Notre Dame lost another big game and got out-classed in many areas. In some other areas, the Irish stood firm and held their own. It was clearly not an ugly loss on the scoreboard and if you’d like it was surely somewhat of a moral victory to stay competitive with Alabama for stretches of the Rose Bowl semi-final game. Still, Notre Dame goes home a loser again and faces a long off-season wondering what they can do to improve and get better.
At first, it looked really ugly and Alabama jumped out to a big lead. But, things settled in and in reality the second half was mostly a very sleepy affair with very little drama. The Crimson Tide were never fully threatened but also never truly pulled away from the Fighting Irish either.
Stats Package
| STAT | IRISH | BAMA |
|---|---|---|
| Score | 14 | 31 |
| Plays | 80 | 55 |
| Total Yards | 375 | 437 |
| Yards Per Play | 4.7 | 7.9 |
| Conversions | 10/19 | 6/10 |
| Completions | 28 | 25 |
| Yards/Pass Attempt | 5.6 | 9.9 |
| Rushes | 38 | 25 |
| Rushing Success | 47.2% | 54.1% |
| 10+ Yds Rushing | 4 | 4 |
| Defense Stuff Rate | 21.8% | 16.2% |
I think it’s perfectly fair to look at this game from two different angles. One, Alabama seemed almost bored once they went up by 3 touchdowns and turned off their offensive death star capabilities. Or possibly, Notre Dame made adjustments and finally got into a game that they believed they could catch up and ultimately upset the top team in the nation.
Either way, the upset didn’t happen.
Offense
QB: C
RB: B
TE: B+
OL: A
WR: D
A lot of people didn’t like the offensive gameplan. I figured we’d dink and dunk and see what the offensive line and running game could do in response. The line and run game held up pretty well, so they continued to push forward with their gameplan and what they’ve been comfortable doing most of the season. I don’t necessarily agree with that approach fully, but I understand it.
On the one hand, Notre Dame held the ball for over 7 more minutes and ran 25 more plays than Alabama. They picked up 24 first downs and broke into Alabama territory on 5 separate occasions. In a lot of ways, I think this is exactly the gamplan Notre Dame wanted to achieve. Given their ingredients, I’m sure they believe this was going to be a tasty meal with those numbers. They hogged the ball just enough and put themselves into position where they could get close to Alabama while needing to catch some breaks.
However, they didn’t catch many breaks and didn’t do quite enough on offense before it was late in the game.
Ian Book did have a really ugly interception on the first series of the 3rd quarter when the game was still 21-7 and the defense left the door open for a possible comeback. That was one of those moments Notre Dame just couldn’t inflict upon themselves. Just 6 plays later, Alabama took a 28-7 lead and largely cruised for the win thereafter.
As we suspected, there wasn’t much in the passing game for the Irish. Book only had 2 completions in the first 3 quarters for more than 10 yards and finished 12 of 18 for 92 yards before the 4th quarter. Without those 2 long completions Book was just 10 of 16 for 45 yards in 3 quarters. That won’t get it done.
I’m sure Notre Dame would’ve loved more explosiveness in the passing game but it never came and frankly wasted a pretty strong-willed performance from Kyren Williams and the offensive line.
Rushing Success
Williams – 10 of 16 (62.5%)
Book – 6 of 13 (46.1%)
Tyree – 0 of 5 (0%)
Skowronek – 1 of 1 (100%)
Flemister – 0 of 1 (0%)
Maybe if Book doesn’t throw that interception, and Doerer hits the field goal, or the illegal shift doesn’t wipe out a touchdown we’d be looking at this game as keeping Alabama just enough at bay to steal a win. However, being able to zoom out this offense largely laid an egg again.
If you’re going to bank on a ball-control passing game (5.6 yards per attempt, gross) there needed to be more success overall. For example, the Irish had 10 completions that weren’t successful. Sure, you threw the ball 42 times but many of those attempts were glorified running plays. A 4-yard pass on 2nd & 8 certainly isn’t going to scare Alabama and as we saw eventually the Irish couldn’t convert enough 3rd downs to get themselves into position to score points.
Kyren Williams and the offensive line played well, but again, no explosiveness whatsoever. They limited Alabama to just 13 stuffs on 80 snaps which is actually pretty remarkable. Williams had 24 touches for 95 yards, though. He played his heart out and had so many good snaps but it was largely wasted. Of the 4 running plays to go for more than 10 yards, 3 came from Book with 2 coming on the last series of the game.
The wide receivers caught 8 receptions for 96 yards, the first catch not coming until under a minute remaining in the 1st half when the Irish were hurrying up to try a field goal before the break. Seeing as how the running backs and tight ends caught a combined 20 receptions it’s pretty clear what the gameplan entailed.
Defense
DL: C
LB: B
DB: D-
Alabama averaged nearly 8 yards per play so it’s difficult to really call this a good performance from the defense. However, they did appear to get things in check after a brutal start. In particular, they did keep Alabama’s running game in check and created their fair share of stuffs to put the Tide in uncomfortable situations.
The problem was A) Alabama overcame those situations pretty easily when the game was close and B) Their passing game tore apart Notre Dame early on.
Now, did the Tide get conservative after scoring 3 touchdowns? It sure seemed like it to me.
