A very wise man once said, “You can either run from your past, or learn from it.”
Alright, fine. It was Rafiki in The Lion King. But it still applies to Notre Dame, and the Irish performed far better in week two than in week one, downing Nevada 39-10. It remains to be seen whether ND actually learned enough from the week-one loss – that will be seen next week – but at least the Irish looked the part of a very good team in the second and third quarters of today’s win.
WatchND highlights:
Kizer continues to be good
To say the Irish ran a vanilla offense today would be an understatement. DeShone Kizer wasn’t asked to do a heck of a lot, and he didn’t need to. But what he did do was good. He threw just three incompletions and was on the money on almost every throw, with the glaring exception of the interception he threw, a pass that could’ve been an easy touchdown to Kevin Stepherson if Kizer hadn’t lofted it far too much.
However, Kizer bounced back from that and did what he does otherwise: Look the part of a pro quarterback. He moved the sticks when needed with un-sexy but very effective third down dump-off throws, and ran well enough. He was, as always, in total command.
And hey, we even got to see Malik Zaire. And he played pretty well too. Nice to see for him after last week’s cruddy showing, and hopefully it’ll keep him fired up in case he is needed later in the season.
The defense played better, but: Another injury
It’s more or less impossible to take much from the way ND’s defense performed against Nevada, but after last week’s abomination, the fact that ND was shutting out anyone well into the second half was nice to see. Nevada averaged only 3.3 yards per rushing attempt, a major improvement. Anecdotally, there were far fewer horrendous missed tackles. Nevada did post 300 yards, but a good chunk of it came in garbage time.
Of course, this being ND, it couldn’t be that simple. The Irish lost Shaun Crawford for the season – again – with a torn Achilles sustained while breaking up a pass (originally ruled a fumble). Crawford was supposed to play a lot last year before blowing out his knee. This really sucks for a kid who is clearly well-liked by his teammates based on the way they swarmed him after he came off the field. This means a lot more of Nick Coleman, who clearly needs to improve to get to the level he needs to be.
Let’s fix those penalties
ND’s final penalty total – nine for 94 yards – wasn’t that excessive, but man, that first half was ugly. It seemed like every time the Irish did something good, a flag came out. A couple of them were really dumb penalties, like the roughing-the-passer that wiped out an interception.
Twice ND was whistled for offensive pass interference on pick plays. Both calls were correct, but given that Pitt got away with a crazy-blatant OPI for a TD earlier Saturday against Penn State, and given our history with this call, I’m starting to wonder if that page of the rule book is just ripped out for every game that doesn’t involve us.
Bitter sarcasm aside, nine penalties won’t cut it against teams the Irish can’t just out-talent.
Video of the week
I liked the idea of finishing last week’s sad wrap-up with a good play. I’m going to keep that up with the good reviews as well. For this week’s video, I’m picking this awesome catch-and-run by Equanimeous St. Brown in the first quarter. (Probably would’ve gone with Jarron Jones’ pick, but there’s no video of that yet.) It’s been really fun to watch this guy through two weeks. He’ll need to be even better next week.
That Jarron Jones pick was great. All that experience dropping into coverage paid off.
Good write up, but I believe the interception was intended for Stepherson. That’s right all you nitpickers, you’ve got competition.
Edited that – thanks!
Good review. Agreed on every point.
I was really excited to see them scripting plays for CJ Sanders. We’ve got to get the ball in his hands. I can’t remember an ND player as elusive.
St Brown posted another really good game. He’s going to be quite a weapon. My only qualm is that I’d like to see him attack the ball more while it’s in the air. I like his routes, and he’s good with running after the catch. But he seems like he wants no part of contested balls, and looks like a deer in headlights until the ball is in his hands. Anyone else see that, or is it just me?
Finke looks like the ghost of Robby Toma.
Onwualu had himself a game. Jarron Jones’s interception was fantastic and surprisingly athletic. He high pointed the ball like a receiver.
