Alabama survives a scare in the Swamp, Penn State holds serve over visiting Auburn, while UCLA blows all the goodwill they built up early in this 2021 season. Elsewhere, Clemson survived a near brutal upset by the Bees and Cincinnati comes back to defeat Indiana in the scorching Bloomington heat. Let's take a look at [...]
Notre Dame picked up its fifth 2023 commitment today when Florida running back Sedrick Irvin Jr. committed to Notre Dame. The 5'10", 190-pound Floridian is in fact the son of that Sedrick Irvin, who fans of the late-90s Irish will remember running very well for Nick Saban's Michigan State, and the cousin of Michael Irvin. Pops [...]
The Irish still haven't looked dominant this season, but Notre Dame destroyed Purdue in the explosiveness battle to cement a third straight awkward win. The offense survived ghastly efficiency numbers against a bad Boilermaker defense, including many self-inflicted wounds in the passing game. Defensively, Marcus Freeman and company finally limited big plays and made Jeff [...]
Welcome back to the 18Stripes G5 Top 10. This week had a ton of shake up, yet the top of the list remains unchanged. Let's dive into the rest of the list. Also Considered: San Diego State, Army, UAB, Marshall, San Jose State Week 3 Recap Movers and Shakers We have to start with the [...]
We're 3 games into the 2021 season and the one thing Notre Dame has firmly established so far is that nothing will be easy. Granted, you could find plenty of entertainment in this product if you'd like but the reality is the Irish are giving us all plenty of heartburn through September. After trailing early [...]
Notre Dame football might not be as entertaining, or as good, as a year ago, but for the moment the Irish remain undefeated after beating Purdue 27-13. The game was, mostly by default, ND's best performance of the season. It also tied Brian Kelly with Knute Rockne with 105 wins at Notre Dame. As the [...]
In the Toledo postgame episode of The Athletic's Notre Dame podcast, The Shamrock, longtime Irish reporter Pete Sampson noted that this wasn't what he had in mind when he said the one thing he knew for sure about this season was that Notre Dame would be entertaining. We hear you, Pete. We hear you. An [...]
Week 2 is in the books and with it a little more stability across the country as many power programs inserted easy opponents before the bulk of their conference scheduling begins. While ESPN did not choose the Fox telecast of Oregon-Ohio State for GameDay the Buckeyes loss (only the 3rd defeat of the Ryan Day [...]
I have good news! After re-watching the game against Toledo I came away a little surprised and not quite as disgusted with the offensive line than I originally thought watching live. I also have bad news. As I'll explain, I don't think the ceiling for this offensive line is that high at all. Maybe that's [...]
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 [...]
Two straight weeks, two straight heart attacks, 2-0. Notre Dame nearly suffered a massive upset against Toledo despite dominating the efficiency battle, as several concerning storylines from Tallahassee followed the Irish home. For a second straight week, the defense dominated long stretches of the game and wreaked tons of havoc, yet surrendered huge plays to [...]
Welcome back to the 18Stripes G5 Top 10. This might have been a slow week by last week's standards, but we still saw some G5 hold their own, including one big jumper into the top three. Also Considered: Louisiana, UAB, San Jose State, Memphis, Marshall Week 2 Recap Movers and Shakers The first game we [...]
A 2-0 start for Notre Dame hasn't felt this bad since 2008, and perhaps much longer. The Irish were able to fight back late for a touchdown and accompanied backyard 2-point completion to post a 32-29 victory over visiting Toledo on Saturday. It's always better to win than lose but the action this weekend continued [...]
There were three big news items for the Irish this offseason. Two were on the field, with the transfer of Jack Coan and the hiring of Marcus Freeman. The third was the announcement that this game against the Rockets would air exclusively on Peacock. Now, to me, this isn’t a surprising endeavor. The Irish aired [...]
Well folks, it's time to bring back the advanced stats win probability matrices. I know you missed perusing these rainbow-colored Excel graphics and agonizing (?) over decimal point changes, didn't want you to miss out on all that fun as the new season gets going. This is going to be an interesting year for comparisons [...]
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