Notre Dame couldn’t establish an efficiency advantage for the first time since Ian Book took over the offense, but countered with a Dexter Williams-led win in explosiveness. The Irish also continued their excellence limiting scoring opportunities to create a big advantage in points per scoring chance, with some thanks due to Justin Fuente and his affinity for field goal attempts. 

Basics

The high-level box score was almost dead-even, although it took the Hokies nearly 20 more plays to approach Notre Dame’s total yardage. Despite allowing more scoring opportunities to Virginia Tech, Justin Fuente settled for five field goal attempts and a defensive touchdown was a game-changing play. Technically this game went in and out of garbage time (up 21+ in the 4th quarter) late, but for our purposes it began with Julian Love’s late interception. As a result only 4.7% of plays were thrown out – hardly changing much, but let’s take a second to appreciate the absurdity of garbage time at VT and versus Stanford while not having any against Vanderbilt and Ball State.

Efficiency

At halftime, I found myself just hoping for an escape from Lane Stadium. It had initially appeared Notre Dame had advantages on both sides of the football – going up to a quick 10-0 lead on a suspect pass defense, and with the top-5 defense ready to quiet the crowd. Then, suddenly, a semi-disastrous series of events took place that seemed to set things up put a stroke-inducing second half.

My biggest fears for the game involved turnovers, special teams, penalties, and the offense bogging down facing a stout run defense and with Ian Book due for some regression. Then in the second quarter, all of those boxes were checked with 15 minutes:

  1. A botched snap to Tyler Newsome resulted in a loss of yards on 4th down (essentially a turnover)
  2. Book’s accuracy (particularly attempting some deep balls) led to inefficiency (a 21% pass play success rate in the 2nd quarter)
  3. A bad read on an RPO led to Book throwing a gift interception directly to Virginia Tech’s Reggie Floyd
  4. With just 1:08 remaining, the defense let up a 75-yard touchdown drive in under a minute to the Hokies, including Julian Okwara ejected for targeting

Yes, it was Murphy’s Law bingo, and the halftime lead felt a little tenuous. Then the Irish averaged 10 yards per play before garbage time in the second half to the Hokie’s 5.6. It was a strong display of mental toughness, execution, and coaching adjustments (for a second consecutive week, dominating a quality opponent after halftime).

While the Notre Dame offense didn’t put up another insanely efficient performance, it was again a balanced effort against a disruptive Bud Foster defense. Both the running and passing games ran hot and cold at times, but ended the day averaging over 7 yards per pass (7.03, including sacks) and per rush (7.79). The Irish offense was terrific on 3rd down, including converting on 6 of 11 3rd down passing downs (3rd and 5+).

The defensive effort (5.27 YPP) was the second worst by yards per play so far in this young season (Vanderbilt tallied 5.91 YPP), but continued its excellence in the critical areas of the field. That “down” effort of 5.27 YPP is also better than the defensive average of every team left on the schedule with the exception of FSU (4.91), for context of the extremely high bar this group has set for itself. The defense bent a decent amount on standard downs, including giving up a 53% success rate against VT runs in the first half, bu capitalized on passing downs when the Hokies were behind schedule.

Explosiveness

Before garbage time the Irish outgained Virginia Tech on the road by +2.06 yards, making up for an almost dead heat in efficiency with added explosiveness. The Dexter Williams 97 yarder was the easy highlight, but the first Boykin touchdown off Ian Book’s scramble was a sneaky-long 40 yarder to add to the early 56 yard Finke grab.

We’ve now seen the new edition of the Book-led offense succeed utilizing two different styles, which is pretty encouraging. The Wake Forest and Stanford games were hyper-efficient offensively, with some solid chunk plays sprinkled in. This performance was fairly averaged from a success rate standpoint, but with devastating explosiveness in a few key plays that changed the game.

I’m excited by the complementary nature of the Dexter-Book combination. Book in Chip Long’s offense is going to be more of a high-efficiency QB, and thus far has brought plus-plus accuracy to the table on short and intermediate throws. That’s a strong foundation, as enough successful plays and eventually a blown coverage or busted tackle leads to big gains where maybe they weren’t anticipated. Add Williams to the rushing attack and now you have a high-explosiveness option with the threat of a long TD or two a game.

It’s a small sample size over the past two seasons, but basically one of every ten Williams carries has gone for 30 yards or more. The chart above, showing each of Dexter’s carries in sequence, is a fun little seismograph. There are lulls (but never for too long), tremors, earthquakes, and then occasionally some aftershocks as well. He’s been often characterized as a “boom or bust” type of back, but his efficiency has been very good as well in this stretch, with very few run stuffs or negative carries.

The defense once again played a nice bend but don’t break, a mode which they’ve toggled between when not on the “total QB annihilation” setting. Justin Fuente is a strong offensive mind, and effectively targeting the weak points of the Irish defense early, challenging ND linebackers to defend backs in the pass game and effectively utilizing play action. The run defense was a little less stout than we’ve come to expect, but still stuffed a quarter of VT runs for no gain or less.

Finishing Drives, Field Position, & Turnovers

Essential to the win was strong work by both the offense and defense in scoring opportunities. Between holding the Hokies to field goal attempts in key situations (including a 1st and goal from the ND 1) and converting five of six scoring opportunities into touchdowns, the Irish ensured that their explosiveness edge wasn’t wasted. Halfway through the regular season the Notre Dame defense checks in at #8 nationally in allowing just 3.33 points per opponent trip inside the 40.

Notre Dame managed to salvage a draw in average starting field position, but was beat up in that area until late in the game, when the VT onside kick and Julian Love pick evened things out. The Hokies continued to allow absolutely nothing in the return game, as they had for most of the season. It was a shakier day for the ND punt team between the botched snap / aborted Newsome punt and a 20-yard return allowed on one where the senior captain out-kicked his coverage a bit. Props to Jonathan Doerer and the kickoff team for much improved execution with the whole “kick it high (in bounds) and pretty deep then tackle” thing.

After winning the turnover battle 2-1, Notre Dame’s +5 margin sits as a top-15 mark nationally. It hasn’t been fluky either – the “expected” turnover margin for the Irish (based on fumble recoveries being 50/50 over the long haul, and a baseline ratio of pass breakups to interceptions) is +5.4, 6th in FBS.

Much of this credit goes to the defense, but the offense also continues to largely make good decisions and execute well. The interception was the only Ian Book pass a Hokie defender got their hands on – zero other pass deflections in the game for a defense that would like to be disruptive. Notre Dame has also fumbled just four times in six games, tied for 10th nationally, with just one of those recovered by an opponent (the Michael Young fumble at Wake).