Yesterday’s game against San Diego State was not the kind of start any of us had hoped for. SDSU was smaller, slower, and injured and we were an inch or two away from being down 2 scores in the fourth quarter. I’ve been saying all summer long that if we couldn’t run the ball against SDSU or struggled scoring points, we would be in trouble this year so seeing us struggle to move the ball on the ground was extremely disappointing.
Still, a day later I tried like hell to find some positives out of Saturday’s game. Maybe its the optimist in me who doesn’t want to think that I’ve waited all off-season to see how improved we’d be only to find out we aren’t that improved at all. Whatever the reason, he are some positives I took out of yesterday’s game.
- Golden Tate is a legit playmaker. Tate showed he has made a lot of progress since last season and was the only consistent threat on offense for Notre Dame. He showed that he is very, very good at playing the ball once its in the air. His two near catches – the sideline “catch” that was ruled out of bounds and the deep play in which he was interferred with – were both nearly spectacular catches that take good concentration and excellent hands to make. Considering he is still just a sophomore and learning everyday, seeing him was very encouraging.
- Jimmy Clausen looks MUCH better. Clausen made some very nice throws. His touchdown passes to Golden Tate and David Grimes were perfectly thrown balls. He did throw two interceptions but one was 100% on Duval Kamara (the one that hit him in the numbers) and on the other Kamara didn’t do Clausen any favors either. Clausen showed some good zip on the ball that wasn’t really there last year and for the most part he made very good decisions. One play that ended up not hurting him was when Clausen ran out of bounds five yards behind the line of scrimmage instead of throwing the ball away but that play was luckily negated by a SDSU penalty.
- The OL didn’t allow a sack. Yes it was San Diego State, but after surrendering an average of almost 5 sacks a game last year it was nice to see the OL keep Clausen standing upright. Now, if we can just get them to run block…
- Michael Floyd looks like he is every bit as good as advertised. He only had one catch, but it was a touchdown and on the play Floyd got behind the SDSU corner within five yards. He exploded off the line and had the corner beat in an instant. He was also WIDE open running down the field on a few occassions in the fourth quarter but didn’t have the ball thrown his way. I don’t see any way that he isn’t on the field much more this weekend.
- Armando Allen is running much tougher. Allen broke some tackles that he wouldn’t have broken last year. On his one nice punt return he broke at least 3 tackles. His vision is still a little suspect and he missed some cut back lanes, but it was nice to see him running stronger.
- Kyle McCarthy is an excellent tackler. There isn’t a better tackler on the team than Kyle McCarthy. He ended up with 15 tackles on Saturday and didn’t miss the kind of tackles some of his defensive counterparts did.
- Raeshon McNeil was very good in coverage. He missed a couple tackles in supporting the run, but his coverage was pretty good.
- Sergio Brown appears to be a very good nickel back. Brown played a lot on Saturday and was probably the most effective blitzer for Notre Dame.
- Special Teams looked improved other than the place kicking. The return units looked better; the coverage units looked better; the punt block team blocked a punt; Maust was pretty good punting the ball. The missed 48 yarder by Brandon Walker was disappointing, but at least he had plenty of leg on it and it was close – in years past we’ve seen some really ugly misses. Long snapping was VERY poor, but that should be expected with a new long snapper. Still, the special teams gave the offense outstanding field positon twice in the first half with the punt block and Allen’s tackle breaking return.
One thing about Forde and ESPN: Would they be so anti-ND if ND joined ESPN’s near monopoly? Personally I’d like to see NBC and CBS get a few more conferences away from the ESPN cartel. ND has been singled out but the reality is that ESPN’s conferences get a lot of hype. Look at the Big Ten this year.
I read Forde’s garbage. what a worthless use of disk space. I’ll comment on that in another post.
ND’s win was solid and worthy. This team still has some holes and a long way to go to be where we wan them which is a perennial top 10 team with legitimate title hopes. And I’m still uncertain that Weis will get them there, BUT they played with leadership, and took advantage of Michigan miscues. ND didn’t fumble as often. And ND’s pressure caused issues for Michigan. The offensive line didn’t consistently blow holes, but they did block decently. Clausen didn’t get sacked. Many positives, and some things to for the team to remain humble about and work on. They should hit practice, upbeat but ready to work. They can beat MSU, but they’ll need to be prepared to do it.