On their first 3 drives (all touchdowns) quarterback Mac Jones was an absurd 12 of 13 for 173 yards while they ran the ball just 5 times. For the rest of the game Jones finished 13 of 17 for 124 yards. Still quite good, but Alabama clearly leaned on the running game a lot more after taking a lead–plus they just didn’t run enough plays overall in the game to score 50+ points. They only had 8 possessions! Opening up passing the ball 72.2% of the time on 3 touchdown drives then switching to 46% passing sure seems like a conservative turn to me.
The Tide started the game with successful plays on 17 out of their first 18 snaps, 20 out of their first 21 snaps, and 29 out of their first 40 snaps when they established a 28-7 lead. The 4th quarter got a little wonky with Notre Dame recovering an onsides kick but deep down I think Alabama would’ve turned the heat back up if they felt it was necessary. I’m sure Devonta Smith getting banged up on a touchdown (following that back injury only 6 targets over the last 38:49 of the game, including one that was wiped out due to a roughing the passer) played a part in Alabama shifting down a couple gears.
Stuffs vs. Alabama
White – 2.5
Ademilola, Ja. – 2.5
JOK – 1.5
Liufau – 1.5
Hamilton – 1
Simon – 0.5
Hinish – 0.5
Cross – 0.5
Mills – 0.5
Ogundeji – 0.5
Ademilola, Ju. – 0.5
The Irish started to get a teeny bit of pressure later in the game (officially no pressures and 1 sack) and had 3 batted passes at the line, one pass breakup from Hamilton, and a couple drops from Alabama pass catchers. It’s tough to point to many plays where Notre Dame won when the Tide were attempting to pass.
I thought the defensive line did a good job not getting pushed around. The linebackers did some good things creating pressure and picking up some negative plays. Still, the secondary was largely a non-factor and Notre Dame found out the hard way that their pass-rush really wasn’t anything special and couldn’t help slow down Alabama’s passing game.
Final Thoughts
When you predict a 51-13 score like I did it’s difficult to be upset about a 31-14 loss. In the aggregate, Notre Dame did a little bit better than I thought but being -3.2 in yards per play differential is still a super ugly number that signals these teams were far, far apart competitively.
Speaking of YPP, Notre Dame’s number was absolutely destroyed over the last 2 games falling to +0.65 on the year. It’ll always be a bit of an asterisk season facing Clemson twice plus Alabama compared to other Irish schedules in the past, but that mark is only +0.02 better than the 2016 team! In another comparison to show how much better the other playoff offenses can be, this 2020 defense finished with a YPP the same as the 2015 defense. For their part, Alabama’s YPP ticked up to +2.83 for the season. They gained 1,038 more yards on offense on 48 fewer plays while their defense surrendered 115 more yards on 105 more snaps.
Not a great start to the game when Chris Tyree takes the kickoff and fumbles after being nearly blasted into the 3rd row of seats. Talk about setting the tone, sheesh.
This was another harsh lesson that Notre Dame needs major upgrades at quarterback, receiver, defensive end, and in the secondary. Personally, I only feel good about one of those positions heading into 2021 and that’s a big problem.
I’m sure if they could go back and replay the game Notre Dame would’ve gone for it on 4th down on their second drive of the game. You know the one where Book took a designed run for 2 yards on 3rd & 7? They probably thought it would gain more yardage, but still. Alabama scored a touchdown 2 minutes later anyway. I thought this drive was a microcosm of the game offensively for Notre Dame. Gains of 7, 1, 6, 7, -4, and 2 yards before a punt. Just moving so damn slowly down the field and forcing yourself not to make mistakes and be so clinical over so many plays.
This happened:
Sweet Jesus.
We can’t forget Notre Dame’s wonderful 3rd series leading to their only touchdown before garbage time. It went for 15 plays, 75 yards, and chewed up 8:03 of the game clock. You have to think Notre Dame finally got some mojo after making it 14-7 into the 2nd quarter. However, Alabama scored just over 2 minutes later, and in turn, I’m sure the Tide knew the game would be theirs.
To me, the game felt lost once Notre Dame’s defense got 2 stops and the Irish offense responded with a missed field goal and an interception. After that, they were going to have to play nearly perfect football to climb back in it and that just isn’t realistic given Alabama’s talent level.
Big thing that stuck out to me on a re-watch: 21 completions for Notre Dame went for 10 yards or fewer. The inability to break something on a quick receiver screen or slant just minimizes the effectiveness of the offense in a big way. It seems like such a missing piece to an offense that wants to control the ball with short passes–you’re leaving relatively safe plays out that could potentially provide you some explosiveness. But, they apparently don’t feel like they have the speed to even try it.
Devonta Smith cemented a Heisman & finished with 130 yards and 3 touchdowns.
The Irish effectively lost an offensive series when Book went out with his injury. They were gifted a soft-ish roughing the passer penalty on Book right before the 14-yard sack that forced Book out of the game. Then, a paltry 1-yard run by Kyren on 2nd down followed up by Drew Pyne throwing a million miles behind the sticks for a 7-yard completion and the ball went back to the Crimson Tide.
Sneaky big play when Notre Dame still technically had life: Late third quarter and Najee Harris dropped a first down pass and then was stopped on 2nd down by Drew White for only 2 yards. The third down & 8 began the 4th quarter with the ball just out of field goal range. However, Harris burst through for 13 yards and Alabama would eventually kick a field goal to go up 31-7.
