The last thing many want to do after watching Notre Dame lose to Marshall is take a look at what all of the good teams are doing. Still, we march on with the rankings. Plus, fear not there is plenty of schadenfreude to fill your spirit with the struggles from other teams, too. There were some big upsets across the landscape, although the Tide escape from Austin prevents a major shakeup in this week’s poll and potentially massive ramifications for the playoffs.
Here’s the latest from 18 Strips as we head into week 3.
18 Stripes Top 20 Poll
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | RESULT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Georgia (+2) | 2-0 | 33-0 W vs. Samford |
| 2 | Ohio State | 2-0 | 45-12 W vs. Arkansas St. |
| 3 | Alabama (-2) | 2-0 | 20-19 W at Texas |
| 4 | USC | 2-0 | 41-28 W at Stanford |
| 5 | Clemson | 2-0 | 35-12 W vs. Furman |
| 6 | Arkansas (+3) | 2-0 | 44-30 W vs. South Carolina |
| 7 | Tennessee (+3) | 2-0 | 34-27 W (OT) at Pittsburgh |
| 8 | Oklahoma | 2-0 | 33-3 W vs. Kent St. |
| 9 | BYU (+6) | 2-0 | 26-20 W (2OT) vs. Baylor |
| 10 | Kentucky (NR) | 2-0 | 26-16 W at Florida |
| 11 | Miami | 2-0 | 30-7 W vs. Southern Miss |
| 12 | Florida (-6) | 1-1 | 26-16 L vs. Kentucky |
| 13 | Utah | 1-1 | 73-7 W vs. Southern Utah |
| 14 | Michigan | 2-0 | 56-10 W vs. Hawaii |
| 15 | Texas (+1) | 1-1 | 20-19 L vs. Alabama |
| 16 | Air Force (+1) | 2-0 | 44-10 W vs. Colorado |
| 17 | Oklahoma State (+1) | 2-0 | 34-17 W vs. Arizona St. |
| 18 | Wake Forest (+1) | 2-0 | 45-25 W at Vanderbilt |
| 19 | Michigan State (+1) | 2-0 | 52-0 W vs. Akron |
| 20 | Penn State (NR) | 2-0 | 46-10 W vs. Ohio |
National Storylines
It was an uncharacteristic poor performance from Alabama this weekend, including 100 yards in penalties plus an offense that sputtered way too often. Outside of Bryce Young they looked strangely ordinary for a long time. They also had big problems containing the Texas offense before quarterback Quinn Ewers went out with a shoulder injury, and even afterward didn’t shut the door.
The Tide needed a late field goal drive (and plenty of luck from the refs on one of the most bizarre end zone calls in history) to escape with a win. Given the Ewers injury, I thought it fair that Texas outplayed Alabama which drops the Tide and actually moves the Horns up one spot despite the defeat.
We worried about that A&M offense and yup, that was justified. The Aggies only put up an astonishing 186 total yards in a 17-14 home loss to Appalachian State. The oil bag men have questions and would like to speak with Jimbo.
Oklahoma started slowly and only led Kent State 7-3 at half before laying it on in the 2nd half.
BYU missed a 35-yard field goal to beat Baylor with 8 seconds left but credit the Cougars for coming back and winning for good in overtime.
Mark Stoops continues to DGT™ as the Cats beat Florida again. We knew it would be a tough turn around for the Gators after last week’s upset of Utah and their offense really struggled while being shutout in the 2nd half.
Arkansas now has 2 solid to good wins (TBD on South Carolina) and things got a little shootout-y against the Gamecocks on Saturday as the team’s combined for 37 points in the 4th quarter.
Tennessee won a very fun and entertaining double overtime game at Pitt. Although, the Vols did get to play against a backup following noted Heisman hopeful Kedon Slovis’ injury right before halftime.
It was nice to see Sam Hartman in good health back on the field as Wake Forest took down Vanderbilt on the road. Hartman ended up throwing for 300 yards and 4 touchdowns.
Houston had been hanging around the bottom of the Top 25 polls and that will be over for the near future as they fell in overtime to Texas Tech.
A weird but fun matchup saw Washington State go into Madison and pull out a 17-14 win over Wisconsin. That game featured a combined 6 turnovers and only 10 first downs from Wazzu. Tough loss for the Badgers.
Louisville won an important game on the road against UCF 20-14.