Great win and we’ll take it. Go Irish!!!
Hey Bleed, It just gets better, Pat Forde the Senior media mouth from the EGO SPORTS NET WORK is having a personal diatribe moment over the ND victory.
I love it when they whine this hard. Gee, did he give OSU the same lip service for their dynamic loss to USC 35-3?
Hmm….3 blow outs for OSU and they still get a media mouth pass?
The Irish played very good… regardless of the vainglorious
comments from the usual prima donnas over at ESPN.
One game at a time and maybe we can get them to squak and whine a little harder. Sweet beautiful MUSIC!
Sorry about my language. Did I mention F!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Mark Mays. In your FACE!
Well, the transformation came true 35-17 ND, where’s Frankie?
bleednd82,
Good start off – would like to see Frankie’s preview. But I’ll bite now.
This will be an interesting game because the jury is still out on both teams. The “professional” analysis by ESPN ( College Football Pimps ), is pathetic.
Michigan’s front 4 is an unknown. Utah handled them until ironically, the Utes went Loydd Carr conservative in the 2nd half. Does Miami (Ohio) have anything? I don’t know. So yes Mich’s front 4 are solid, but not proven yet. That one boils down to ND’s O-line, enough said.
ND’s Skill players totally outclass UofM’s. I have no doubt if our line can reasonably run block and pass block, we’ll put up 24 or more points.
On defense, I believe we held something back. It was a pretty straightfoward blitz scheme, and I suspect you’ll see some wrinkles tomorrow. I expect the pass coverage to be blanketing, and solid. If our offense can control the ball, I do not expect Michigan to have a ton of success on the run. But the offense MUST help the defense here.
Bottom line: ND must be both emotional, but patient. By emotional, I mean positive. By patient, I mean not getting down because of some potential adversity in the middle of the game.
ND can and should win this. if a fast start gets the fans fired up, then this year’s Michigan team could fold under the pressure. No predictions, but I’d like to see a 31-10 score in favor of the Irish.
Weis shouldn’t even stand next to Lou on saturday. Weis is anything but a headcoach. And to prove my point, I guarantee Duval will start and Floyd will not. Lou would have bench that slug, in favor of Floyd, after the first INT, let alone play him after 2.
Game time tomarrow Men. Lets move on and focus on scUM coming into town. Frankie doesnt have a preview up yet but Im guessing he will sometime today. I will get it started.
I think our D line and lb’s will control the line of scrimmage and we will win that battle. scUM O is terrible. So far ours is soso. I watched the Utah game and it looks like they have a good D but dont like to be spread out. I think we need to Spread their Lb’s and Db’s out in order to run up the middle and give the ball to HUGHES!
Joe Murbox,
Ever go on http://www.und.com and see a practice video? Unless they don’t ever show it, the practices look pretty low key. I hate mentioning his name in here, but Pete Carroll will get in the mix during his practice and jump over a pile to demonstrate something. I don’t think its that these kids are suppressed but more of they never get fired up in practice. I hope I’m wrong. I’d love for someone to tell me I’m wrong.
are the players coming out to professional a reflection of charlie, VERY FLAT? I expected energy with tons of group celebrations after any semi-big play like the days of Vontez Duff.
The KIDS need to have fun, let them go out there and be loose and get each other fired up. they look like they do not have pulses in their body.
I would like to be positive, but ND football reached a new low against SDSU. If you can’t run the ball your not going to win games. Look for Clausen to throw 50 times per game to offset near-zero rushing yards.
If they defense can make plays it will help, but they are young an untested.
The one person I would not like to be right now is Charlie Weis.
JC,
I’m with you, hoping some transformation of the line is underway an dwe just haven’t seen it.
For all: on Wikipedia there is an interesting entry for Notre Dame football. It talks about successful and unsucessful era’s. Terry Brennan is given special note. A lot of statisitcs to put in perspective all the trends. After reading it, I can see why we’re all hopeful, but restless.
By the way guys, I understand the concerns; this is without question a critical year. I too, Love Lou’s approach to football.
I suspect if we don’t see marked improvement this Saturday against Michigan and WIN, it will be extremely difficult not to be hypercritical.
It is embarrassingly obvious the offensive line has a long way to go. Hopefully some positive transformation will indeed take place vs Michigan.