I’m curious to see the temperature at Notre Dame in what should be a very interesting and intriguing off-season. I’ll certainly have some thoughts coming soon!
“Notre Dame needs major upgrades at quarterback, receiver, defensive end, and in the secondary.” The secondary is most daunting for me because you really need to be good at every position or they’ll pick on your weaknesses as we’ve seen. Receiver is a bit different in that we’ve seen the impact just a Claypool or a Fuller can make. Of course, I’d like to have several of them.
ND’s third drive is going to bother me for a long time. That was precisely what our overall game strategy needed to be, and it worked! Another drive like that would have completely changed the complexion of this game. It reminds me of when Weis’s teams would zoom down the field running no-huddle for a touchdown at the end of the half, then never do that again for the rest of the game.
Unrelated, but I really enjoyed Dabo’s big mouth getting smacked around in the Sugar Bowl.
(1) Yea I thought there were 2 times we needed to go for it on 4th (if I remember correctly) that we didn’t and then the interception was killer. If you are going to beat someone more talented than you, you need to be at least a +1 in the TO department, not a -1.
(2) Don’t disagree with the need for talent upgrade in the secondary – and maybe Clemson needs a talent upgrade there too – but man it’s tough playing these elite WR’s with speed no matter who you are. Olave was unguardable against Clemson too.
And Lawrence was not able to overcome the OSU defense enough (Clemson WR’s this year don’t have much of that elite speed – though I realize QB pressure played a big part here too).
Even Saban realizes good offense beats good defense nowadays and to have the good offense you need to have at least one elite WR with some unguardable speed. (Unless you are ***willing*** to throw it up to your big WRs and ***let them*** go get it. – Not sure if that’s more on the QB or the coaches or both, but if you aren’t going to use your size advantage at WR, then it’s not much good having it.)
(3) An idea for an article series going forward: “5 star watch” It’d probably take very little work and would be super short to read (sadly) but who are the targets, dreams of the guys we may get with the 5 stars. Hope is eternal! (Really top-100 watch or something would be more useful/helpful but it’s not quite as catchy.)
Based on message board chatter, ND does not currently lead for a single top-100 2022 recruit :/
yikes.
One would think being a solid top 5-7 program would attract *some* in the top 100. I mean they aren’t all going to Bama, Georgia, Clemson, OSU, LSU, Texas, USC, right?
We gotta be able to pull a handful from the rest.
And just to beat a dead-horse with how this year’s class is nothing to write home about. I had mentioned before while we were at #8, we were likely to slide – maybe even outside of the top 10 because many top commits haven’t committed yet.
Well USC just got the top recruit in the country and jumped us (all the way from like 14 or 15 if I remember correctly) – so we are at 9 now.
It wouldn’t surprise if Oklahoma, florida, and/or Miami pick up another high-end recruit and jump us.
I was stunned watching the Clemson / OSU game. Clemson never seemed to adjust their defensive game plan, even as Olave continued to torch them. Why not put more on the front 7 to stop the run, and provide safety help for the corners? Also, what the hell happened to the Clemson O-line? Late in the game OSU was only rushing 3, and still getting to Lawrence regularly- sometimes multiple guys getting through.
Yea amazing.
Though tough to put safety help when their RB is gashing you too.
Btw, watching ESPN this morning, they’ve basically said what we’ve been saying. They understand the nuance: ND is not on Clemson, OSU, Bama level but they are a tremendous program and the best of the rest (and definitely deserving of the 4 seed in the playoffs). David Pollack and Rece Davis most reasonable about this. Kirk noted the last 3-4 years with the “reset,” ND is an entirely different team from before and that ND is close.
ND is 4th in winning percentage the last few years. The Bear notes, so they can’t beat those teams, who can? (And you can hear Pollack saying “exactly” in the background).
I found it re-assuring actually that ND is being recognized accurately. It’s actually a really good spot to be in – and we should appreciate than how very very good we have been – despite not being the best.
Agreed overall which is why I’m OK with this year.
For instance I think Texas and Georgia are close to the Big 3 in recruiting. Also there’s no reason USC can’t be up there based on program. We could be Texas or USC with no excuse and mediocre teams, or Georgia who is close to the top like us but also no excuse for not breaking through.
I don’t follow tOSU. We know Meyer can build a program in this day and age. How long can day keep it going? Because if USC and Texas get decent coaches, I could see them bumping tOSU out of the top spot if Day isn’t the real deal.
I’m pretty sure Day proved last night that he’s the real deal. And even if he wasn’t, a performance like that will win him a lot of looks from elite recruits.
yup Day and OSU are here to stay.
Elite recruiting is not enough because yes Texas and even LSU are close with the elite recruiting. But you still need good coaching and developing players, etc.
We’ve obviously done a great job with that in the last few years especially.
It appears Herman just got fired and Sark is taking the reigns at Texas.
not surprising – great recruiting – which probably stems mostly from the institution – with average outcome.
Man, Texas must have wanted to get rid of Herman bad. Openly flirting with Urban, and then hiring a thoroughly mediocre coach to replace him. Yikes.
