Notre Dame averaged ten yards per play and held New Mexico to a 9.5% passing success rate in an explosive home opener. Yet there were some lingering red flags that will need to be cleaned up to have a shot at an upset in Athens. Breaking down the blowout of the Lobos and highlighting some [...]
SP+ predicted a 35-16 Notre Dame win at Louisville. The spread in Vegas was 18 points in many places. But the Irish win to open 2019 didn’t feel particularly fun, did it? Breaking down reasons to be encouraged, concerned, and confused using advanced stats from the season opener. Something not clear? Check out this handy [...]
What do projection systems like SP+ (newly re-named!) and FEI see for Notre Dame in 2019? A much more difficult schedule, an improving offense, and a defense that will hope its strength in the passing game helps it continue to be a top-10 unit. Transparently, this was intended to be a multi-part series, but hey, [...]
Unless you've been living under an internet-less rock, a terrific preseason tradition is the annual preseason ranking of Notre Dame's top 25 players at Inside the Irish. Once again our 18 Stripes crew was invited to participate, and as in past years we submitted a group ballot, using some "wisdom of the crowd" or whatever [...]
Clemson just won the title with one of the more dominant seasons in recent memory. Nick Saban and Alabama have owned much of the decade, and been a part of every single College Football Playoff to date. Trevor Lawrence has two more seasons before he's draft eligible, Tua Tagovailoa one more. It got us thinking [...]
They've been great on paper, but they haven't faced a top-10 opponent like this in 2018. That statement applies to both the Clemson offense and Notre Dame defense, as both will raise the difficult setting considerably in the Cotton Bowl. Why Clemson's efficiency is underrated and will test Clark Lea's "bend but don't break" defense, [...]
Wrapping up the advanced stats from Notre Dame's regular season with an eye toward Clemson - how can the Irish move the ball on the nation's top defense? The numbers provide strong evidence that it's time for Ian Book to really air it out. Irish Run Offense vs. Clemson Run Defense Running into an orange [...]
Notre Dame entered the final game of the 2018 season having allowed an opponent to go over an average (40%) success rate just once, against Michigan. The Trojans put up a 50% efficiency mark, besting the Irish by 12%. How did Notre Dame overcome this disadvantage, and what areas still need to be cleaned up [...]
In a game where the Irish needed to lean on the run, Dexter Williams and the offensive line came through with a season-high 8.14 yards per carry (excluding garbage time) against a solid FSU front. The Noles entered the game ranked 33rd in Rushing Defense S&P+, including the 26th best run stuff rate. But the [...]
This morning Irish Sports Daily broke the news that Ian Book will not play Saturday against Florida State. Brian Kelly will address the injury at his press conference today and likely provide additional details, but according to the ISD report Book "suffered multiple injuries to his midsection" in the Northwestern game, and a timetable for his [...]
The advanced stats show that Notre Dame dominated Northwestern in most key phases of the game, yet special teams miscues, turnovers, and penalties let the Wildcats get within a score late in the 4th quarter. The Irish should walk away confident about a strong effort against a solid opponent, but maybe a bit concerned about [...]
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 [...]
Notre Dame put up some insane numbers in the win over the Cardinal. Instead of the usual categories, it seemed like a great occasion to count down some of the best numbers from the Irish defense smothering Bryce Love and JJ Arcega-Whiteside, the extremely efficient Book-Boykin connection, and an insane amount of havoc. When you [...]
For the first time this season, Notre Dame dominated an opponent in virtually every category of advanced stats. The Irish were perfect in the red zone leaning on a spread run game, and had the 3rd highest efficiency advantage of any P5 vs P5 game last week. Before garbage time Notre Dame out-gained Wake Forest [...]
S&P+ gave Vanderbilt a 56% post-game win probability based on an advantage in yards per play, more scoring opportunities, and perceived poor turnover luck. An efficiency edge and slightly better performance converting scoring opportunities (even though it was ugly) saved Notre Dame is this one. Confused? Check out this advanced stats glossary. Efficiency Vanderbilt’s defense is [...]
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