Mike Elko is on the DGT™ radar with a tight win over Northwestern to move Duke to 2-0 on the season. Northwestern had a brutal lost fumble running into the end zone to possibly tie the game, oof.
Colorado traveling to Air Force to lose by 31 points can’t feel great.
Iowa State finally beat Iowa! It appears the Hawkeyes were not playing coy about their offense with 150 yards and 7 points.
Kansas won a road game in overtime against West Virginia. I repeat, Kansas won a road game.
Penn State enters our rankings for the first time. Former Notre Dame big recruiting targets Drew Allar (6 of 8 for 88 yards, 2 TD) and Nicholas Singleton (10 carries, 179 yards, 2 TD) looked impressive if you care about these things.
Utah State finished last year ranked, by the way. They’ve been blown out by Alabama and now Weber State in 2022 with only a modest victory over UConn.
What can you say about Nebraska at this point? There are no words left. They lose 45-42 at home to Georgia Southern. Yeesh. As I just finish up this section, the Huskers went ahead and fired Scott Frost while eating the extra $7.5 million in buyout money that would’ve gone away in a few weeks. Huskers AD Trev Alberts has been talking a big game since the firing, best of luck dude.
OUT:
No. 7 Texas A&M
I can’t imagine Darrell Dickey will have a job much longer after this performance. Plus, maybe he should be fired for having the name Darrell Dickey, too. I don’t know the status of a buyout for Jimbo Fisher but even for the deep pockets around A&M it may be far too much.
No. 12 Notre Dame
Instant review HERE and game review HERE if you like punishing yourself and even more discussion on the loss to Marshall.
Opponent Watch
Ohio State (2-0): Marvin Harrison Jr. catches 3 touchdown passes as the Buckeyes roll without Jaxon Smith-Njigba in the lineup. Emeka Egbuka also went over 100 receiving yards.
Marshall (2-0): Sun Belt SZN? It was a big weekend for the conference that has been trying to stake a claim as being on par with the AAC in recent seasons. You feel good for the Sun Belt, but also, settle down a bit.
California (2-0): Our next opponent started out well but didn’t exactly put UNLV away in a 20-14 win.
North Carolina (3-0): North Carolina’s defense continues to look inept giving up over 400 yards to Georgia State. The Heels were -3 on turnovers and needed an early 4th quarter touchdown to survive 35-28.
BYU (2-0): This BYU defense looks much improved. They held Baylor to just 289 total yards. As things stand today, Notre Dame would be easy 10+ point underdogs when they visit Vegas for this matchup.
Stanford (1-1): The Cardinal shot themselves in the foot far too often and didn’t have the horses to stop the USC offense.
UNLV (1-1): After shining so well in week 1, quarterback Doug Brumfield threw for 206 yards with 1 touchdown and 1 interception during their loss to California.
Syracuse (2-0): Remember that dark 2003 loss at Syracuse? I’m having flashbacks as sneaky decent Syracuse has looked pretty good so far this year with quarterback Garrett Shrader 4th nationally in passer rating through 2 weeks.
Clemson (2-0): Despite the 35-12 scoreline, Clemson still doesn’t look super threatening and is arguably one of the shakiest teams in our top 20 rankings. They were out-gained by 8 yards against Furman and cannot get a ground game going at all.
Navy (0-2): The Middies can’t afford turnovers and coughed up 3 more in a 37-13 loss to Memphis. Navy has only won 4 out of their last 18 games stretching back to 2020.
Boston College (0-2): First round hopeful Phil Jurkovec threw an interception on his first attempt of the game as BC didn’t pick up a first down until their 22nd play on their last drive before halftime. The Eagles lost 27-10 on the road at Virginia Tech.
USC (2-0): The Trojans scored touchdowns on each of their first half drives before taking their foot off the gas in the 2nd half against Stanford. It took them just 27 plays at 13.4 yards per play to do that damage. Their defense is still leaky but I’m not sure if it’ll matter in all but a game or two.
Week 2 Games to Watch
Not a great week of action which is becoming all to common for week 3 in recent years. This partly explains why ESPN GameDay is headed to the Troy-Appalachian State game, mostly because Texas A&M lost and no one wants to go there right now.