Ohio State isn’t going anywhere no matter who the HC is. As an institution they’ve gone all in on football for 50+ years now. It’s actually shocking how few National Championships they’ve won despite every coach since 1951 having a +.700 winning percentage.
I’m basically fine with where we are right now. ND needs to ride out the current era until big-time structural change comes to college football, which I think is probably coming in the next decade or so. We’re in a great place to do exactly that.
That doesn’t mean there isn’t room for improvement, though. ND can recruit offensive skill positions better than this — Kelly did it early in his time at ND, and Weis did it as well. We can have better offensive design and more productive, efficient offenses than this. If we can’t outright beat Bama/Clemson/Ohio State, we can give them all they can handle. Teams with far less talent do it all the time — Indiana, Ole Miss, etc. ND’s complete flops in these kinds of games are anomalous and should not be treated as inevitable.
The primary goal of the final stage of the Kelly era needs to be finally fielding an offense that puts some fear into the best teams in college football. I think we can do that.
Being extremely efficient is a great way to beat teams with less talent than you. If you can be an efficient team that doesn’t turn the ball over, you’re going to be favored heavily in 85% of your games. There just aren’t enough college football players out there for most teams to compete with a disciplined, efficient team.
But to beat the beat teams, the teams with more talent than you, you need explosiveness and havoc. The defense held Alabama to their lowest point total since 2018, and we still lost by 3 scores because we have no explosiveness. I don’t see that changing next year, but if our RBs continue to play well, we should still be strong enough to beat most teams.
We’re so close to taking that next step; but I’m not sure if we’ll take it. For all of the talent Clemson has, they haven’t consistently had #1-ish recruiting classes. Instead, they hit on QBs and WRs consistently. If Kelly can keep building a strong foundation on his lines, throwing in an elite QB and 1 elite WR recruit could be enough to get there. Of course, a great D Coordinator will also be needed. (And Del Alexander absolutely had to be shown the door).
Disappointing finish to a really fun season, but I feel better about the state of this program than I did at the beginning of the year.
Thank god I’m not the only one calling for Del Alexander’s head. He’s been coasting on (undeserved) credit for Boykin and Claypool making it to the NFL, but there hasn’t been much to write home about that didn’t involve two guys who had massive combine performances. Replace Alexander with a competent receivers coach and maybe then ND can start fixing the passing game.
How has his recruiting been?
Not showing up on the field?
We could’ve squeezed a few more points out of the offense with more mid-length passes mixed in and more creative play design, but it still wouldn’t have been enough to win.
The key to making the next jump is singular: recruiting. All the grit and play design and game plan design in the world won’t get a team with 1 consensus five star over the last 5 cycles to beat a team that has 20.
If the program wants to take the next step, that’s the challenge. That’s the missing piece, plain and simple.
I’m proud of this team and all the success in this crazy season. I’ll never forget November 7th. Three undefeated regular season in just over a decade feels so far away from the despair of the Weis and Willingham years.
Well put. If you look at the teams that tend to win playoff games, they usually have an elite QB who is going to be a very high draft pick. And several 1st round players all over the field. Notre Dame isn’t there.
But I do think they should be commended for a strong season. Having Book battle back to take out #1 Clemson was an elite memory and the high point of this program for a very long time.
HI to everyone from France. Thanks for the ESPN rundown, that’s helpful to have that narrative out there. Though “We’re #4” is not how we used to make “We’re # !” thunder around campus, right Kiwi, right Cubs Fan? But when my French friends asked me today why I am so sad, they don’t cut me much slack when I say we are in the top four (or top 4-6) of 120 teams. But darn it, I still underneath all had this feeling that maybe this year we would sneak back up there.
Anyway, thanks for the excellent article, and sincerely, thanks for all your posts above, everyone. Essentially each of you have sorted out positive threads, which is where we need to be. It has been indeed a good year in the face of enormous challenges.
“This was another harsh lesson that Notre Dame needs major upgrades at quarterback, receiver, defensive end, and in the secondary. Personally, I only feel good about one of those positions heading into 2021 and that’s a big problem.”
Which one is there to feel good about? Still buying the junior WR class hype?
Also, FWIW, the Heisman voting was done before the game. Smith certainly *should* win it, but I wonder if there was enough vote-splitting for Lawrence to sneak in.
By the way — forgive me all, but what’s the matter with our QB recruit? He was an early commit, was supposed to be great, then I guess he didn’t play this year? But maybe he can be great?
Depends on your definition of “wrong” – Buchner was likely overranked early on, and has performed poorly in the (few, admittedly) national camps since then. He also changed his throwing motion ahead of that. And then he didn’t play his senior year of high school.
So, basically, even the (typically optimistic) 247 basically staff don’t think he’s at all ready to play significant minutes next year.
Of course, there’s still hope that he’s a great QB, but it should be tempered with the reality that he is now a noticeably lower-ranked recruit than, say, Bo Nix was.
One would think we could get a pretty high caliber QB to ND. Why is that so hard for us that we can’t regularly even get a top 10(!) QB?
Wimbush was a top 10 QB recruit. Buchner is still a top 10 QB recruit. Jurko was a top 10 QB recruit. We’ve actually gotten some top 10 recruits (with top 20 recruits basically every other year). What we need is a top of the board recruit. We need a #1 or #2 QB recruit every few years. Of course, the passing game for the past…4(?) years hasn’t been on nearly the same level as our big time competition. If I was a QB, I certainly wouldn’t want to come to ND over Bama/Clemson/OSU/Oklahoma.