GO IRISH!
C-Dog, your right on the money. Charlie still has his way when it comes to calling offensive plays. He may say that the coordinators will call plays, but Charlie is a control freak. Not that there is nothing wrong with that, but the university is paying them GOOOOD money to call the plays.
Watching Saturday’s game one thought came to my mind, “Here we go again!” But as the game progressed, Jimmy Clausen gained more confidence, and he lead the offense to 2 additional scores. To me it shows that he can handle the pressure much better than last year. The true test is Michigan!
C-Dog
I didnt see very good play calling by Haywood. I think this is actually because Charlie may have not settled him down enough and maybe just turned him completely loose on his first game. I wasn’t happy with the power run abandoning.
Also, on defense I wasn’t happy with the amount of pass coverage we ran.
I hope they get their stuff right for Michigan. UM will not let us run down the field twice in a row at the end of the game to score TDs. I think if we get a fast start we’ll be ok.
GOOOOOOO
IRISHHHHHHHH
BEATT..
MICHIGAN
I think the truth about the game was turnovers. Lets do the math Hughes doesn’t fumble(7). Kamara turns around(7). No fumble on the field goal(3). Their is an extra 17 points added to the 21 they already had now we are at 38. I won’t count the missed FG because that happens and the hit Allen took was a great shot. With great hits sometimes fumbles happen. If those points would have been scored the defense may have had a little time to rest and hold off SDSU scoring drives. I am not saying this looked like a polished team but no young team does even against a lesser opponent especially in its first game. Building confidence in yourself and your team takes time. Expecting to win instead of expecting to lose happens when you are winning. Once they are able to gain that confidence they will build on it (the beating by the media and fans those kids took last year was pretty bad). Will they win every game no but with more confidence in yourself and your teams ability you won’t hesitate on the field. When you have confidence you let it all hang out on the field. I am waiting to see that switch flip. The game kind of felt like the players were holding back. I could be wrong on all of this and we are as bad as everyone thinks but I choose to beleive these kids have it in them to win and be a good team this year and an even better team next year. ND fans we got to stay positive. GO IRISH!
“I thought Davie was a snake the way he bad mouthed Lou. But Ty and Charlie are class acts. My concern her is simply that ND teams until Bob Davie, were almost always ready to compete.”
AMEN C-DOG- Aside from 2005 (year of the Bush Push), I have not seen an ND team that has been consistently ready to at least compete. That is coaching. When you play scared and “not to lose” it is blatantly obvious.
Let’s hope that changes and changes fast. Go Irish…
Joe Tennant,
Like the comments on the play calling. They talk about Clausen getting a better command of running the offense this year, thinking beyond the next play. Do you think Haywood is going to have that problem, being this is HIS rookie year as Offensive coordinator? Can Weis guide him without being overbearing?
SDSU was looking forward to this game. You can bet that in camp they were running plays to pick up our blitzes. I thought, for the most part, our blitzing was ineffective. We played good coverage when we dropped 6 or 7.
Also, I have to disagree with our abandonment of the run. The first 3rd and 2 after running for 4-5 yards easily, Haywood called a pass play without Jimmy getting in any rythym. This kindof incompletion/punt puts us in a negative frame of mind right off the bat.
I say we should have pounded, pounded, pounded the ball until they decided to put 8 in the box. I mean we have 300lb offensive linemen, and they were on their backup defensive linemen. I hate to see our coaching staff “overthink” their playcalling, but we need to develop a more aggressive attitude. Even in the 2nd half our run plays were draws, delays that are based from the passing game. I want to see us line up 2/3 tight sets and smash the ball on teams like SDSU.
Our guys played their asses off and I feel like our coaching was sub par based on our play calling.
GO Irish, but damn that was a close one against an undermanned opponent.
The real forecast for this season will come on Saturday against Michigan. I am hoping Charlie was holding back, and did not want to show Michigan anything. I am hoping Charlie was thinking, “OK, run what we have to run to get the win, and keep it simple”. I don’t want to be negative, but I can’t take another season like last season. I can’t take another team like last years that COULD NOT MOVE THE BALL (We fired Davie for a reason). I think the players need to stop playing scared, waiting for something bad to happen, and get out there and make ND proud!!
GO IRISH!!
Kudos, Frankie on Clausen.