Oklahoma (-13.5) at Nebraska
Nebraska made this a 7-point game late in last year’s meeting. They just fired Scott Frost so maybe they’ll be playing a little more free and with reckless abandon. An upset here would be so college football and overall very, very funny.
BYU (+3.5) at Oregon
Bo Nix just tore up Eastern Washington and he’s back, baby! A let down sandwich is a huge possibility with BYU coming off an emotional and very physical OT win, so I understand the Ducks being favored. A win here and BYU is very likely undefeated and a top 10 team in all the polls when they face Notre Dame.
Penn State (-2.5) at Auburn
We haven’t heard much from Auburn so far this year. They recently scraped past San Jose State 24-16 which doesn’t feel like a super great sign for their season. But, teams can get better right? RIGHT? With the Big Ten being all fancy with their upcoming media deal this is the type of game Penn State has to put away for the league.
Michigan State (-3.5) at Washington
Quarterback Payton Thorne has been a bit shaky so far this season so fair play if anyone is skeptical of Michigan State being favored on the road in Seattle. I was on the Michael Penix, Jr. hype train last year and it didn’t work out at Indiana. He transferred to Washington and is averaging 341 yards per game through the air. Great story!
Miami (+6.5) at Texas A&M
We had to move the G5 poll to later in the week which bumped up today’s article and is giving us some EARLY lines. I have to think this one is going to continually fall in favor of Miami throughout the week. It’s already dropped by a point in the time it’s taken to put this together on Sunday. I’m guessing Jimbo Fisher wasn’t thinking about 2 losses before the Aggies even opened up SEC play.
Is that the most you’ve ever jumped a team up in the rankings following a loss? It’s definitely a deserved jump up for Texas. It’s a shame their #1 QB got knocked out on a roughing and that their backup was limping for the majority of the game. I’m really interested to see how the rest of their season goes; normally, Texas has several really good positions groups, but a few massive weaknesses. It sure didn’t look that way against Bama.
Also lol at salty Murtaugh: “noted Heisman hopeful Kedon Slovis”
I seem to remember maybe one time there was some brisk discussion about moving someone up after a loss?
When do the “Fire HCMF, Hire Lance Leipold” chants start? Honestly though, Leipold seems to be on a Brian Kelly type of career path. I wonder if he recruits any better than Kelly?
Also, because I’m to lazy to go into either of the Marshall threads, I’ll drop this thought here: I remember reading one of the articles on Deland McCullough leading up to week one where he stated something along the lines of we’ll have the running backs run to where they are blocking for us and the reporter stated the Hiestand was nodding in the background. I thought it was odd that McCullough would make a comment like that. Why wouldn’t the running backs run to where they are blocking? Either the running backs were totally undisciplined and doing their own thing, or they aren’t running there, because there isn’t a hole to run through. Seems like it is more along the lines of the second than the first.
I guess that does give me some hope for the future though. As long as the team keeps working toward team play, and players not getting off onto the thoughts that they can do it better their way, then we might pull out a 8-4 season still.
Sucks for Leipold that he’s kind of too old (58) on his current career trajectory. If this is his Cincinnati, he’s 15 years older than Kelly at that point in their careers.
He’ll coach till he is 70 like Saban, He has a good 12 years left in him!
70?! Can we hope? It wouldn’t surprise me to see Saban coaching in his 90s.
“Coach, you turn 93 next year, will you finally retire?”
Yea, can anyone imagine this guy retiring?
The question isn’t when will he retire, but more like how long will he live?
He seems immortal at this point
Great GIF lol.
Buchner officially done for the year. Expected but oof nonetheless.
Relevant to this postt: gotta keep an eye out on these other teams for potential grad transfers! The Hudson Card watch begins!
He returns.
Now we’ll never know if Buchner was going to put up Joe Burrow/Vince Young numbers this year!
Yes the Joe Burrow for Buchner in the 2019 LSU analogy is funny, but even funnier is the WR comparison. Many people saying Braden Lenzy is like Ja’Marr Chase or Jordan Jefferson (whoever was the #2 WR on that team); hearing it more and more.
And Chansi Stuckey came up to me, big, strong guy, Chansi, and he was crying, can you believe it, and he said, “Sir, the WRs are so strong and beautiful, sir, thank you for recruiting them,” and so we’ll be like 2019 LSU combined with 2005 Texas, and so we’re looking into that very strongly. So we’re going to do that.