Especially when ND has made it clear that we want to run a power spread offense, with a focus on Tight Ends. That’s not how you go about selling yourself to the NFL.
yea getting a few sprinkled in is exactly my point (And the comments above make it seem like Buchner is a little lucky to be a top-10 guy). We should have one of those guys every year.
I’m not even saying come to ND over Bama/Clemson/OSU/Oklahoma. I’ll take the 5th-10th guy every year just fine.
Ha I should have read your comment first before responding. I totally agree.
Failing that, we need to recruit a Buchner *every year*. We shouldn’t go multiple years between Jurkovec and Buchner, and between Wimbush and Jurkovec (notwithstanding that Book overperformed). Buchner/Wimbush/Jurkovec should be the annual baseline if we’re not recruiting a top-2 QB who scares other QBs off.
Relatedly we should be recruiting Arch Manning like crazy. Sell him on the Catholic school thing, plus the opportunity to become an absolute legend.
Exactly, a Buchner every year and then sprinkle in a Jurkovec (wasn’t he like a top 3 guy?) every 4-5 years.
Jurkovec was not a top-3 guy; he was similarly ranked to Buchner. Like Buchner, he was a higher-ranked recruit who slid down the board over his senior year due to bad performances at national competitions (Jurk’s performances were borderline awful on an absolute scale, whereas Buchner did just somewhat bad/bad relative to expectations).
ok, well then substitute whoever a top 3 kind of guy would be every 4-5 years on top of the yearly Jurkovec/Buchner type player.
Like Gavin Wimsatt – whom we’ve offered – is a “must get” in 2022. A top 3 dual QB guy (top 6 QB incuding Pro/dual together).
I think Buchner is really talented and has all the tools. (watch his junior film) I think he learned a valuable lesson about messing with his arm mechanics too. Missing his senior season is not good but, if all he did was train he may come in more physically ready.
I’ll take your word for it on the film, and I know the coaches took him over JJ McCarthy, who ended up as a 5-star. But also he played against low-level San Diego competition, and that was over a year ago. They can’t plan on him being college-competition ready.
And if the alternative is Pyne, well, they badly need a grad transfer.
Could we really have had McCarthy?
I’m not sure how strict the distinction is between PRO and DUAL, but I’d rather have the DUAL guy every time. It’s going to take a rare PRO guy over a guy who is mobile. QB’s who can run just add so much to offense. (McCarthy is listed as PRO rather than DUAL).
And at any rate I can forgive making decisions between top guys early on. That’s gotta be tough and esp. at QB there’s a lot of variables in play for who works out and who doesn’t.
I think qb is the position most badly affected by missing a season. So wherever Buchner was, he’s sure to have fallen behind the strong qb prospects who have played this year.
That’s really uncharted waters isn’t it? I’m sure it’s not a plus but…He had transferred to play better competition, so he missed out on that. That he’s getting to ND in a few weeks is a plus.
Also film on Buchner is not hard to find if you want to draw your own opinions. Google Buchner junior film.
I don’t think Kelly wants a top of the board recruit every year; I don’t think he likes the idea of QBs transferring, even though that’s what happens at the big time schools. He seems to prefer a top of the board recruit every 2-3 years, with an Ian Book (i.e. a guy who won’t transfer if he isn’t a starter) each year in between.
(I don’t think this is a good strategy)
Except one of those three hasn’t played a down in college, so who knows, and the other two flamed out here. You could add Keil and Crist to that pile.
we need to do much better than that.
I second that question, out of curiosity.
Another great report, Eric. Like you, my hunch is Bama backed off and cruised.
Book’s int was the worst I’ve seen him throw. I wonder if it was out of sheer frustration. Ya know, “Screw it if you can’t get open!”
One thing that sticks in my picture memory from this game is Clarence Lewis running around seemingly with no notion of what to do. I felt sorry for him.
All in all another successful season, and like Noise commenting below, I can get behind “We’re number four….probably”. From where we were for so long, it’s pretty great improvement.
I think the interception was because he was moving right and didn’t have the arm strength to get it there…it was underthrown.
College football is in danger of becoming like women’s basketball. Lots of teams, but only a few very good ones who have a realistic chance. It is so freaking expensive that very few schools can make the commitment…facilities, coaches, analysts, etc etc. Saban probably has more analysts than most teams have coaches.
I mean obviously who knows, but it wouldn’t be the first time that it took awhile before a breakout – Lenzy and Austin have been plagued it seems by injuries/suspension. Has Keys had multiple (small) injuries too?
They’ve obviously showed flashes, so it’s not like they were just highly touted but turned out not to quite have the talent that we thought.
I think since they will be finally forced into action that (if available) they will step up. Though let’s hope Johnson grabs one of those starting spots too.
I feel pretty good about the receivers. Austin and Lenzy is potentially a very good starting duo, we have to get them healthy. Johnson and Watts could develop pretty quickly and Brunelle could surprise. I think Styles will have a role by mid-season.
Lots of talent, which is good.
Compared to something like the secondary which seems super yikes.