JDH puts the right tone on this conversation. Look, I’d rather see honorable guys like Weis and his immediate predecessor succeed. I thought Davie was a snake the way he bad mouthed Lou. But Ty and Charlie are class acts. My concern her is simply that ND teams until Bob Davie, were almost always ready to compete. That usually means few mistakes, an effective ground game against 90% of your opponents, and tough defense. It also means seeing a nucleus of tough guys who walk the walk. Coaching finds that kind of recruit and molds that kind of recruit into an effective player by year two or three. I don’t care if they win one game this year. But I think, given the schedule, an 8 to 10 win season will be a by-product of taking care of the elemental aspects required of these coaches to give the Irish the hope of competing for a National Championship in the coming years. I don’t want to give up on that. Not yet, not ever. Go Irish!
HIKEND.COM:
No apologies necessary my man. We’ve got some great discussions going on here with alot of good points being made. I just needed to clarify mine.
And JC: I’m not griping just to gripe. I’ll let C-Dog’s explanation suffice. I understand where your coming from- griping too much creates an atmosphere of negativity. I got it off my chest and now it’s time to move on. I’m hoping Weis and staff are dealing with these concerns/problems all this week. Go Irish…
I almost wish this week’s game was at Michigan so the Irish would have less chance of being booed.
Does anyone want to recognize that this game was a few costly miscues away from something like 42-14. At the end of the day, all Jimmy had to do was say, “Run real fast towards the endzone. The ball will be waiting for you.” Face it, if Floyd and Tate had played from the get go, and if the scheme was simplified to let them run right past the DB lined up in front, this game would have been over in the first quarter. That’s what college teams usually do when they have a clear athletic advantage. Even though Weis has been on the receiving end several times going back to the Fiesta Bowl against OSU, he still insists on outsmarting everybody. That’s not an entirely bad philosophy because, like next week, you eventually run into a team that can match your athleticism, and your players/coaches have to prove they actually understand how to play the game. As it stands this team still has more frosh on the two-deep than all but 3 other FBS teams. They still aren’t going to consistently execute in the immediate future. But unlike last year, at least they have a chance for big plays, which will make everything else easier. I just can’t believe all the pessimism after Jimmy was THAT close to having a phenomenal game (Tate slips cutting in the endzone, Kamara doesn’t look back).
As for not running the ball effectively, anyone would agree that we kinda telegraphed our punch the week before. Still, I don’t remember too many negative plays where we weren’t simply outnumbered.
His decision making isn’t there yet, but Jimmy already throws a better ball than Quinn did as a senior. Hughes, Allen, Floyd, Tate, and yes Kamara have way more upside than Walker, Thomas, McKnight, Grimes, and Stovall respectively (Samardzija is still in his own class).
We’ll see about the D-line on the 13th. I don’t remember Williams and Kuntz being on the field at the same time too often (could be wrong).
The only people that need to go are those two d-bag NBC commentators.
Not quite, JC.
I’m not wanting to gripe. I am pointing out concerns and things I feel bear watching to determine if there is hope or need for a change. This year is the year to determine that. An arbitrary number of wins isn’t the metric, it’s seeing certain things. I look to the coaches to lead and cause those things to happen. One thing is the Offensive line play. The coaches need to set the bar higher. I think they have enough talent to have a better than average line. That offensive line has gotten worse every year and that clearly has been the achilles heel of this staff. Lou Holtz would have seen that problem and corrected it before last year. Aaron Taylor knows how that offensive line needs to be coached and should be on staff. The mental mistakes, would have been stamped out by a Holtz coached squad. Again setting a high but achievable bar. Finally people are right in questioning the attitude. Again Holtz knew to keep the kids under wraps until the appropriate time, such as the Miami fight in 1988. ND teams knew in days gone by that “Fightin Irish” doesn’t mean starting a fight, it means ending it. When you walk with that attitude, folks understand and respect you. That’s the chip you want these guys to have. The coaches need to whip that into the players through tough disciplined practices.
Those are the elements I want to notice this year regardless of wins.
Amen Bleed, Gripe-Fest 101 over?
After reading a lot of posts the results seems pretty negative. I saw a team struggle for 3 quarters and in the 4th something changed. It might have been the O went in 2 minute drill or Jimmy C finally figured “it” out. I dont know but a win is a win in my book. 1-0 looks better than 0-1 no matter who your playing against.
