Notre Dame did what you’re supposed to do to a team missing its best player Saturday, pounding Virginia 28-3 on the road.
Much of the game was perfunctory due to how hopeless the Cavaliers looked offensively, which was certainly because of the absence of Brennan Armstrong, out with a rib injury. However, it’s worth crediting the Irish defense too, because no matter how much the loss of Armstrong hurt, the fact is ND took a team that had eclipsed 48 points in 3 straight games and made them look, frankly, pathetic at times.
A couple things worth noting:
8 sacks (8!!)
Again, no Armstrong, a true freshman making his first start of competitive football in 2 years, we get it, all caveats apply. But the Irish defense was fantastic tonight, forcing two picks, recording those eight sacks, making most every big play. Much of the second half was effectively extended garbage time, so a lot of the yardage numbers can be taken with a grain of salt.
Because of that factor, ND was able to rotate a lot of guys in, and we saw some good stuff from guys who haven’t gotten much spotlight this year. Clarence Lewis had a sack and nearly a fumble-takeaway. Rylie Mills had one of the more manly sacks you’ll ever see, bulling through two Cavaliers’ offensive linemen. Bo Bauer was an absolute madman in the first half. You play who’s across from you, and it was fun to see the Marcus Freeman defense in its element for just about the entire game.
Coan, passing game in rhythm
But for an overshot interception in the 3rd quarter, it was effectively a perfect game for the passing portion of the ND attack. Jack Coan was as on point as he has been in a Notre Dame uniform; it’s funny what a functioning offensive line can do for a guy who was always quite good when he had one of those at Wisconsin, too. His TD throw to Kevin Austin in the corner of the end zone was an absolute dime, and many of his other ones were pretty nice too.
It was also cool to see Tyler Buchner get to run something resembling a full offensive playbook in the 4th quarter, and he did it really well. Too bad it ended with an unforced fumble.
Running backs need no introduction
Kyren Williams had not one, but several absurd runs today, including another one of those 5-yard gains that very few humans on Earth could ever have turned into a 5-yard gain. He’s just making it look routine at this point. 85 offensive yards, a touchdown. Ho-hum.
Enjoy him while you can, friends. The kid has no business whatsoever coming back next season. He’s an NFL back, and I’ve got a feeling he’s going to be a really good one.
It’s OK, though, because Logan Diggs is a guy too, and he’ll be around 2 more years.
ummmm… straight ridiculous @logandiggs3#GoIrish | #SCTop10 pic.twitter.com/E38g9PM8p4
— Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) November 14, 2021
He’s your RB1 next year. Toss in Chris Tyree, currently-redshirting Audric Estime, and incoming freshman JD Price, and this RB room will be juuuust fine.
2 more until an NY6 game
Notre Dame has two more games on the schedule.
Those games are against Georgia Tech, which is 3-7 and hasn’t given up fewer than 26 points in a game in nearly 2 months, and Stanford, which could be sitting on a 6-game losing streak when ND arrives in Palo Alto. That would make ND 11-1, giving them five straight 10-win seasons, and – who knows – keep them in play for a CFP spot if all hell breaks loose, even if that looks less likely by the week.
There are way worse places to be than looking at a New Year’s 6 bowl spot – especially when the Irish are poised to actually benefit for once from the various conference contracts in play and get a relatively winnable matchup. (I’ll explain in the comments.) I say it a lot in this space, but while this program isn’t yet where we want it to be, it’s also in a place a ton of other programs (a good example today is Texas) would kill to be.
OK, so here’s why Notre Dame is in good shape, for those of you who aren’t bowl project-o-philes (and you shouldn’t be):
Cincinnati, if they don’t make the CFP (I’m not optimistic for them), will be in the Fiesta Bowl because they were in the Peach Bowl last year and it seems to be an unspoken agreement that the same game isn’t going to get ‘stuck’ with the Group of 5 representative 2 years in a row. Those are the only options for them because the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl both have conference contracts – B1G vs Pac-12 for the former and SEC vs Big 12 for the latter.
