The answer? 45.
The question: How many more undergraduates does Marshall University have than Notre Dame?
So we begin our incredible journey through the similarities and differences that comprise this Saturday’s gridiron matchup!
MARSHALL RANKINGS & SEASON TO DATE
The Thundering Herd currently sit in the mid-50s in both SP+ and The Athletic’s 1-131 Ranking of all FBS teams. One imagines those rankings are mostly on the strength of last year’s performance, which saw The Big Green rack up a +129 point differential, albeit with a 7-6 overall record (1-4 in one score games). They smoked FCS Norfolk State (6-5 last year, having played 4 home games an 7 road games) last Saturay 55-3 (more on that game later).
ROSTER ONCE-OVER
The big note to lead with here is returning 1,400+ yard rusher Rasheen Ali’s decision to take a step away from football to sort through some personal issues. Obviously, in the grand scheme of things what’s important is Ali doing what is best for his long term mental and physical well-being. Within the narrow purview of this article, though, this development stands as an irreplaceable loss for Marshall, both in terms of quantitative offensive production, as well as in terms of having a practically dominant leader behind which to rally as they make an upset bid.
The Thundering Herd do have some highly touted talent on their roster, however. FSU transfer #8 Khalan Laborn is a former 5-star (.9867) and was more highly rated coming out of high school than anyone ND will have suiting up on Saturday. There are a trio of former 4-stars on the squad as well at the safety, wide receiver, and defensive line positions respectively. Marshall, annoyingly, hasn’t released a depth chart with player heights and weights as far as I can tell, but looking over class year alone there would seem to be a large amount of veteran presence in the two-deep, so I would not presume a star-struck affect among the boys in green in their first trip to ND Stadium.
SCOUTING REPORT
If you are in search of an in depth, “professional” scouting report, I would highly recommend signing up for Irish Sports Daily.  If you want to read the very specific notes of an author who watched the first half of Marshall-Norfolk State on Youtube while his wife was watching S2, E1 of Better Call Saul, then you simply must read on:
- Broad context: Marshall took a 38-0 lead into the half, but it was an oddly sweaty affair that featured some real garbage from Norfolk State. There’s no play by play data available for the game but Marshall for the most part labored for what it got (at least as much as a team can when gaining 600 yards on the day)
OFFENSE
- Starting QB Henri Colombi had the truly bizzare statline of 24/26 for 205 yards (7.9 ypa) 1 TD & 1 INT, for an overall QBR of 27.1. From what I saw of Combi he is enthusiastic about running, but not good at it. He also had a horrible, horrible interception in the end zone vs NSU, which makes me think he can be both pressured and goaded into mistakes more than could CJ Stroud
- WR #7 has some real wiggle to him, but no one in the skill set looked truly dangerous
- The offensive line looked pretty pedestrian vs. Norfolk State. Guys playing high, early pressures given up. Norfolk State seemed to wear down even over the course of the half, but it took a lot of sloppy/broken tackling early on for Marshall to rack up yardage on the ground
DEFENSE
- The defensive line looked like it might be a problem. The Herd run a 4 man front with stand up ends. The DL against Norfolk State were super physical and disruptive and played very aggressively with their hands. On the potential plus side, though, Marshall didn’t run much in the way of stunts, blitzes, etc. – I’d guess they’re saving those looks for ND but at the very least they’ll be running them for the first time in a game.
- Marshall’s Safety #20 Sam Andre really struggled with vertical stuff out of the slot – look for ND to try to exploit that matchup specifically.
SPECIAL TEAMS
- They were really repping punt block in the two quarters I saw. I’d expect them to come after a kick aggressively
- Their kicker was booming stuff out of the end zone early but then started kicking short as the half went on. Don’t know if they put a new guy in or just wanted practice. Have to imagine after last week they will be interested in tempting ND to try to run some kicks back.
CONTEXT FOR NOTRE DAME
This is a MUST WIN GAME! A thumping victory will create a festival atmosphere around the triumph of Marcus Freeman’s Notre Dame in the golden light of the afternoon sun. An unpleasantly tight game (or even a loss, egads!) will set cursors blinking across countless smartphone screens as the letters S-C-O-T-T F-R-O-S-T hysterically materialize behind them.
1 WEIRD OVERLOOKED FACTOR
The football team didn’t get back to South Bend until like 9 a.m Sunday morning. Dudes missed treatment, meeting schedule got compressed, etc. At the start of the school year, home opener — look for a noticeable lull in energy for some unpleasant chunk in the middle third of the game.
PREDICTION
Notre Dame gets off to a very fast start, Marshall gets back within striking distance. Notre Dame puts it away in the early 4th.
Here’s a great data point for HCMF. He got tossed a pretty rough deal for his first 2 games as coach: keep your coaching staff/recruiting class together in the wake of kelly splitting against a top 10 team into the bowl game, without your 2 best players. Okay survived that with a close/frustrating loss, but then go play an odds on national champion favorite at their place, at night, with a new QB. OOF.
But now, we have the horses, we have the talent differential, this is the softball game. If this was kelly, legit I’m thinking it’s a less than 2 score victory and looks ugly as hell, maybe even akin to Toledo last year.
So for HCMF, how does your team come out and play? Do you dominate as you should, play with that same fervor and tenacity and bury these fellas, or is it a “kelly slog?”
I feel like hes done and said mostly all the right stuff up to this point, but I would absolutely love for a snoozer by halftime. Go irish! Beat the fighting Randy Mosses/Chad penningtons/Byron Leftwiches!
Everything I know about Marshall football I have learned from this preview. More like Blundering Turd if you ask me.
Uhhhh let’s say ND 35-13.
Man you weren’t kidding, how does that even happen?
I was looking into this…
Colombi only played 1 series into the 3rd quarter, too.
12 throws for 1st down (or TD) for 140 yards. Not bad!
All other throws, 12 of 14 for 65 yards.
So basically 0 missed tackles on the WRs? Sounds like the opposite of the RBs.
Pretty sure it is 42.
Nice picture of John Marshall at the top. I had to use the google to determine if Marshall is named after him. Turns out it is (probably why the picture was chosen).
Turns out there is a Thurgood Marshall College as well in La Jolla, CA that is part of UC San Diego.