How often do you leave a Notre Dame game essentially without a complaint? My last time would have to be the 2015 season opener against Texas. Until tonight. A 38-18 road win over Michigan State will do that. Pretty much every concern ND fans had about this team was, if not solved, at least addressed. [...]
Our Film Room articles have always been one of our most popular features - I know I've learned a ton from the smart guys on here who actually know what they're talking about with this stuff. We're trying something new with the film room that we hope brings another perspective, something we're calling "Film Room [...]
Breaking down the classic "beat an opponent by 29 points, yet inspire a crisis of confidence in your fanbase" win over Boston College. What does Notre Dame's offensive identity look like through three games, and how might the Irish evolve if the passing game doesn't improve*? *It might just improve The Basics Saturday’s game was [...]
Well into the third quarter, I had the epitaph for this Boston College game written in my head. "This could be the beginning of the Kelly Death March"...you know the drill. Instead, this one turned and became one of the stranger blowouts in ND history, 49-20. The Irish went over 500 yards rushing, setting a [...]
Recapping Notre Dame's tough loss to Georgia with an review of the advanced stats. In a fairly even contest, where did the Irish come up short? Bear with me for a quick trip into an alternate universe… Notre Dame finally reversed their streak of losses in close games, gutting out a tough 22-20 win over [...]
I frankly don't want to hear about 'good effort' from anyone regarding Notre Dame's 20-19 loss to Georgia today. Here are some reasons I don't want to hear about it: Brandon Wimbush should be better I don't want to pile on the quarterback, because there's so much more to any team than that, and he [...]
Recapping Notre Dame –Temple with advanced stats: a dominant rushing performance, some questions in the passing game, and an improving defense that showed flashes but needs more consistency. Introduction If you’ve been with us a few years, you’ll notice a few tweaks and changes for 2017. I’ll introduce them as they arrive, but as always [...]
If you are inclined to look at 2017 Notre Dame football as Year One of a reboot - and certainly Brian Kelly has done nothing to indicate it isn't - then consider the first checkpoint passed. Notre Dame easily dispatched Temple 49-16 Saturday in a game that was not free of nits to pick; but [...]
It's time to break out the advanced stats again, taking a glance at the few things that went right and the many things that went wrong in 2016 and predicting how they'll change this season. Last year I broke out each of Bill Connelly's Five Factors into it's own posts, but procrastination has led to [...]
If you’ve missed it last week, it’s a great chance to catch up on the annual preseason rankings of the top 25 Notre Dame football players over at Inside the Irish. You can see the consensus ranking that includes our ballot and Douglas Farmer’s astute commentary over there, but if you’ve read this far, you [...]
I've been on a quest this summer to find the most awful logos in sports. I didn't have a ton of rules except I didn't want to include American colleges, you had to be a current franchise, and I held some of the major North American sports to a much higher standard than other teams [...]
As fall practice begins, it’s getting closer and closer to prediction time for all of your favorite writers. And for Notre Dame in 2017, that means that every one-line prognostication will devote a few words to Brian Kelly’s future. “Notre Dame: 9-3 with an improved defense under Mike Elko, cooling Brian Kelly’s hot seat.” Or [...]
If you've been with us a while, you may remember the inaugural ranking of Notre Dame away games in 2015. While I won't give myself too much credit, the top three games listed (Clemson, Stanford, UVA) were incredible games, even though they featured two Irish losses and the season-ending injury to Malik Zaire. Looking back [...]
Every season the coaching carousel seems to escalate the craziness, and 2016-2017 was no exception. Two gigantic openings were filled at LSU and Texas, and several hot commodities like PJ Fleck, Willie Taggart, and Matt Rhule made jumps to Power 5 conferences. Excluding Brian Kelly, who would certainly make this list if he weren't already [...]
Well, they did it again. In many ways not much came together for Stanford in 2016. After carrying so much of the load two falls ago Christian McCaffrey couldn't do the same in 2016 and missed some time on the field. The Cardinal attempt to break in a new quarterback didn't do great, either. However, [...]
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