For those same reasons, the Fiesta and Peach are ND’s only options if they’re not in the CFP. Obviously, they’re not going to arrange a rematch. So, Peach Bowl. And since the ACC’s contracted bowl, the Orange, is a semifinal this year, the conference champ’s guaranteed spot will be in a different bowl. Geography dictates that would be the Peach. So ND is likely on course to play someone like Wake Forest or Pittsburgh in an NY6 game.
Easy, no. Easier than playing Nick Saban, Dabo Swinney, Ohio State or College JaMarcus Russell (+ the core of the next year’s national champs), which represent literally all of ND’s major bowl opponents over the past 20 years? Hell effing yes.
And that’s why you should be optimistic.
(If Cincinnati does in fact make the CFP, there’s no Group of 5 team in the Fiesta or Peach bowls, and you can throw all of this out because at that point ND is probably looking at a B1G team in the Fiesta. But again, I’m not optimistic for the Bearcats.)
I think I’d much rather play the B1G team in the Fiesta. Whoever it is is going to have a lot more national cache and yet I think will be just as beatable.
Wow, Virginia looked bad…like worse than Navy bad. At least ND took care of business and didn’t play down to their level. It was a boring game but at least a lot of guys (especially on D) got some playing time.
Tough to take too much away from this one, since playing UVA without Armstrong is like getting to wrangle a defanged snake instead of having to hunt down a real one, but I liked the defense anyways. Freeman’s aggressive scheme worked to perfection. And beyond that, UVA just couldn’t block. Riley Mills had 3 sacks. Armstrong no doubt would have had better pocket presence but he would have been in trouble all night. Especially with bad ribs, look like Notre Dame tuned up the backup pretty good, felt sorry for that kid.
Recap was pretty charitable to Coan, maybe he’s just an easy guy to pick on since he’s so close to being really really good, but I felt like he left a lot of points on the field. But then he’ll go and make that perfect pass to Austin. Coan’s kinda like plain oatmeal, it’ll do the job to the lowest degree but not very enjoyable and no style points. He’s fine, and a lot better now in a short pas offense, but not always fun.
Are Ramon Henderson and Xavier Watts the future of safety? Seemed like they played a lot and were DGT, though again the competition level wasn’t much.
And are we sure BVG isn’t UVA’s DC? Still old man Tenuta? Woof their tackling “efforts” was almost comical. Pairing that up against Kyren, with amazing balance and the force of will to not want to go down that was just silly at points. Looked like a team full of little brothers trying to drag down a full grown man.
I had the same thoughts regarding Henderson and Watts – I thought both looked better than Griffith has looked all year. But then I had to remind myself that the UVA offense was just not very good
I am certain sure jillions of folks have noted this already, but it seems like a “fair” trade for us to be w/o our generational early 1st round safety vs them being w/o their ace QB.
I stopped watching at half time and I was sure I would wake up to a fifty burger or at least in the 40s. Looks like a solid win for sure and I’m sure there is a good reason for not scoring more
It looked like BK decided very early not to run up the score. They had a chance to be aggressive at the end of the first half, but then just ran the ball.
I think that was more situational than gentlemanly. ND got the ball at their 15 yard line with 1:16 left. Up 21-0 and on the road, I didn’t have a problem with the decision to not try and mash the gas and risk something bad happening to let UVA back in (they got the ball to start the 2nd half too). Coan’s first pass of the 2nd half was an INT, glad it wasn’t his last pass of the 1st half.
Kelly went for it on 4th+1 with 3 minutes left, he was fine with trying to score as much as they could, just wasn’t going to take an unnecessary risk, which I think was wise.