The DB situation is frightening. I cringe thinking of these guys trying to cover Juju Simon&Schuster later this year.
Onwualu was very good. I also thought Coney over Martini was a big, big upgrade. Morgan, while very good, wasn’t as much as notable standout today as last he was week, but that may be a good thing if he has more support from his fellow LB’s.
I noticed Coney a lot, doing good things. Much better than Martini, at least vs Nevada.
Wasn’t Rafiki the baboon? Great write up. I’m far from confident on about the defense, but it was nice to see some good play on both sides of the ball for a change.
RAFIKI IS A MANDRILL, COME ON PEOPLE
Was at the game. Wow, that first half took almost two hours. Crazy ridiculous. Not sure if it was all the flags or if NBC is trying to recoup the beating they took on the olympics in one crazy orgy of advertising.
Finke played a lot…did a good job. But, man, he is tiny. Really noticeable when you see him from the stands.
The game left me nervous about both our lines. Next week is going to be a real tester.
Thoughts:
–Gotta learn how to run a **** pick play on the crossing routes. Long been a problem, and the sad part is the receiver doesn’t even need the interference for the most part.
–ESB is the next one. Stud.
–Crawford loss is gutting. Couldn’t help but notice when he was on the bench that Folston and Zaire (fellow long-term injury guys last year) were two of the closest to comfort him. Sucks so bad.
–Josh Adams is the best running back on this team.
–Nice bounce-back for the defense. Helped the Nevada QB was not very accurate, but hey, gotta play who you’re lined up against.
–The more touches for Sanders, the better. Not exactly a controversial opinion but worth pointing out. Get this kid the ball in his hands and good things will happen.
–Nice hands by Jarron Jones. Hopefully that boosts confidence for him and the coaches and he can play more, and make a difference. 2nd time in as many games as he’s made a big difference.
–0 receptions today for tight ends. (And, only 1 last week for Smythe). With Hunter out, so much for looking to TE’s for anything. Kizer’s good enough to look downfield but, man, what a departure not to have any kind of TE option around. Gotta think it would be different with Aliz’e. But for this year, yikes.
So. Part I of the “These 5 Players Can’t Get Hurt” curse you implemented has come to fruition. Thanks Eric!
So, Part I of the “These 5 Players Can’t Get Hurt” curse has come to fruition. Thanks Eric!
What is the update on Watkins??? Wasn’t he supposed to be coming back by Oct? Whenever it is it wont be a moment too soon.
This might be in the longer summary piece on the game but what freshmen played in the secondary? Was it me or with the injuries, have did a few more freshmen get a chance – which I take to mean they might be playing a lot more this year than was expected? Perhaps we could revisit the % chance of red-shirting this year and see where we stand after 2 weeks. I bet there would be some big differences now.
And did anyone else roll their eyes when on the first snap for Daelin Hayes – pass rushing specialist hopefully – he dropped back into coverage?
Many many college and pro teams drop Dlinemen into coverage occasionally . Bama was doing it vs USC, for instance.
Yes, we all know what a zone blitz with a lineman dropping is. BVG’s (almost) never work, though props for Jarron’s interception this week.
So why do some of you act like only ND does it and that its always stupid?
It doesn’t really play to Daelin Hayes’ skillset to drop him into coverage, he’s in there to rush the passer. I don’t really think it’s the end of the world to occasionally drop a d-lineman into coverage, and ND certainly isn’t the only team to do it…But it is a little curious that they didn’t rush him on one of the few snaps he got in the game.
Because hyperbole is fun.
Because dropping a freshman DE in his 2nd game ever probably isn’t the best application of it.
Because it very very rarely seems to work out for us.
Because last year, when this became a regular criticism, it was because our less athletic DL guys like Cage were the ones dropping back, as opposed to our more athletic guys like Okwara.