That’s fair enough re: the WRs. No reason to believe Lenzy can be a #1, but alongside a healthy Austin it could be good. My issue is basically that I’ll believe Austin is available to make plays for ND when I see it. Would it be particularly surprising if he just transfers and starts anew (assuming he can graduate by end-of-summer, which may not be a good assumption)? And of course wouldn’t be surprising at all if the injuries piling up render him a lesser player than anticipated and/or he gets injured again.
On the secondary point, we need a grad transfer cornerback starter and a grad transfer safety starter (again)… Odds of that coming through aren’t great. Super yikes indeed.
Also might need a starting strongside DE grad transfer… do those even ever exist?
Rumor is my boy Jack Coan might be the QB grad transfer. Obviously that’s not going to win us playoff games, but if he’s healthy it puts 11 wins next year squarely in play given that our schedule appears to be Charmin soft. Still hoping Desmond Ridder decides he’d like to play P5 football, but if not Coan seems like the best plausible option.
I would think this year would be the most grad transfers ever due to COVID eligibility rules.
Interesting regarding Coan. Are you seeing that he’s considering/leaning ND or just that it’s plausible? Re:Ridder: are you just hoping for a pre-grad transfer (he’s only a junior, right?)? I’ve watched a few Cincy games this year as I’m in town, and would like them to give Freeman a call as well. Not sure who else would be on the external list to call.
Not sure exactly what the rules are re: sharing premium message board content, but while avoiding specifics and based on my reads of previous stories like this I think it’s beyond the “plausible” stage and arguably likely, as it sounds like Coan will be making his decision soonish.
What I hope they’re doing is putting out behind-the-scenes feelers to Ridder to see if he’s interested in leaving Cincy to play higher-level opponents, and failing that taking Coan seems like a good idea.
I don’t see what the point of Coan would be, but maybe that’s just me down on him. If they get a transfer QB, it should be one capable of winning a NY6 or playoff game. To me, I don’t think Coan is that guy. Ridder, yeah he could be. I hope they put feelers out.
But I’d also be OK with 2021 being something of a reload to hit the ground running in 2022 with Buchner. I’d expect as an early entry that Buchner should be pushing for playing time at some point in the 2021 season. Great QB commits don’t sit long at one place before they go..
Ultimately, if it’s like get Coan-caliber and go 9-3/10-2 with a bowl loss or go with Clark/Buchner and be OK with going 8-4 and looking ahead to the future, I guess I’d take the latter.
Coan was #9 in QBR in 2019. I don’t think he was really the 9th best quarterback, but he was a lot better than people at least on the 247 message board are giving him credit for (maybe the 15th-20th best QB in the country?).
If he’s healthy and playing even near that level he’s probably significantly better than anything we’ll have for next year. And if he’s at that level, we can probably win 11 games next year given the soft schedule; winning 11 games is almost per se worth trying to do.
FWIW, though, if Coan comes in and really isn’t what he was, I’m not at all opposed to the “punt on 2021” idea. Next year’s team is almost certainly going to be worse than this year’s, and this year’s team will probably end up lower than 10th in the SP+/F+ rankings. We’re not winning playoff games next year either, so maybe the thing to do is prep/hope for the future.
Yeah, I don’t know that Coan is a top 15-20 QB in 2021 coming off not playing at all in 2020, thus probably why Wisconsin didn’t get him the job back…He’s also got a 12-6 record as a starter, does that make for 11 wins in one year at Notre Dame? I don’t really see it. Could be wrong but just isn’t moving the needle enough for me. I’d rather take the short term hit in 2021 to hopefully figure out what the long-term answer is. ND needs that next big QB to take the program forward. Top 15-20 QBs don’t win playoff games so that level of player just wouldn’t interest me too much. Those players usually don’t tend to work out or elevate a program.
Win/loss record for quarterbacks is like win/loss records in baseball for pitchers: to some degree it’s indicative of QB play, but it’s ultimately more of a reflection of the team around the QB than the QB play (actually maybe even more other-people-dependent than baseball even). I wouldn’t really hold that against him too much.
But, yes, ultimately I don’t disagree that Jack Coan doesn’t put us any closer to winning playoff games. But it does make us more likely to beat USC, which at least to me has some value.
On the W/L record, sure, and I don’t think it’s a smoking gun, but in a lot of ways Wisconsin and Notre Dame are probably incredibly similar teams in terms of strategy and strengths/weaknesses. Further, I don’t see much in his game log to suggest Coan would actually help Notre Dame beat USC (whose arguably the most talented team on the schedule).
Coan was bad 2 times playing Ohio State (both losses), flopped vs Penn State and pumped up his numbers against non-P5 teams. After looking closer I’d be even more inclined in passing on him. Like most transfers, he ain’t what you’re really looking for — especially when it’ll be 21 months and several injuries in between starts.
https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/players/jack-coan-1/gamelog/
It’s not that Coan is particularly good, it’s that our QB room is bad. Under-discussed thing is how meh our QB recruiting has been with Rees. Hopefully Buchner is so good that it doesn’t matter.
Every QB in our QB room next year will have been a more highly graded recruit than Coan (per the 247 composite at least).
And yet……….
I would take the under on 11 wins next year no matter who our QB is. Wisconsin, USC, UNC, and Cincinnati should all be pretty good next year. We lose a ton on the O Line, all of our production at WR, our QB, our DC, and our best or possibly 2nd best player, JOK. Not to mention the secondary is thin.