If we see the ND team that showed up and played the 4th quarter we will beat Michigan on Saturday. If we see the team that played the first 3 we will not.
When will I see a star emerge ? You’re at Notre Dame,you play on national television every week,and most of these guys are big time recruits.There has to be time when a player with true talent says get me the ball and leads by example.
Man guys love to complain about coaching when things don’t turn out the way everyone thinks they will. Weis makes mistakes, but nobody was complaining about his developing talent those first two years. Look at Ty’s team in 2004, and Charlie’s in 2005 and it’s not even close.
The running game was bad yesterday, but the offense never got into rhythm (which is something that the running game needs). The lack of rhythm wasn’t all the coaches fault either, the players made those mistakes (Duval Kamara). Execution can sometimes be on the coaching, but it is much more often on the players-because mental mistakes happen in tight situations, even if you are prepared.
Also, the Irish have a lot of young players on the 2 deep, how would they be moving up if the staff wasn’t teaching proper fundamentals?
The biggest contributors are all young guys, and it looks like offensive lineman (from the first full recruiting class) like Sam Young were clearly over rated.
Sorry JDH, I wasn’t trying to call you out in particular. It just struck me how we’ve all been complaining about this team’s lack of emotion, but at the same time we hold Notre Dame as being above things like ego. We want nasty AND we want sportsmanship, but I don’t think we always know where the line is between them.
I would hope that even if there’s something disingenuous about the attitude now, that it would kickstart the kind of emotion that might lead this team to the point where they deserve to be a little cocky. Fake it until you make it.
Svenghali had a great point, that SDSU was looking ahead. I thought about this once, yesterday, and that’s probably a lot more than most people thought about it. After all, who’s thinking anything about SDSU? And Saturday’s game will be the biggest game San Diego will play all season.
With that said, I was going into the game thinking anything less than 50-pointing SDSU was going to be a dissapointment. I was a little cocky, but I only noticed Clausen when he had his head down.
Michigan: Their defense is good. Way better than their offense. So is our defense, but I don’t think defense will win next Saturday’s game for either team. I think the first offense to finally wake up, shake off the rust, and play like an elite offense, will win.
My standards for ND this year is to reach a bowl game, preferably one where our opponent isn’t way better than us, as in years past. We’ve already got one win. Since we’re obviously not after a BCS birth, final score really doesn’t mean anything. The Irish just need to go out and find a way to win, whether it be ugly or hideous. Polls and bookies can eat their point-spreads. Bottom line = Win.
Clausen looked like he can make some big plays for this offence if given the time. This week ND plays my home states pride and joy Mich. I hope this game is not as bad as it appears on paper. It looks like a 10-7 win for ND, but they must let Hughes run the ball more to set up the play action pass. Allen is a good player but he is not Reggie Bush or Darius Walker, he has great speed but does not have the vision to break big runs.
I know Charlie loves tall receivers, but Kamara is too inconsistent to have on the field during big plays. Tate and Grimes are the best two weapons the passing game has right now, and they must be on the field to help Clausen live up to the hype that surrounds him. The secondary looked a lot better, but if the blitzes don’t get to the quarterback there will be easy big plays to come. I’m not ready to call for Charlie’s head just yet, but if he doesn’t find a way to make the proper adjustments it is time to let him go. This team has the talent to win eight games this season, or at least beat U of M and their little sisters at MSU. Go Irish !!!
Also, I noticed that I FAILED to mention the positives about Clausen. No doubt that he made some fine passes that were very impressive. And I think C-Dog’s comments are right on. The bigger problem is the coaches, not Clausen or any other player/kid.
WOAH THERE! I’m not “complaining about a lack of confidence and then simultaneously condeming a player for showing confidence”! First, I’m not CONDEMNING anyone. Complaining yes.
As a former D-1 athlete myself, THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN COCKINESS AND CONFIDENCE/SWAGGAR. We may not agree on where that line is, but there is still a difference.
I hope Clausen DOES get his team fired up and I hope he WILL be great. Sincerely. But until then get back to work. Brady Quinn didn’t/doesn’t have an arrogant bone in his body- Clausen is a long way from Brady’s career.