Because frequently it seems that when we drop a DLineman back into coverage, he vacates a hole that the opposing RB scoots right through.
Trumbetti dropped in coverage on 3 straight plays. I was incredibly confused, but then I remembered he doesn’t do anything when he rushes the passer either. Maybe BvG just enjoys messing with him.
I don’t think that play was designed to have Jarron drop back into coverage. I think he just read the play really well and did what he was taught to do when he reads screen.
One more thing: it may never get to this if Crawford can eventually get a chance to play and lives up to his billing next year and the year after, but I suppose this would be a textbook case of being able to receive a 6th year of eligibility, no? I thought losing 2 years to injury is usually when they allow for a 6th year.
Not usually…only. A 6th year requires to full years of injury.
Yay for no edit button! To=Two
It’s early enough in the season to count this as a full season medical redshirt for him. Last year can count as well. So he would have a sixth year available.
Yup, i think the season ending injury can actually happen as late as the 3rd game, but i’m not 100% on that.
Is there not some rule that would preclude him from taking the redshirt because the injury happened too early? If I recall correctly, Jones played at DT in the bowl game last year because his injury (which happened before the first snap of the season) was ineligible for an injury RS.
He’d already taken a non-medical red shirt his freshman year, so he wasn’t eligible for another red shirt. If he’d been injured his freshman year, then that would be a different story. Or at least this is my understanding of how it works. I believe Smythe was in the same boat. Neither would have been eligible for sixth years.
Yep. We revisit this about four or five times a year, so I’ll lay it all out here…
To be eligible for a sixth year, a player has to have lost two full seasons to injury. It’s important to file the paperwork for a medical redshirt at the time, since retroactive medical redshirts are extremely rare – Jamoris Slaughter missed his freshman year with a torn ACL he suffered in a high school all star game but couldn’t get a retroactive medical redshirt on appeal. Thanks, Chuck.
Anyway… To count as a “full season lost” for medical redshirt purposes, the injury must have occurred in the first half of the season and the player must have competed in no more than 30% of the team’s games, or three games, whichever is fewer. Jarrett Grace got hurt in game 6 in 2013, which would’ve fit the rule, but he also appeared in all six games to that point, which is why that couldn’t count as a medical year for him.
So I had a first date with a gal, and accidentally agreed for us to meet at 3 p.m. mountain time – oops. I considered tanking to get an early exit, but it’s not like it was MSU week. Good time to get that early-season error out of the way.
Judging by the highlights though, it looks like C.J. Sanders is fully earning his favorite player status. And Kizer’s 156 yards was underwhelming, but it still looks like he pulled off some pretty nice throws.
Most of my thoughts have already been voiced by y’all–good to get a win, nice bounce-back, DB situation is scary, Kizer is good, etc…
Returning to the subject that dominated the aftermath of the Texas game, I am still concerned about the defense. Nevada’s QB was really bad most of the game, and I’m worried that that hid flaws that will come back to hurt the team in upcoming games against better teams. I’d like it if BVG really does turn things around and ND manages a top-30 defense, though I’m not sanguine on that point. My worry is that he’ll continue to coach the defense to mediocrity, but won’t be quite bad enough to get forced out.
Was at a wedding for most of the game yesterday (sad!) but watching now. I’m watching Nick Coleman post-injury. Not great, Bob!
We are in trouble against passing teams (take Syracuse and the points). Nick Watkins cannot get healthy soon enough. Thankfully/hopefully, MSU and Stanford may not have 3-wideout sets good enough to really spread us out as their teams aren’t built around that.
Also, I’m just starting the 4th quarter so maybe things change, but it doesn’t look like we’ve played nickel since the Crawford injury. Reminds me of last year, and not in a good way.
I’m feeling bad for Crawford. Really too bad.
I agree that Onwaulu had a nice game. I noticed he and Rochell had 6 and 7.5 tackles for loss last season. I believe they both already have 3 through two games. Senior-year jump?