So yeah, if the staff thinks Buchner will be ready enough to be a competent DI QB in 2021, that’s probably the best strategy.
Ok good to know. Sorry, didn’t realize it was mostly subscription info. Appreciate the reply.
Ridder is interesting. Can you even “recruit” someone who isn’t a grad off another team?
My yardstick for great elite talent like it takes to compete for a chance to win the NC is the kid starts and is a difference maker virtually immediately, a la the platoon of elite freshmen receivers Bama Clemson and OSU have had. We have none in that category.
That’s about 30 combined career touches returning right there. Pair that with a first time starter at QB (potentially a true freshman starter at QB), and I don’t feel great about that at all! While there is certainly potential, at least the secondary returns SOME production. The best player on next year’s team (BY FAR the best player) will be in the secondary.
This is more a QB problem for me though. I don’t feel great about things either but if we can get competent QB play we *should* be able to develop a bunch of blue-chip receivers.
Welp losing Houston Griffith certainly bumps up the DB concern level.
I’d be more concerned if he had ever shown anything that called for playing time.
How can you rate the RBs as a B when they had 3.7 YPC?
I am also not conviced that Devonta is a shoo in for Heisman.
I thought Kyren played pretty well, we put so much on his shoulders.
Kyren was a bright spot. Ran hard, decent YAContact, caught passes, really fought for yards. Lots of heart.
Hes a very good back. Then there’s Najee Harris and Sermon. Different kind of animal. Kind of like the Bus for combined brute power and speed.
For me, that grade is right on, concur with Kiwi. Kyren has been excellent. Good vision, the second effort is amazing. Maybe not Heisman but we were not close to 10-0 without him. Plus you have to love his energy and sense of teamwork.
I am thinking the quarterback issue deserves a dedicated off-season article and a separate thread:
(1) Yes, the modern game absolutely demands an elite QB to compete for the national title, that seems clear enough.
(2) Nothing of what we can say can take away from Ian Book and his contribution to this team. He may not be elite as far as arm, but we should all be grateful for all his heart, his ability to make it happen against every body but Clemson II and Bama — everything BK has commented about him.
(3) But getting to the Lawrence/Fields/Heisman level is another matter. Can we not admit that some of this is luck? As has been said here, it’s a position that can be very tricky to judge in high school — especially now when the recruiters are having to judge sophomores a lot, to get in on someone who might be a 5-star prospect. Adding to this are the numbers of highly regarded QBs who do not pan out, both in college and the NFL. The Peter Principle really seems to apply at the QB position at each level.
(4) Plus there are simply not nearly enough of these budding superstars to go around.
(5) When you add in ND’s built in hindrances to recruiting, well-discussed on this board, my honest feeling is that this is a crap shoot. Now, in ND history it has often been such, since after Paul Hornung anyway. Huarte was nowhere until Ara packaged him in a great offense. Thiesmann was not that highly recruited, Montana neither as I recall. Tony Rice, yes, but had to get an academic waiver I am not sure he could get today. Ron Powlus was as high a 5 star as one could get, but his injury paved the way for our last QB that brought us oh so close to being #1, Kevin McDougal. And you all know the history of the past 25 years.
Sorry for the long post, but I have been fascinated by the exchange of ideas on this topic. My gut tells me that finding a truly elite QB may be more on good fortune than on BK to just get off his butt find a magic formula. But I hope I am wrong!
There is not one answer to this. Put better receivers around Ian Book and he becomes a better QB. That was not a good group this year. Far from it. Of course Jones was relaxed for Bama. He had all kinds of options that stressed our secondary to it’s breaking point.
Better HS scouting is needed. Our QB coach should be finding us QBs that don’t have obvious problems with their throwing mechanics. ND should be able to find a big athletic kid, with a good arm and some mobility every year. Put serious weapons around a kid like that and one out of three won’t excel?
Yes, maybe ND needs to be a little more flexible in recruiting. Tony Rice has been a great rep for the school. Others couldn’t be? From what I hear ND is quitting on kids far too early in the process because they “don’t fit”. Rice knew what he needed change and do to “fit” and he did it.
Good answer, thanks. Even with your formula, you’d have to pick up big athletic kids with a good arm and some mobility every year, to have a chance that you hit the jackpot with one of them. Still a tough mountain to climb.
As much as I appreciate Ian and some of the others. I don’t want anymore 5’11” or less QBs. The kid at Bama was a 3star. They’re out there, find them. Put some better playmakers around them. Though every one seems to down play him, I like Brendon Clark. I think if you give a kid like that some weapons, he may do quite well. It became quite obvious that Book just didn’t think his receivers were open. I think part of that was on him but, they certainly weren’t open enough.
Ian HATED to throw interceptions (and we can certainly understand that, can’t we?) Thus with receivers that have a hard time getting separation, at least early, he would not throw the ball from within the pocket. Which was why he did so much better when off and on the go outside the pocket, the receivers had a chance to get more separation. The underthrown ball to Meyer was a very sad exception to that, for reasons that might have had to do with how the game had been unfolding.
And to your point, him not being tall has never helped.
The Bama guy is indeed tall, and also was helped by having that GIANT veteran O-line, plus incredible receivers.
