Like a grizzly bear on a moose carcass, the first game of the 2022 Notre Dame football season was a study in contrast.* At times the Irish played like a team ready to compete with the best in college football and at other times they looked outmatched. The first offensive play for Notre Dame was [...]
After a long hiatus, it’s time for a little film analysis from the great white north. I apologize for being away, I’ve been locked in a secret hideaway, in the farthest reaches of the Canadian wilderness, simultaneously working on a project to train grizzly bears, moose and muskrats to play football and working with NBC [...]
Well, it certainly is an exciting time to be a Notre Dame fan. After an undefeated season, the Irish have earned the right to play in the national semi-final. In the build-up to the game, much has been made of the matchup between Notre Dame’s offense and Clemson’s defense. Clemson will be the best defense [...]
I was wrong. Before the season started, I predicted the offense would struggle. I reasoned that losing your best receiver, best tight end, best running back, two first round picks on the offensive line and returning a QB that was pulled in his last start was not a recipe for success. The first three games [...]
Let’s say you didn’t know the outcome of the 2018 Notre Dame - Navy game and I shared the following stats with you: Team A 28 first downs Team B 14 first downs Team A 56% conversion rate on 3rd and 4th down Team B 27% conversion rate on 3rd and 4th down Team A held [...]
So far, 2018 has been a bit of roller coaster ride for the Notre Dame offense. At times, they’ve looked very good and at other times, they’ve looked dreadful. Typically, when the offense isn’t producing, there is a lot of scrutiny placed on the quarterback. This has certainly been the case for Brandon Wimbush in [...]
It’s been a while since I’ve stepped into the 18 Stripes film room. I apologize for my absence over the last year; I’ve been sequestered in a top secret facility, deep in the Canadian backcountry, training grizzly and black bears to be defensive linemen. Although, I’m not at liberty to share much in the way [...]
Chip Long came in talking about running the ball. But I was skeptical. After years of listening to Brian Kelly talk about emphasizing the run game and then seeing him abandon the run at the first sign of an extra defender approaching the line of scrimmage, I’ve learned to ignore the rhetoric and see what [...]
Remember in 2015 when Notre Dame played a scrappy Wake Forest team? At the time I didn’t pay much attention to the Demon Deacon defense. Of course now that Mike Elko is Notre Dame’s defensive coordinator that 2015 match up becomes more intriguing. In this edition of Iso Cam, we’ll take a look at the [...]
As I mentioned last week, I spent a portion of my holidays charting 111 Wake Forest defensive plays from 2016 games against Clemson, FSU and Temple. In the previous post we looked at the base alignment incoming Notre Dame defensive coordinator Mike Elko uses (link here). This time we are going to take a look [...]
Over the holiday season, I took on a little project. I decided I would take a look at the scheme incoming Notre Dame defensive coordinator Mike Elko employs. I charted 111 defensive plays from games against Clemson, FSU and Temple. Through this I was able to get a good sense of how Elko coordinates a [...]
DeShone Kizer has been a bit of an enigma this year. At times, he has looked like a sure fire first round NFL draft pick, big, strong, athletic, confident, decisive, accurate. Other times he has been inconsistent, indecisive and struggled with accuracy. The ups and downs in his play are due to a variety of [...]
For large portions of the year the offensive play calling for Notre Dame has been inconsistent and at times downright puzzling. It’s difficult to pick out a unifying concept or a core philosophy in the way that the Irish call plays. In fact, one could almost envision the Notre Dame play calling process to be [...]
After the first four games of the 2016 football season, the Notre Dame defense could rightfully be described as a raging tire fire. As a result of the horrific performance of the defense, Brian Kelly decided to make a change and fired defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder. After watching the defense play against Syracuse, I’m comfortable upgrading their [...]
I have to admit, I’m actually not a huge proponent of the “Brian VanGorder’s scheme is too complicated” theory to explain the struggles of the Notre Dame defense. In fact, my plan for this post was to look at fundamentals and pay very little attention to scheme. However, as I re-watched the game, by the [...]
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