I haven’t been too impressed with O’Connor. Hopefully the DBs can keep him in check next week.
Who did the play-by-play announcing last year? Mike Tirico is a serious upgrade, he even picks up a lot of Flutie’s slack.
Agreed, but Tirico is only temporary, then it’s back to Dan Hicks.
He’s doing play by play on Notre Dame’s first three NBC games of the season because Dan Hicks is covering golf’s Fed-Ex Cup playoffs.
Why won’t NBC have Flutie cover something else for a few games? Or all of them?
Because, you see, if they have a color guy or studio analyst who went to a school that doesn’t hate ND, you see, then they’d be overly homer, so they have to keep getting guys from BC (Mayock, Flutie) or USC (Haden) or Michigan (Dhani Jones now) or Miami (Jonathan Vilma last year)…yo
(Mayock and Vilma were good enough that it didn’t matter, and Jones I haven’t seen enough to judge. The rest? Pure torture. Just wait until they hire Matt Leinart away from Fox)
Speaking of pretty boy QB’s, Brady Quinn does regular hits on the radio here in DC and he sounds really good. Very polished, nice insight, articulate, the whole 9. That might be a little too homer-ish even for NBC’s standards but I could see him in a booth for someone soon if he chooses to pursue broadcasting as a career.
Quinn broadcasts games for Fox. He did the BYU/Arizona game in week 1 and the Texas Tech/ASU game this week.
And I agree, he is really, really good. If he were interested he’d be a slam dunk for NBC, but he might like doing 13-14 games a year and not just 7.
I just saw this and the below. Figures he already has a gig, he’s good at it.
I would love to see more of Vilma. Thought he was great last year. I’d give him a 2 game spin with Tirico in the booth, knowing that Mikey T could cover up for any rookie mistakes.
Jones has potential, but he gets like 5 lines at half-time, so doesn’t make a huge difference if he is great or garbage.
It would be great to get an ND guy in the booth and we actually have a pretty good number kicking around in analyst rolls in media. Unfortunately, Darius Walker and BQ are both with Fox, and Aaron Taylor is with CBS. Why the heck hasn’t NBC hired Jack Collinsworth yet?
I bet it won’t be temporary. They are paying Tirico a lot of money to not do anything this football season, and Dan Hicks is a complete nothing in the booth.
I thought I read somewhere – probably here – that Tirico is just doing NBC temporarily for ND (with Hicks doing something else) and his full-time gig will be the NFL games on NBC. I don’t follow the NFL all that much, but I got the sense that some prime-time slot that he did before switched to NBC this year and that he would do it because the NFL wanted him to do it basically got him hired at NBC from ESPN for that slot alone.
apparently what I read was wrong – unless there is even newer info: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/al-michaels-not-mike-tirico-calling-thursday-nfl-games-article-1.2759020
I read it here as well at some point, but NBC confirms that Tirico is only in the booth for the first three home games:
http://irish.nbcsports.com/2016/09/10/where-to-watch-notre-dame-vs-nevada/
i wouldn’t mind having Criqui move over from radio and join Tirico for home games. i don’t know if they’ve ever worked together before since Criqui was CBS and Tirico ESPN, but they’re both excellent sportscasters. Additionally, despite being an alum, Criqui isn’t really perceived as an ND guy so NBC could continue their stupid game.
I’ve thought for some time that Don Criqui has lost his fastball. He’s really tough to listen to on the radio.
Also, Criqui isn’t a color guy, so it’d basically be two play-by-play guys in the booth.
For a long time I wanted Tony Roberts to come back to ND radio and Criqui to move to TV, when Hammond was torturing us on NBC. That ship sailed long ago, though.
I think I’d prefer just one play-by-play guy and then just silence (if we can’t get someone better than Flutie).
I hope you are right alstein, but I fear Hicks will return just in time for what will (optimistically) be a huge game against Stanford.