Saturday’s game was a little scary for an Irish fan. Thank goodness for Bruton’s play to knock the ball out and recover it, otherwise the game could have turned out different. We may have seen Weis fired that night. The defense played pretty solid and I absolutely love the constant blitzing. This is something we used to never do. We always let qb’s stand back there and pick us apart. Now, we are making the opposing team’s offense to make plays. If you think about it, the blitz was somewhat ineffective against SDSU because the QB was getting rid of it after a one step drop out of shotgun. That is the reason they somewhat moved the ball on us. Once we figured out to press the receivers at the line, that type of offense wasn’t getting anywhere.
Offensively, Jimmy Clausen is an extremely accurate passer. Whether it is deep passes, deep outs, short throws, he is putting it on the money. It looks to me like his arm is stronger, but still could use improvement. I guess this is because I am still used to Brady Quinn zipping it in there. But, Jimmy’s arm will only get stronger as he grows. If you think about it though, we could have easily had 13 more points on the board with the fumbles and botched kicks. So, our offense didn’t play terrible, but it didn’t turn any heads either.
I look forward to seeing how our team will step up to better competition in the next three weeks. Go Irish!!!!
Frankie V,
I agree with you. Clausen just like all the skill players on offense are good enough. I keep harping, but on the field, it’s the offensive line that needs to improve. I clearly think this is a coaching, not personnel issue. It’s not just one or two linemen.
Here’s the larger coaching issue. Charlie has talked about the issue of developing these kids. Why have other active coaches been able to do that in a quicker timeframe? How did the last successful ND coach do it? Lou, and Ara are around get and listen to them for help. Listen to Aaron Taylor.
I can’t fault the kids on the team. I’d say they are all doing what they think is best. It’s the coaching staff of seasoned veteran coaches who have to pass on leadership, toughness, and a winning ( not cocky ) attitude. Again jury’s out, but may be in by the seventh game.
The game was indeed frustrating for all fans who wanted to see immediate change and a return to the first two years of Weis’ tenure. I know I would, and I’m the first to admit that my patience is a till tried, but let’s remember that aside from the O-line, many of the starters (all the offensive playmakers for instance) for still young, inexperienced, and have a lot of weight on their shoulders to perform above expectations. Seeing their faces on the sideline Saturday you could see they were more concerned about disappointing the crowd behind them than their team mates. It’s imperative that many fans have patience. Sergio Brown was a huge surprise and a key player on defense and special teams. Clausen showed some real perseverance and clearly did not seek to blame offensive mistakes on his teammates. He simply eased his team into each drive. I do hope everyone noticed how well coached SDSU was…Chuck Long did an incredible job picking up on the ND blitz…sometimes having as many as 6 or 7 men blocking to protect Lindley. And despite their injuries, he was able to stack the line and stop the run in many situations. Often, it was just too clear to the SDSU defense what play would be run. Each game is different and often the team that shows up to play is different each week. Certainly that was the case for SDSU and hopefully that will be the case of ND in the coming weeks.
I’m with Frankie V about Clausen. He’s single-handedly trying to pump up a flagging team. You can’t complain about a lack of confidence and then condemn one of the players for showing too much confidence. Right now, as fans, we’re in a place where we’re mad enough to hate everything, but let’s not hate on a kid who’s doing his best to keep up morale.
After last season I’m no longer inclined to look for positives in what was a terrible performance. After one week we’re a bad team, and until it’s proven otherwise on the field I’m going to operate under that assumption – we’re bad. This could easily be another long year, despite the easier schedule.
Clausen looked good, I think he is the real deal, Kamera stinks, if he doesn’t want to play get someone who can. WE HAD FOUR TURNOVERS AND TWO BOTCHED FIELD GOALS!!! my biggest complaint against Charlie, end of the game forth down and two to go, 26 secs on the clock, would be a thirty five yard field goal approx? and he is more comfortable going for the first down than kicking the field goal! How can you put a team like this on the field, I mean STOP PRACTICING EVERYTHING ELSE AND GET A GUY TO HOLD A DOGGONE PLACE KICK!!! it’s these little things…. and Kamera has not heart, or else he’s hurt, and WE NEED WIDE RECIEVERS TO BLOCK DOWN FIELD that was the cause of Allen’s fumble, and stay on their blocks, and ALLEN NEEDS TO LEARN TO COVER UP! the hughes’ fumble was a bad call, he let go of the ball to avoid getting injured and clearly his knee was down. When will the IRISH get officials from their conference to come to home games? Can’t we get some refs from NBC?