I think this is spot on, and agree with both you and Tindma.
it’s really hard to find the can’t miss QB. Powlus was the top QB out of high school as I recall, but I liked McDougal much better. Lou was in love with Powlus and McDougal never would have started without Powlus breaking his collar bone.
And just the qb isn’t enough, gotta have elite WRs too. Preferably with an elite RB. Somehow the big three get em all at the same time repeatedly.
I’m all for the Rice Zorich type guys getting into. I don’t think we can win the big one without them.
Plus, really do gotta have a superior O-line! So, ND has that, plus the tight ends. Just gotta go for the other three targets…
Yep, those Rice and Zorich kind of exceptions help. But the memories of Randy Moss indicate the University’s red lines.
Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields were two of the highest rated recruits in CFB history. Sure, there might be some luck involved, but at some point you need to do something to create your own luck.
Yes, some seem obvious and actually do turn out to be elite, but many other obvious qb’s aren’t when all is said and done. We’ve had a number of our own in that category.
Fields and Lawrence were zero chance of coming to ND. We get the next tier or lower.
Aaron Banks on his Twitter declares for the NFL, so now the likely is reality — 4 linemen to replace with the only returnee coming back from major foot surgery.
Should have the talent to reload but it’s going to be a very young line besides Lugg, who himself doesn’t have that much time at tackle.
Patterson-?-Correll-?-Lugg
I wonder if Spindler and/or Fisher make a run at playing early. Wouldn’t be bad to see Patterson at guard and see if Kristofic or Baker can get in at tackle.
Besides comfort working with each other (and building trust/communication), I am not that concerned with talent on the o-line. Patterson started out as a tackle, so it’s possible that they see if he is talented enough to excel there (or he can stay inside, probably as a guard with Correll at center). Lugg is probably the same, see if he is better than one of the sophomores at tackle and if not, keep him inside at guard. Patterson and Lugg both having versatility helps as it will allow Quinn to find the youngsters most ready to step in.
The plan as of now is Patterson LT and Lugg RT with Correll at C. Spindler could challenge but Fisher needs time with Balis according to II pod. Not sure who the favs at guard are.(Carroll, Gibbons ?)
Looks like Freeman is interviewing for the LSU DC opening…I do wonder how long he would stick around anywhere as a DC before taking a head coaching gig.
Any news on the Elko to ND speculation? Based on BK’s history, I would not be shocked to see an Elston promotion and then bring on Nick L as the new LB coach
That speculation never made sense to me, only seemed to be a wishful thought since Elko and Kelly apparently are still cool after Elko departed.
But Texas A&M already won a bidding war for Elko’s services against ND once, and I think his defense has been pretty strong and they’re probably not going to let him go…So, um, what’s the end game here? Not sure why it makes sense for him to leave A&M for ND when the reason he left in the first place still exists (they’re going to pay him more money).
There’s been (granted, wildly unsourced) speculation that Elko just doesn’t like it much at A&M. I don’t know if that’s true, but that would really be the only reason for him to consider leaving a high-paying safe job, so perhaps it is.
Ah, that would make some sense.
Houston Griffith and Isaiah Rutherford in the transfer portal. Guess those 6 DBs coming in are going to cause some movement. Might be a very young team in 2021.
I’m not surprised by Rutherford, but I am somewhat surprised by Griffith — thought he might be in line for Crawford’s role next year. But, if he was showing positive improvement, I suppose he would have been in there more this year
With all of this movement (transfers, declaring for the draft), I’m wondering if we’ll see an article from E later this week with a roster/numbers update?
Here here! Especially since the legion of early enrollments are coming very soon.
Agree with you on Griffith, but after what he did for 3 years, meh, so it goes. I wonder if Pryor might be able to play the SS role? Looked like he was more a rover but he’s probably not getting a lot of playing time there.
Probably next week or the week after. Sounds like the roster movement is going to keep trickling out in the coming days.
I have a program assessment going live soon and then a 2021 roster article after that. A full scholarship/depth chart look coming after that for sure.
Yea one would imagine you’d want to wait a week or two to let all the dust settle since everyone can technically come back so lots of extra questions this year (no matter how reasonable it seems that a particular player would or would not come back).
Yep. Hinish is coming back (which I think was whispered about earlier) and I think I heard MTA is coming back too. So at least DT is stout. Doerer said he was coming back, so um, that’s cool too I guess.
Confirmed gone: Book, McKinley, Skowronek, Hainsey, Eichenberg, Banks, Owusu-Koramoah, Ogundeji, Hayes. Crawford last week said he was not coming back….Kraemer I think is in this boat too but I haven’t seen officially.
Griffith, Rutherford, Grunhard, Jahmir Smith, Jafar Armstrong, Kofi Wardlow all in the transfer portal
Still officially TBD for seniors (I think anyways): Drew White, Isaiah Pryor, Avery Davis, Dillon Gibbons, Josh Lugg (with White and Lugg expected back)
But really, going to be some vicious losses in terms of experience. Nice that the DTs are back, but they had some depth there anyways. Big exodus of starters and no surprise re-recruitments, which is how it goes sometimes.
Wow, hadn’t heard any of this. Thanks for the update. Great news at DT. It’s helpful to at least have one position nailed down.