When I was a kid, Notre Dame pretty much sucked. I turned 11 during Bob Davie’s first season, also the first season for me back in Indiana after over six years in South Carolina. So I was well into adulthood before I witnessed a truly very good Notre Dame football team, and well into my 30s before I saw a sustained run of good seasons.

This is all to say that it still feels weird being largely unsatisfied with a 17-point home victory over Michigan State, even if it might (or might not) be a crummy Michigan State, and even if the standard this team has very publicly announced for itself demands better than the Irish displayed tonight in game three of the season.

By the way, it’s great to have this series back. More, please.

Let’s run down some big takeaways from this win:

It feels great to be able to lean on the defense

While the offense labored through its most trying night so far, Notre Dame’s defense rarely inspired much worry. MSU’s lone touchdown drive, featuring a perfectly placed long pass and lousy defense on a QB keeper, was not pretty. And neither was the Spartans’ other scoring drive, which should have been a touchdown but for a drop (although the B1G referee inexplicably tried to say it was anyway a couple moments later, not long before announcing that Bubba Frazier -No. 4 – had committed a celebration penalty when he was not on the field at the time).

But I digress. The second-half ND defense was what it should be. Except for a couple of improvisational plays by MSU quarterback Alession Milivojevic (definitely had to look up the spelling), it was largely shutdown mode for a defense that’s become accustomed to it over the past 12 games. ND’s pass rush was excellent, getting in the QB’s face and rushing things, directly leading to the Irish’s second pick of the night, by Adon Shuler. Several different guys got involved too, including mainstay Boubacar Traore, Francis Brewu, Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa and freshman dynamo Rodney Dunham.

There were really no major issues of concern as the ND defense held MSU to 167 total offensive yards. But for a fake punt that should have worked, it would’ve been another single-digit scoring night for an ND opponent.

By the way, I don’t know where else to put it, but Luke Talich is a steely-eyed missile man. I cannot believe a dude that good is not a starting player for Notre Dame.

CJ Carr isn’t putting up Heisman numbers – but he is elite

I was always skeptical CJ Carr would actually win the Heisman. Not because he’s not good – because ND wouldn’t lean on him that much (I’ll get back to this) and because the things he’s good at aren’t necessarily racking up statistics.

We saw some of those things tonight. The Irish’s final TD drive was Carr stamping himself as an elite quarterback, if not (right now) a Heisman front-runner. That anticipation throw to Micah Gilbert – who had a monster night and asserted himself as the big-guy complement to Jordan Faison in the receiving corps – was spectacular, and he followed it with a long bomb over Gilbert’s shoulder on which he could scarcely have walked the ball out to Gilbert any better than where he placed it. And he capped it off with a QB power for the TD, because why not.

And his Jeremiyah Love impression on a first-down throw to Mylan Graham was otherworldly. Impressive enough that he stayed off the ground – far more impressive that he got up, raced 10 yards to his left and fired a strike for the first down. You’re always comfortable with CJ back there.

He did, once, get a little too caught up with the mind games at the line of scrimmage, costing ND five yards and maybe ultimately four points. Nobody’s perfect. But Carr is an outstanding quarterback.

The running game is now officially a concern – but Nolan James might be on his way to neutralizing it

Michigan State probably has a good run defense. But that ND averaged (0.2) fewer yards per carry against them than either of the Spartans’ two MAC opponents prior to tonight, paired with the lack of running game production in ND’s first two games, has taken this thing from a curiosity to a legitimate concern if you’re grading on a national title curve. (Which ND itself is.)

Obviously the personnel running the ball is not as good as last year; that’s a given. But the lack of push up front for much of the game is also a problem. Jonaz Walton briefly came in in the fourth quarter and was buried by three different Spartans on his only carry because the entire left side of the line had been caved in. (It was not Will Black’s finest night.) A few different carries by Aneyas Williams and Nolan James met similar fates. The only reason I’m not feverishly getting buckets of water to put out this fire is that ND had similar issues last year and figured it out – but last year they had those issues against playoff teams, not maybe-OK B1G opponents.

That being said, it felt very telling that James was the guy who came out for both the 17-play drive that ended in a field goal and the final drive of the game – and never came out either time. Aneyas’ reprehensible celebration penalty aside (and dude, if you’re going to get 15 yards, do something cooler than mime starting a leaf blower), James just seems to have a knack for squeezing out more yards than Williams does. He ended the night with 26 carries – not many Irish backs of recent vintage have a game like that on their CV – and gained 121 yards. ‘Only’ 4.7 a carry, but he turned several attempts that didn’t look promising into good runs.

It feels very much like a changing of the guard. Aneyas Williams will absolutely have a role on this team due to his pass blocking and ability as a receiver – though James has shown to be good at that as well – but it feels like the best version of the Irish right now has James carrying the ball the most.

There’s still much to be done

On a day where a lot of body-bag games were closer than they should have been for quite some time, I doubt too many people will raise an eyebrow at a potentially improved* MSU team pushing Notre Dame a bit, and maybe they shouldn’t. There’s definitely an element of simmering anticipation not quite being met with these Irish so far – I’m not sure anything short of 50-point blowouts would’ve really satisfied much of the fan base considering the talent of the team, the hype surrounding it, and the lack of big-time early season tests to point to.

* Did you catch the NBC graphic showing the Spartans’ B1G schedule? There were a whole bunch of winnable games there. MSU does not play a single team in league play that has proven they are good yet – dodging Ohio State and IU among others. It’s possible they could rack up a bunch of wins this year.

But we also need to keep in mind it’s a long season. This time last year, many of us (maybe myself included) were still ready to run Chris Ash out of town and ND couldn’t run the ball. By the end of the season, Jeremiyah Love was in NYC, Ash’s defense was dominating and ND was No. 4 on the Vegas odds list of who would win the national title even though (as we obviously now know) they didn’t even have a secure playoff spot. This team should keep getting better.

Shout out Marcus Freeman, who set a Notre Dame record this evening by winning his 13th consecutive game by double digits. Believe it or not, no Irish coach had ever done that. And frankly there’s no reason that streak shouldn’t hit 16 before the Oct. 17 game at a BYU team that will enter the AP top 10 tomorrow after our boy Kenny Minchey led Kentucky past Texas A&M.

We’ll be back next week for Purdue.

(Photo credit – South Bend Tribune)