Am I the only one with NO ISSUE whatsoever with Clausen’s demeanor/attitude? The kid is going to be great and we need more attitude like that out there. I’m tired of seeing ND play flat an emotionless.
It was the first game and all that, so yes the jury is out. What concerns me most of all is the amount of mental errors. And they are not few and far between at ND.They are a long pattern of behavior. ND wills itself to lose. You can see it in their demeanor and their incredible lack of execution at key times. This is a lack of discipline that trickles down from Weis and it shows that the players DO NOT HAVE CONFIDENCE in their coaches.
The other thing that I HATE is Jimmy Clausen’s demeanor. He walks around like he’s a proven QB and Heisman Winner! His cockiness in VERY UNBECOMING. Someone needs to remind him that he’s a sophomore that has won 4 games against crap teams. ND has got a looong way to go to show that they are not literally one of the worst teams in the nation. And if they don’t win at least 7 games, Weis should be gone. Offensive genius or not, he does not command respect and confidence from his players.
On the positive side, the Defense really was solid. They will get worn down against good teams because that blitzing style needs an offense that can sustain drives.
But the coverage was excellent. Remember SDSU is a very good passing team. No breakdowns in coverage and in fact it was as tight as I’ve ever seen it, even in the Holtz era.
The blitzing was pretty good, although you’d like to have seen some sacks. They’ll get that going in the coming weeks.
My only fear is that they may get beat on the run. Saw a few problems there, but am most worried that a team may try to pound on them and wear them down. That’s where the offense will need to help out.
Bottom Line: D looks improved
We have great talent at the skill positions. All three backs are good enough and comparible to anything Holtz had. The problem is the O-line hasn’t been well prepared. Remember, SDSU’s D-Line was it’s 2nd string due to injuries and we couldn’t push the pile or blow holes. watching the backs was very much like watching Barry Sanders play for the Lions. At least they seemed to learn to pass block this year. I ask, how do other coaches develop their players so quickly when ND’s coaches seem to think blocking is rocket science? Aren’t our linemen supposed to be smarter?
Good question about Skip Holtz getting more out of ND type cast offs. Lou also got more out of lesser talent to fill holes. The issue never came up. Anyone remember, Reggie Ho, Pat Eilers, Stan Smagala?
I’m not on the dump Charlie bandwagon yet. He learned something in the offseason. But given that Skip Holtz also has ND connections, and is demonstrating that he can lead and coach, I’m on the watch. Less than 8 wins with this weak schedule and I’ll be calling for a change.
This was a dark weekend. A win but shattered all hope going into this season.
More Floyd and Tate, bench Duval until he can cathc a damn ball.
Anyone else want Skip Holtz to take over, and get rid of Charlie? He can recruit but clearly can’t coach worth a damn.
Hope it doesn’t turn into another long season, GO ND
Everyone’s like “OMG, SDSU is so bad ’cause they lost to Cal Poly.” Well maybe they got caught looking ahead.
Kamara reminded me of a young Maurice Stovall so much its frightening. One good thing about this team is that they could afford to replace him with playmakers. When’s the last time that would’ve happened? Tate and Floyd are going to be legendary.
If the offense can execute play action (didn’t see much), opposing defenses will have a lot to worry about.
They need to use Schwapp against Michigan for additional run blocking.
I think a hurry-up/2-minute offense gives us the best chance to roll against UM.
The secondary is for real.
This game sucked for fans, but look on the bright side. The Irish are back under the radar. Holtz almost blew their cover..lol!
I wish i could attribue this poor showing to a first game of the year rust but im not sure. If they want to “pound it” better give it to Hughes who faired a little better in my opinion. There is a good chance with a second coming of Bettis/Watters or Becton/Zellers with Allen/Hughes in the form of lightning and thunder. The problem was SD State wasnt really a test for the o-line. Next week is going to be scary, but thankfully it seems we have a decent D and wont get burned for big plays. I expect a stagnant offense but could be wrong. Its just frustrating that during the Ty regime the excuse was the lack of recruits. All the starters on our O-line are 4 an 5 stars so what the hell is going on? How is East Carolina thumping on people with players that ND didnt want?