Ugh, this year is going to be rough. I have no faith Pyne is even going to be passable; he seems like a mess – for every decent play, there’s a TO or mistake waiting to happen. I do hope Angeli can get up to speed and start taking some serious snaps soon.
Imagine though what would have happened last year if Coan played two games and was out for the year? Or the year before if Book played two games and was out for the year?
We’ve been hurting at QB for awhile now. We’ve gotten relatively lucky injury wise that our QBs have not missed too many games in the last handful of years.
I think the immediate goal — like the goal for this week — is being able to play at least an ugly form of complementary football. An offense that can kick FGs with regularity would be an improvement, and would help prevent the fourth quarter defensive collapses we’ve seen 3 games in a row.
To get there, I think we need to reshape the offense into what we did against VT last year — prioritize plays that get the ball out of the pocket in 2 seconds or fewer. Slants, screens, tosses, just get the ball moving and away from the interior OL ASAP. Forget downfield shots and inside zone. Pyne showed some ability to play in an offense like that last year; hopefully it didn’t disappear over the offseason. Presumably we still have this playbook as well.
It’s triage time for this team and I hope Freeman realizes that.
Not trying to be funny; is Pyne even tall enough to see over the middle of the field to throw quick slants? Book never ever threw to the middle of the field, and he was theoretically taller than Pyne.
Cal only scoring 20 on UNLV certainly gives me hope we can muck our way to a 17-13 type of win. But that’s probably still going to require some sort of big play from our defense or special teams, which hasn’t happened yet.
Alternately, maybe you just accept the fact that you aren’t going to be able to put together scoring drives and try to get the ball to a playmaker every play, shooting for an explosive score? Tyree gets 20 touches? Lenzy gets 3 jet sweeps and 3 bubble screens? I don’t know, it’s going to suck whichever way we go.
At least we’ll be doing it in the green jerseys!
To your first question, probably not. Pyne’s true height is probably around 5’9″. I think we’ll have to switch to Angeli pretty quickly.
I dunno, man. It’s gonna be as ugly as navy blue numbers on lime green jerseys.
Can’t believe I’ve gone from “dang, can’t believe we settled for Angeli” to “please please please let him be ready to go ASAP” in such a short period of time.
The best part is that it’s both
Angeli sounds like an old-timey 1940’s QB though so maybe that will help.
Lenzy has fewer than 1,000 receiving and rushing yards in three+ seasons and Tyree has barely over 1,100 in two+ now. Maybe trying to get them the ball in space is the best bet but man, I wouldn’t hold my breath on it. Or count on them actually being playmakers despite their 40 times
God those are depressing numbers to think about (as well as the fact that nobody else on this roster other than Mayer exceeds those numbers).
Maybe we just come out and run the triple option for the rest of the season!
By gawd, that’s Chase Ketterer‘s music!!!
Some fairness there, and to be sure it’s not like either or both are going to be the most key cogs and get a ton of touches…But especially on the Tyree front, there’s some big failing and disconnect between coaching decisions/vision and not getting the ball into someone’s hands who pretty clearly has a good chance of helping the offense do more.
Could be more to the story, but it doesn’t really seem like he’s injured, so I don’t know what to make of that, but it doesn’t look good.
Not sure if it’s the right place to post, but I’m going to throw it out here anyways. With the Buchner news, 0-2 start, and the weight of the internet message boards weighing down on him, I think Freeman needs to lean into the model that I think best represents ND’s situation. I thought ND more closely resembled UGA & Richt moving to Smart than they did OU and Lincoln Riley/Stoops. Smart knew they needed to upgrade talent immediately as they had been top 15 recruiting classes and relative success under Richt.
Smart played freshman a lot in 2016. https://www.dawgnation.com/football/team-news/georgia-football-freshmen-162-games-2016/
I think Freeman needs to make that move starting this week. I’m not arguing that you abandon all of the upperclassmen and they don’t see the field at all, but I also don’t see anyone arguing that Lenzy and other seniors are busting with NFL talent either. It helps insulate against transfers, sends a message to the 2023 class that you will be hitting the ground running and that the message that Freeman has rang since he arrived as DC is true. “I’m here to upgrade talent in recruiting and the talent will see field.”
People don’t like the my guys comment, but guess what they hate losing even more. At least this gives the notion that Freeman has a plan forward and is willing to adjust even in the face of adversity.
