’t have a good game Saturday.
Amon-Ra is a true freshman and has 656 yds, Boykin has 730.
EQ and Boykin were in the same class and when both were catching passes from Wimbush, neither was very impressive. But EQ was never particularly challenged by Boykin. I think it’s fair to say that both of these St. Browns are/will be better than Boykin.
Yeah, bringing stats into this is smart. Amon-Ra is basically putting up Michael Floyd freshman year stats (fewer TDs, slightly more catches, probably will end up with similar yardage), and that’s with a true freshman starting QB. I suspect he’ll be pretty dang good next year, much less two years from now.
How much of that is from the QB and WR playing together in high school for a few years? I would think that would have some impact, if only marginal.
A little bit tangential to the discussions, but having come a long way for my second SS game in Yankee Stadium, some thoughts:
1, I found the crowd and the experience to be pretty good. The video board has helped, and the noise level was OK.
2, I guess there is some value in once every two or three years to do one of these, at least in an environment where there is a significant ND fan base. Obviously the northeast is one. The crowd seemed to really enjoy seeing the Irish come to town.
3, Yes, winning helps — but the whole subway alumni tradition started with us winning in the East — Jess Harper and then the Rock.
4. And Yankee Stadium does hold a historical role there. Wish the Polo Grounds were still around!
Got to get more of us into the Coliseum Saturday!!
Can/will you bring me to the game with you? I’m much closer to LAX than CDG is.
Actually looks like I cannot get there — hoisting the ND Alumni Club in Paris for a delayed Thanksgiving Day dinner. But getting my son Raymond (class of 2014) to go, as he is in LA this year. If that is a go, I will know tonight, and could work your ticket in with Ray and his wife Lucile (being French, this would be her first American football game ever, hopefully a good way to start!)
Hmm…I’m fully assuming you’re sending me a 1st class ticket (MLI-LAX) with game ticket as well. Is this accurate?
Quad Cities… hmmm, I thought you were actually in LA. Since a storied legendary, not for minor children event with my ND roommate from that part of Iowa, I made a sincere promise never to have anything to do with that part of the country again. Guess we’ll each have to be present in spirit — of which I am sure you have bunches!
You’ll never have the pleasure of buying a car from Johnny Lujack then.
Random collection of thoughts:
– Game could have (probably should have) been 28-0 by end of the first quarter.
– I don’t know if the game plays out the same with Dungey in there. probably a tight game for a while ND kicking field goals, if SU gets a TD or two. At least, I wanted them to beat Syracuse with him playing. But am glad the D dominated so completely, so the “they always play down” narrative can go away.
– I really like both Dexter and Jafar on the field at the same time, especially with Dexter being dangerous catching out of the backfield.
– Mack running free on big catches downfield is so nice. Claypool too! More please.
– The 4th down interception where Book tripped was probably going to be a TD, it looked like they wanted to throw outside the Kmet (I think??) after he got off his block, and he was so alone.
– Not a fan of the offense not running down the clock toward the end of the first half. This week and last they gave the ball back to FSU and SU with at least 3+ mins left when it could have been near a minute, and let them run dangerous drives to the break. When your up big already, and the other team gets the ball to start the second half, its seems needlessly dangerous to not just kill the clock some as you try some things, that if they go well, maybe you get some points. idk.
-Really liked that the team seemed very focused. Hope it continues.
-Mike MacIntyre fired today at Colorado. I feel like he gets at least a cup of coffee with ND if they let Kelly go two years ago. SO glad ND stuck with Kelly.
– Josh Adams making some noise for the Eagles. Glad for him that he’s making good on his chance.
I feel like it hasn’t been mentioned yet, but I love the pass to Tony Jones that converted a third down on the first touchdown drive. First of all, it was great that we got the first down, but really is was awesome realizing that we basically ran a screen pass, but with the back catching it 8 yards downfield and having a bunch of receivers ready to block for him.
I think our wideouts like to block… – https://twitter.com/ChaseClaypool/status/1064283285159899137
F-ing loved that play, both design and e CD execution.
I absolutely loved the Jafar TD run, but I lost my mind at this play. The timing on the blocking was perfect; even a half second earlier and you get pass interference. It was so beautiful, I had to rewind and watch it like 4 times.