I was hoping to see more of Buchner last night.The more I watched Coan last night the more disappointed I was that he kept coming in. His stat line looks impressive but, this UVA defense is horrible. I thought he was often inaccurate or indecisive.(I realize he had some very good throws too)The offense just looks so much more aggressive with Buchner. His mobility stresses a defense and opens things for NDs playmakers. (ND has some good ones) Perhaps I have no right to complain about 75% comp. rate with 3TDs for 132yds. but, against that defense I don’t think that’s all that great. I think we’ve seen Coan’s ceiling and no where close to Buchner’s.
20 attempts and 132 yards is worth complaining about. 6.6 y/a vs THAT defense is pretty disappointing. And like you said, some of those out routes either seemed poorly placed or not exactly on time and kinda looked floated in there. It feels nitpicky, but comes with the territory.
I didn’t mind having a plan like “ok Coan, don’t look over your shoulder, it’s all you for the first three quarters, go run this offense and get in a groove”, but that INT was bad and then they followed it up with a 3-and-out to start the second half, preventing the game from getting to the massive blowout that it could/should have been.
I actually didn’t think the INT was that bad (although I seem to be in the minority here). One on one matchup with your supposed #1 WR down the field, who seemed to slow down a bit. If that’s the type of pick he’s going to throw, I’ll take it.
The late deliveries on the out routes and short routes is more concerning to me. These playmakers have speed; he needs to be better at hitting them in stride or coming right out of their breaks, to give them a chance to break some big plays.
The choice to throw wasn’t bad, but the execution was iffy. He threw it fast and low. Austin didn’t have a chance.
These stats aren’t everything obviously but interesting to note that so far Coan’s big time throw % is twice that of Book’s from last year (6.1% to Books 3.2%) and his turnover worthy play % is still less than Book’s (1.9 to Book’s 2.4).
The raw totals so far:
Coan – 17 big time throws to 6 turnover worthy plays
Book (2020) – 12 big time throws to 11 turnover worthy plays on the season
To my eyes, I agree. Coan throws a better deep and intermediate ball and is a more polished passer. He stands in the pocket too long but I like how he keeps his feet calm. Book’s legs were always really wide apart and jumpy
I completed an entire COVID isolation period during one of the (many, many) commercial breaks.
lol
During one of those breaks, I vowed to not watch ABC again until the next ND game.
But how will you keep up with The Bachelorette?
Some of my thoughts on this game:
1) The broadcast team didn’t do a very good job in terms of talking about ND’s problems with the flu. Indeed, I didn’t realize until the end of the game that several players were out with it.
2) It was the most boring ND game I’ve seen in a while, though in a good way. Despite my bitching about Kelly sending a message to his team before halftime that “the game is over”, the game was probably over from the moment we scored our second touchdown. You could see that Virginia, without Armstrong, wasn’t going to score twice against our D. As a result, Kelly let up on the gas pedal in the first half. The second half was just to see what interesting plays would ensue.
3) The two spectacular plays were Kyren Williams’ TD run (he is starting to just amaze me), and Logan Diggs’ high hurdle over the Virginia defender. We’ve got a hell of a deep backfield, don’t we?
4) Let’s not get too stoked up over a win over a team playing with an absolutely crippling injury (i.e., to Armstrong). If he’s healthy, this is an entirely different game (of course, we can say the same about playing without Hamilton, though his absence obviously doesn’t affect us to the extent Armstrong’s absence affected them).
5) It was a great spot for Buchner and Diggs to make their mistake (botched handoff). I suspect those two will be coached up on that ad nauseam this coming week.
Please do not tempt AIRBHG into becoming ANDRBHG. Thank you.
Estime has played in almost every game this year on kickoff return and recently in short yardage and goalline lined up as halfback or wingback, so unless we’re planning to pull one over on the NCAA I don’t think he’s redshirting.
Anyway, great job to the defense, and especially the young guys. Riley Mills got the game ball. Henderson and Watts (second on the team in tackles) both made some plays at safety, and importantly neither blew any plays. Prince Kollie running around making tackles. All great.