Lastly, I would call Phil Longo or the Wake Forest OC and ask them what’s the salary they are looking for to be the new ND OC next year.
What younger players would/could reasonably be playing now that are not? Part of this must be thinking of terms of graduating players – upperclassmen who won’t be around next year either. In other words, you don’t play the younger player who would be the backup also again next year.
This is what I was wondering too, at least for the offense. There’s no way Angeli is ready to start until week 6 at the very earliest. Even then, you’re probably only getting him in for special packages. Merriweather probably can play 20 snaps right now. But then I don’t know what other freshmen we could go to. Is Raridon healthy? Staes got a few snaps last week, so maybe get him involved? Ugh the lack of skill position recruiting makes this a bleak exercise.
Fisher, Alt, Styles, Thomas, Diggs, and Estime from the Sophomore class are all already heavily involved in this dumpster fire.
Don’t disagree the offensive recruiting is putrid and that falls squarely on Rees who has been the OC since January 2020. Del Alexander can take some of the blame, but the OC needs to be involved as well and he has stunk.
I think you definitely start Angeli over Pyne. This team doesn’t need anymore of a complex playbook IMO. I didn’t see anything out of Pyne on Saturday or that makes me think he’s any better at diagnosing coverages. Merriweather should be seeing 50% of snaps and Braden Lenzy should be on the bench until mop up time. Look offensive recruiting is trash and that’s on Kelly and Rees. Zeke Correl isn’t it and either is Lugg.
As for the defense, I think you have to start getting this freshman class involved. The DB’s are already seeing action. Has anyone been super impressed by the linebackers and the d-line? Kiser, Bertrand, Bauer, even Marist aren’t taking us to where we want to go. 11-1 with close wins over Toledo, FSU, Va Tech, and games against Purdue and UNC where Kyren Williams’ individual talent won the game should highlight how close we were to having Kelly be the HC in 2022.
I’m all in on Merriweather taking as many snaps as possible, but the staff really doesn’t seem to feel like he’s up to the task yet. Styles and Mayer are the only players I would really like to see get more targets than him though. Good call on the O Line. Lugg is bad bad, anybody should be able to do what he’s doing. I would be nervous tossing Angeli in behind this line, just because I don’t want to cause him to have a nervous breakdown, but he’s almost certainly going to have to take meaningful snaps at some point this season.
Thinking about the D, it’s a tough call. They haven’t looked bad this year, but also haven’t been spectacular. If you go with the youth, you’re probably giving up on even making a bowl. Is the development of younger players more important than the program at least looking somewhat respectable? I don’t know, but Freeman is probably going to have to make that decision soon.
Raridon played three snaps this week in some three or four tight end sets, but I think he was ineligible in formations that had eight on the line for at least a couple of them, much to my chagrin.
Right now Kiser is your only actually good linebacker, so as far as I’m concerned there are plenty of snaps there that should be up for grabs (and many more of them should go to Kiser, who only took 28 on Saturday).
Morrison looks really good and something is wrong with Hart right now. A perfect result would be to fix Cam because he looked great at times last year, but an imperfect result would be to get Morrison on the field more in the secondary.
Didn’t Bauer come off the field looking injured in one of the last defensive series?
I agree with the youth movement, it lends a sense of optimism to the house burning down around our ears.
Bonus Conspiracy Theory – CBK foresaw the mammoth 22-23 fail and bailed. As he retreated from the team, he slipped on a banana peel and fell bass-ackwards into an LSU payday. Luck of the Boston Irish.
Yea I think I remember Bauer holding his arm like his should hurt. Though I think he has been wearing a kind of should harness so it might just be a recurring (relatively minor) kind of thing.
He was moving like he was hurt after he deflected the punt, but came back in shortly after. I’m not sure that proves anything though, the degree of injury Bo would have to sustain to make him ask for a series off is likely quite significant.
I think he definitely saw it coming. I’ve seen it rumored that Swarbrick told him after the Rockne record game no new extension after 24 unless he won a NC.
If that rumor is true, BK definitely had his agent back channel and he went full win now mode after the Va Tech game.
