There were ups, there were downs, but mostly a lot of ups. Notre Dame got out to a big lead in the opener against Temple, held steady for a while, then pushed the gas pedal to the floor for a strong finish. The 33-point win was an easy cover for the Irish and a great start to the 2017 season.

PASSING OFFENSE

At times, it felt like Wimbush was on his way to a record-setting day but he finished the game with “just” 290 total yards and 3 touchdowns. As a passer, if you’re being kind due to his first start he was okay. Throwing the ball 30 times and not being able to get 200 yards is not ideal. A 6.1 yards-per-attempt is actually quite poor.

In the big picture, Wimbush handled things well. He was hurried 6 times and sacked twice which aren’t great if they continue in the future. His decision-making was decent (not too worried about the pick, we have to make peace with the fact that there will be 10-14 of them which is typical for an Irish QB) and accuracy pretty admirable in his first start–a little off in spots but nothing too bad. There were a few drops (or tough catches) which had they been hauled in would’ve greatly increased Wimbush’s production.

From the pass catchers, hello tight ends! A healthy 7 receptions including a touchdown for Nic Weishar. The early returns suggest we should see plenty of targets to the tight ends in the underneath routes, particularly off play-action. It wasn’t a great return for Alize Mack with a pair of drops but he still did get a pair of receptions on the day.

The receivers are a tougher nut to crack and I’d like to look at the snap counts when they become available. We saw St. Brown do his thing (4 for 80 yards and a score) but the second-leading pass catcher was Cam Smith with 3 for 10 yards. In terms of yardage, Chase Claypool was second among the receivers with 17 yards on 1 catch.

Something just seems odd about the wideouts. Sanders and Finke combined for 34 receptions last year and as far as I could tell barely stepped on the field. Miles Boykin–maybe the 6th receiver at best–didn’t even participate in the game. It seems like the staff is enamored with the likes of Freddy Canteen but you can’t be starting and catching just one pass. Are we trying to hide something for Georgia?

RUSHING OFFENSE

The 422 rushing yards was the second most of the Kelly-era (UMass in 2015 surrendered 457 yards) so there’s very little to complain about after this performance. As one would expect, Josh Adams is the clear No. 1 back with a pretty large gap between him and the other guys. Before we get to the pecking order a quick look at the running success rate from Saturday’s opener:

A total success rate of 64.2% is a pretty good whooping put on a very green Temple front seven.

The rate for Adams is a decent amount off his career pace (57.5% and 59.4% the last two years) which would be a little more concerning if he hadn’t averaged 8.5 per rush, had several long runs, and converted 4 out of his 5 carries on 3rd or 4th down.

It’s super early to judge Tony Jones and he should have better days ahead of him. On an afternoon of #explosiva for the rushing game his long was only 7 yards and his success rate poor from a small sample size. He failed on the 4th down attempt to turn the ball over and in the future he has to be a quality option in these “power” situations–both to give Adams a breather–but also because speed-wise he’s not in the same class as his teammates.

The knock on Dexter Williams has been that he’s not as developed as a pass catcher or pass-blocker and that has to be why he received half (if not fewer) snaps than Tony Jones. However, Dexter has burst and acceleration that is otherworldly. After this first game audition he should be getting twice as many carries as Jones. If you’re going to fancy yourself a running team I frankly don’t want to hear about pass protection as a reason why Dexter can’t get carries in the first half. During Sunday’s phone conference Kelly said all three backs will be rotated but they “like Tony’s versatility catching the ball.” Sigh.

Dexter turbo boost hits fast forward through the hole.

Back to the explosiveness, the Irish had 13 carries of 10+ yards, 5 carries of 20+ yards, and 3 carries of 30+ yards. It’s pretty obvious that Wimbush brings big-time rushing ability which is why I chose the over on our pre-season over/under of 400 yards–he’s already 26.5% of the way there after one game!

PASSING DEFENSE

This was the biggest concern for me. Now, I wouldn’t say it was a bad performance but it wasn’t all that great either, especially with Temple missing their top wideout and playing a brand new quarterback.

By the way, nice head fake by Owls head coach Geoff Collins by playing Logan Marchi the entire game after saying two or three guys could get reps.