I don’t think even he could have dreamt up the deal his agent landed him in LSU. I think he would have stayed at ND if they would’ve offered the same deal. I think it was more about the bag than winning NC’s for him
Oh I absolutely believe that. I also think his agent was putting feelers out to USC, which seemed ridiculous at the time, but looking back it seems those were more than wild rumors. He slipped into his old ways by hiring mediocre offensive coaches he was familiar with, not putting the time into recruiting, spending more time on the golf course than with the team, etc. There’s a distinct lack up upperclassmen contributing on offense, which is pretty conspicuous when ND brought in after going to the playoff the first time are in their fourth season. The “Kelly 2.0” demeanor was always a fraud, and when he realized the hole this program was looking at, he bolted.
Who are you thinking of in particular?
I would really caution against comparisons to Smart and UGA. It’s a nice thought, but ND has very little in common with that program.
Then who do we want ND to be comparable to? Why are we doing this if we don’t want to try and be the best.
I think it’s a decent comparison. They are program who is built on oline/te play, running the ball, a QB who doesn’t turn the ball over and a dominant defense. They have a first time HC who is a DC who has to rely on his OC to be competent and a HC who understands that nobody can outwork him on the recruiting trail or else he’s already lost.
They have a fan base that is rabid and hadn’t won a NC in 40 years and teams who have been pretty good, but when you step back and analyze haven’t really competed for a NC outside of 2017.
Sure academically are they comparable? No, but who is. Stanford? If that’s the case, then let Freeman go somewhere else and we can go back to someone like Kelly who doesn’t really want to push himself to recruit the talent necessary to win a NC.
Slow down a minute. Let’s go one at a time here and not get all worked up about “Don’t we want to be the best!?!?!?!?!” We had that exact discussion about how ND’s 2022 offense should be modeled after 2019 LSU. Of course we want to be the best, but we have to be realistic about what good models for this program are.
Is Freeman comparable to Smart? Freeman has been coaching college football for 11 years, Smart for 22 — exactly twice as long. Freeman was a DC at Cincy and ND for 4 years before he became a head coach; Smart was a DC at Alabama for 7 years before he became a head coach — again, about twice as long. So, Smart has double Freeman’s experience and also learned under the best college football coach of all time. So, aside from generally having backgrounds in defense, no, they are not that similar at this point in their careers.
Is Rees comparable to Georgia’s OC, Todd Monken? Go to Wikipedia and look up Todd Monken’s resume. Then look up Rees’s. Tell me what you think.
Is ND’s program comparable to Georgia’s? ND is a small Catholic school in the upper Midwest. Georgia is a large state school in the deep south. ND football rarely even considers admitting undergrad transfers. Georgia just won a national title with an undergrad transfer at QB. Georgia recruits almost exclusively from the south; ND recruits nationally. So aside from goals that almost everyone aspires to (dominant defense, QB who doesn’t turn the ball over, strong running game), no, they are not similar.
So if not Georgia, who should ND be modeled after? I don’t know, and I’m not sure there’s a good answer to this. ND is a very unusual football program. We’re the only major independent, one of just two Catholic schools that play in FBS, and one of the smallest FBS schools in terms of enrollment. As noted, we rarely take undergrad transfers, unlike virtually everyone else. It’s likely we can’t just point to another program and say, “Copy what they do.” To the extent there is such a program, it’s probably not Georgia.
Very good points and very fair to slow my roll.
To your point on Smart – I agree, not a 1 to 1 comparison with Freeman. Completely agree that Smart has experiences, mentors and insight that Freeman lacks.
I’m firmly in the camp that Rees both Father and Son need to go. I was way wrong on Tommy in 2022. I thought he would explode onto the scene this year, but man he’s been bad and looks completely lost. Also, the skill recruiting has to be on him even if Del stunk. He’s been the OC, he’s the lead guy on offense. Same with the old man. We need diamonds, not trying to find diamonds in the rough.
I agree that they are not comparable from an institutional standpoint. Some institutional changes need to happen at ND if they want to continue down this path. I think we can both agree that this aspect has been discussed ad nauseum and something that no matter how many of us 18stripers complain isn’t going to change.
In summary, I agree I shouldn’t have put it so emphatically black and white that they just copy one program and very easy of me to say hey this program who won the NC last year, let’s do that. ND’s challenges are more complex than a blog comment for sure. I do still think ND needs to upgrade talent across the board and Freeman is doing that and he should lean into that by playing said talent.
Thanks for saying so; I appreciate it. We have good discussions here and, frustrating as the last 3 games have been, I enjoy them.
Agreed! I read more than I post and always appreciate the lack of personal attacks here even on disagreements.
This is bullshit. We’re supposed to hurl vicious ad hominem attacks at each other after a loss, not have a respectful conversation.
Tyler Buchner’s teammates doing just a terrible job of stabilizing his shoulder as he stands on the sideline!
At some point (probably very soon), the administration is going to have to make some very tough decisions as to how we move forward, because as you both note, we really are so different from the big dogs from an institutional standpoint:
1) Do we accept that we are a top 10 program with exceptional academic standards, that has chosen Independence and a TV contract that puts us on a National TV Broadcast nearly every week?
2) Do we choose to relax our academic standards, as well as join a conference, giving us access to a bye in the Playoff, as well as the other benefits of conference membership?
Personally, as an ND graduate, I would prefer route #1, even if you told me that means we will never win a National Championship ever again. Until the very recent recruiting collapses, I believe Freeman could be the guy to elevate us to a Talent Level on par with the Big 3, but it’s becoming more and more clear that is likely not the case. I certainly don’t fault any ND fan that wants us to move to route #2 and join the big boys as a semi-pro football program. I would probably still watch and love the team. But I would be a bit sad about the route we’ve chosen to go down.
Not an alum myself, older brother graduated in 2003. I went to Catholic grade school and high school in north central Illinois (Peoria Diocese) so only about 2 hours from ND campus. I say this because I think it lends to my belief on parochial schools and how I feel about ND.
I don’t want ND to sacrifice it’s independence and I don’t want ND to sacrifice it’s beliefs regarding educating young adults and setting them up for future success outside of football. However, I don’t think when it comes to athletic prowess ND has truly wanted to be a leader the last 35 years. I feel the same way about the Catholic leadership in my hometown and the Diocese as a whole.
I think ND can embrace and combine paying players & recruits, educating them, setting them up for success in the NFL and or life outside of the NFL. I don’t think it will be easy by any means and it will take true leadership and opening up the opportunity for the entire spotlight to be on you. Because of this, I don’t think the ND administration truly wants that. They have enjoyed their position over the past 35 years of continued endowment growth, good success in non-revenue sports, education profile has continued to grow with football making money for everyone and some recent success. They’ve enjoyed being at the table, but don’t want to be sitting at the head of it so to speak.
I generally feel the same about the parochial education in my area of the state. As times got more tough over the past 30 years for catholic schools, the leadership decided it was going to take too much work to do what was necessary so instead they did little to change and just said well there’s nothing we can do about it.
I also don’t pretend to be that individual to lead that change both on my local level and definitely not ND haha. I understand especially as I get older that the skillset and drive is unique and hard to identify and come-by. But also don’t think either should settle just because it is hard.
Very well spoken (from a 4th generation ND family, I say that with humility and gratitude.)
While it drives people who care about football crazy, I’d bet if given truth serum the overall university is probably totally content with the program for 2017-21 results (occasional playoff, graduating almost everyone, little off field issues, generating revenue interest without pushing the boundaries too much).
But it will be interesting to see what happens, especially in the NIL era. And, scary enough, what about 5+ years from now when players are ruled to be employees and entitled to collectively bargain for their piece of the revenues they generate? Crazy times for the whole of “collegiate” sports and maybe just how much collegiately tied they will remain, at least more than in just name alone.
That’s all exactly right. ND isn’t participating in NIL in a serious way because they don’t want to, not because they can’t. You can’t tell me there aren’t enough rich-guy alums who wouldn’t be willing to collectively pony up $10-15M a year to make ND football play with the big boys; the rich alums are the ones who understand as much as anyone value-creation and realize the players create a lot of value for the school.
But, it’s unseemly to the administration, so our differentiator (as is often the case) is the “we’re special” vibe.
Ironically I think it would be better for the school to go into the employee route, because then they’d just be forced to play along with everyone else. (Yes, they’ll make some noise about deemphasizing football and going DII or whatever, but getting 50-70% of football revenues is better than getting no football revenues; their threats would be empty.) NIL allows for more differentiation, which I think will be relatively bad for ND in this (likely) interim period.
I’ll admit, after attending ND for the literal worst 4 year stretch in ND football history, I’m fairly content with the 2017-2021 results.