Back to the secondary, Temple managed 13 of their 18 first downs via the pass game which is a bit alarming. Marchi wasn’t helped out by his receivers on several occasions, too. With a pair of touchdowns given up, no picks, and just 3 pass break-ups I thought we’d see something better.

At times, the Temple screen game really gashed the Irish. To me, the secondary doesn’t look overly physical and you can’t be that way AND display a lack of playmaking.

This is from Temple’s last score of the game. Not great physicality from Julian Love at corner. Not a great angle taken by Studstill coming up from safety and Bilal isn’t fast enough (only Jaylon would’ve stopped this to be fair) to make the tackle. It could be not much but the secondary just does not look athletic enough to make a big difference this year.

You could be heartened by the pass rush, though. There were 3 sacks, 3 hurries, and generally speaking the line actually looked much more athletic and physical than we’re accustomed to in the past.

RUSHING DEFENSE

The start for the Irish rush defense certainly wasn’t good. Temple was successful on 70% of its carries in the first half, including going 3 for 3 on their third-down attempts. The good news is that Temple had just 2 successful runs in the second half on 14 attempts, including going 0 for 4 on 3rd and 4th down. In total, a run success of 47.0% is a decent job by the Notre Dame defense.

The crazy thing is that with Micah Dew-Treadway out (announced he didn’t dress prior to the game, Kelly said it’s a knee strain) all of Brandon Tiassum, Kurt Hinish, Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa, Khalid Kareem, and Julian Okwara played early on and extensively. That’s definitely a departure from the past where starters would play the bulk of the first 2 and sometimes 3 quarters in games like this.

Okwara even had a sack and Kareem added a tackle for loss!

During and after the game linebacker Greer Martini was criticized for his poor play and it’s tough to disagree. In general, the Irish will need their linebackers to be the best unit on defense and for long stretches on Saturday they were not. Here’s a good example very early in the game:

There’s a lot to like here. First, the line completely caves Temple’s offense toward the sideline and limits their ability to work in space. Two, all three of Bonner, Tillery, and Daelin Hayes are physically stout enough to be instantly in the backfield after the snap. Three, Bonner’s chase down and Hayes’ ability to chip off the line, take on the fullback, and still get in on the tackle were impressive. There’s just one missing ingredient.

Temple clearly tries to scheme Nyles Morgan out of the play with a second-level double team. That frees up Martini to make this play. He shows good instincts, but gets twisted by a small chip and can’t make the tackle for loss. This should’ve been 2nd & 11 instead Temple gained 5 yards.

The defense seemed better with Coney in the game in place of Martini but that could be deceiving as they both played a lot. Martini actually had a decent game stat-wise and if you combine both Buck linebackers they had 12 tackles (although only 4 solo, and just 1 solo from Martini), 2.5 tackles for loss, 1 sack, and 1 hurry.

Here’s a great example of run defense that hopefully we’ll see more of in the future:

This was the last time Temple threatened in the game and it’s a big second down. The line actually doesn’t do a great job here but the rest of the defense does. Coney is plenty physical with a pulling lineman, Morgan is fast enough to react and avoid being blocked by a guard, and Studstill gets his nose dirty for half the tackle. The very next play Coney would pick up a sack and then Temple missed their field goal.

SPECIAL TEAMS

The coverage units were fantastic which was a huge improvement from last year. The return game really couldn’t get going all that much but that’s modern football these days.

I suspected Yoon wouldn’t be too sharp and he ended up missing both field goals. They were decent kicks, though. He’s started slow in each of the past two seasons, as well. It’s not much of a worry but definitely something to keep an eye on in the future.

TURNING POINT

The Coney sack + missed field goal mentioned above is probably the most obvious turning point of the game. There was a brief surge by Temple late in the 2nd quarter and into the 3rd quarter that died right at this moment.

However, heading into the game I believed Temple’s offense would be struggling and once the Irish reached a certain amount of points the game would be over. Early in the second quarter Wimbush threw a ball down the sideline that fell incomplete on third down from the Temple 10-yard line. However, a roughing the passer penalty gave Notre Dame a first down and Wimbush hit St. Brown on a fade for a touchdown on the very next snap.

That made it 28-3 and this Owls team wasn’t scoring 30 points. By the way, Notre Dame scored 6 touchdowns on 6 red zone attempts on Saturday.

3 STARS