I still contend that even though clearly even at the time a crazy example to put yourself in the same breath with the best college offense ever, just speaking theoretically the concepts are areas to borrow.
And it’s not reinventing the wheel, it’s the same basic idea dating back to Rockne: you shift in one direction, see what the defense gives you, then attack to where you have a numbers edge.
That is what I’m most disappointed about for Rees, at his best he has a creative playbook, like the TE tunnel screen to Mayer against tOSU or the play action concepts that look nice when they work.
But it seems like Rees and especially Freeman thought this OL was going to be physical and above average and the team would be based around the power running between the tackles of Estime and Diggs (and then Diggs hurt his shoulder) and having a running QB to keep defenses honest. And that was a very poor miscalculation based on the OL and now they’re in shambles with Buchner out.
I really don’t know where they go from here to change on the fly, but nothing looks like a good option. Really need to become a team that the defense bails out and smarter on that end (i.e. stop playing backups in the 4th quarter in key drives: Ehrensberger, Henderson, Botehlo, etc). As said above, gotta try to win 17-13, which ironically is the opposite of the high-octane modern LSU style offenses that are trying to score touchdowns on basically every play.
Kansas’s win in Nov last year in Austin was a shocker. TheJayhawks still rely on the Transfer Portal. Almost half of the players on their two deep transfers. As far as transfers, Ovie Oghoufo seems to have hit his stride in Texas. In addition to the Weber State win over Utah State, some very entertaining FCS v Group of Five games. The Knights of Holy Cross beat Buffalo on a Hail Mary (37-31). Eastern Kentucky beat Bowling Green in 7 OTs. After spotting Nevada a 17-3 lead, Incarnate Word scored 52 points, taking a one touchdown lead into the fourth quarter. They traded scores until a TD in the last minute secured the game for a Cardinals win 55-41. The game finished in a thick haze from the Mosquito fire located between Reno and Sacramento. I like the new KU uniforms.
So NDNation is doing just fine, thanks for asking.
lol, you can never forget your first love.
Gruden or Urban, whomst is more toxic and unhireable at this point? (Especially at Notre Dame!) That will probably pop up there soon, if it hasn’t already.
OMG. I haven’t even thought about NDN for years, I was counting on some of you to let me know of any weirdness out of the ordinary. And here it is. I do recall all that NDN fascination with him, but you would think the awfulness of his emails would have put a stake in that.
sickos.jif
Gruden? I hear Scott Frost is looking for work.
Decided. Emailing. Advantage.
The Four Horseman’s Lounge at II wanted to get in on the act too…
Post title lets you know it’s going to be a spicy tamale: “You might think I’m joking but I’m not…”
When mentioned that the type of athletes would be more Salerno than actual D1-type of talent, he doubled down with a response..
Actually, ND’s offense right now looks a lot like Dillon’s when I was there!
Also, what better way to impress the coaching staff than hurling your guts up during the game because your dorm got the noon Sunday slot and you were at Finny’s until 3 a.m.?
What the hell, Marshall is clearly a top 5 program. It Just Means More in the Sun Belt.
Was actually thinking Marshall may end up the year ranked between 25-30. I’m hoping that’s our floor and like last year we get things figured out with what we have like last year. Although we don’t have last year’s talent, obviously, so we won’t get to #5, but we can hang around 25-30 range.
Speaking of last year’s talent, here’s a quote from Greg Flammang: Kyren Williams touched the ball 497 times from scrimmage the last 2 seasons, 78 receiving, and scored 31 touchdowns. Everyone talks about MF being 0-3 to start, Notre Dame is 0-3 since KW left the program. Special player whose intangibles are as hard to replace as his ability.
Well Greg, for me it’s not the intangibles. It’s having a guy who can get hit three yards in the backfield and then bust a 90 yard run. Or at least a successful run play. It’s a guy who can truck a blitzing linebacker or anticipate a whiffed block from a lineman and slow down a 290 DE end enough for a QB to get a throw off. Just watch Kyren pass blocking clip on youtube and then watch Estime see an unblocked OSU LB come straight through a hole right at him and then he sorta kinda gives him a nudge on his way to blowing up TB. For me it’s pretty tangible that he was a perfect back for an imperfect line, and like having JOK or Kyle Hamilton, one freak in college can cover up a lot of problems, especially against inferior talent.