Notre Dame 2015 Shamrock Series Keys to Victory

“Style points”? Or “strength of schedule” when most were set before there were even playoffs?
When you have only four teams chosen, and you could easily make the case for eight this year, “style points” are the glaring weakness evident in the playoff scenario. Robert above is correct in that selective attention to certain teams’ style points has been arbitrarily enforced by fans and pundits. The playoff committee has an impossible task this year, and will in the future as well as parity continues. Last night, as I mentioned above, I heard Clemson “blew out” Wake by 20, after Wake having just played with an emotional edge and with an extra-week prep vs. ND the week before- which many described as ND struggling to win by “only” 21. So rather than encouraging the elite to run up the scores as their schedules wind down, like was the case before the playoffs, giving more than four the opportunity to earn the championship would be fairer and more telling as to who actually belong in the final four at season’s end. If it’s eight, or even six with the top 2 getting a bye- one more game for those who earn their way into the final four would serve the process better. With seemingly thousands of bowl games leading up to New Year’s Day, one or two to serve as elimination playoff games would both generate greater revenue for the host bowl and make it fairer than it now exists.

ND is only school that has to apologize for winning all other schools that win ugly get a pass. If ND beats Stanford they should be in playoff. Maybe BK needs to scream at media the way Sabin and Dabo and all the other coaches do each week. Big 12 is a joke league that plays video game football, first to 50 pts seems to win there.

The Irish have had a good year without question – 10-1 with wins over #16 Navy and Southern Cal, Temple, Pitt – all pretty good teams. Their only loss being to the #1 team in the country and I think they win that one if they had gone to OT. That being said, last night’s win vs. BC was extremely disappointing. They needed to win convincingly and “score some points” with the selection committee and they did anything but that – in fact they hurt themselves significantly. The bottom line is ND is not playing their best football right now (Wake and BC) and this is not the time of year to play poorly. Not sure I understand how they can play so poorly when so much is on the line. Last night killed them. 5 turnovers and three were either inside BC’s two yard line or in BC’s end zone – they “gave” at least 21 points away last night. Reminded me of the Clemson game. Inexcusable! They should have won by 24 or more last night. ND always seems to play up (or down) to their level of competition. Here’s hoping they “bring it” next Saturday and find a way to win at Stanford! If they can get it done I think it’s hard to keep them out of the playoff.

Just heard Clemson at home “blew out” Wake by 20 from a sports analyst on a college-day wrap-up show. Same guy last week said ND at home struggled to defeat Wake by 21.
So is the final score relevant or not? Let’s review . . .
Bottom line: ND is 10-1 – it’s only loss to #1 rated and at Clemson, by 2 points, having won on the road three of the last four, (playing BC at Fenway is not an ND home game, regardless what NBC calls it), with still another road game to go.
I know injuries are part of the game, but has any other team lost as many starters approaching their last road game and still won 10 of their 11 games – or even close to 10 games?
I suspect no one has lost 12 starters- period!

ND will probably have to win at Stanford to even secure a major bowl, let alone the final four. A tough order at this point – now adding K. Russell (Stress fractured leg), and CJ (leaving the field on crutches) to the limping wounded dozen or so -both having played great despite the team’s very ugly, sloppy win in Fenway. But it was a win!

Great individual efforts by Carlisle and Brown despite numerous team dropped passes, 5 turnovers (could have been more), and an 80 yard QB keeper for a TD by BC, with BC seemingly gaining more yards offensively in the second half than ND. That’s not good! Kudos to the ball-hawking Eagles. Haven’t seen such aggressive attacking of the ball both against the run or the pass since Peanuts Tillman left the Bears!

ND returns to another red zone horror show – or this would have been much more impressive vs. the best D they’ve faced.

Bourbon and a cigar. Just another win. 10-1. Could have been a loss!!!! But it wasn’t. Thanks.

Worst game this season that’s been played. They are lucky they scored more than BC. They gave naysayers much proof they don’t belong in the top 4 CFP ratings. Maybe they need to take some coffins to Palo Alto because if they play like how they played tonight, they are going to get buried by Stanford.

has kizer caught tommy rees disease? play great between the 20 yardlines, turn it over in the red zone.

CAN YOU GUYS NOT TURN THE FRICKING BALL OVER, JESUS

We were led to believe that Temple was the second coming of the 85 Bears. How many points have they given up of late to far from powerhouse teams? The USF Bulls are certainly right up there with Bama and Ohio St., I guess.

Then it was Wake’s D being the Steel Curtain reborn. Anyone seeing what Clemson is doing to that same D?

We’re always told that every team that plays ND is playing its Super Bowl. Just another excuse for when this team underachieves.

How about for a change the Irish play like it was their Super Bowl and they exert their collective will against a vastly inferior opponent?!

Enough of hyping inferior opponents to make us feel good about this Irish team.

It’s time for them to do the talking for themselves on the field, preferably starting tonight against BC!

The Wake game was exactly what it should’ve been; a convincing win, with all the cards held very close to the chest. In the same conditions, I’d predict Kelly to do the same against BC, but with the rapid ascension of OU into the #4 talk, I doubt he’ll have the same wholly conservative attitude. My guess is he’ll seek dominance with the same vanilla football we saw against Wake, but if there’s any doubt that the game might end as anything other than convincing, he’ll stretch the field and go for points.

Fuller wasn’t shut down, he was never activated.

The point about Elmer, though, couldn’t be more accurate. I couldn’t see well enough through his snot bubbles to get the color on his pacifier, but I do remember the laughing face of Ejiofor. I haven’t seen an owning like that in years. Sore ankle or not, his performance was simply embarrassing. Let’s hope it was just a really, really bad game, because if that’s what he’s going to be for the remainder of the season, all of Kelly’s attempts to restrain the strengths of his offense won’t veil that glaring weakness. Stanford will take full advantage.

@ Jack…agreed the WF game should have been a cake walk. But don’t put it on our O, put it on our D which could not get the ball back into Kizer’s hands. In 60 mins of FB, WF had the ball 15 more mins then we did. Reverse that, add 7 to 10 more points and it’s an ND blowout. As bad as our D was, if not for the bogus 15 yd penalty for ‘bumping’ the WF snapper (later resulted in a WF TD), they pitch a shut-out. My point, IF as billed, BC has no offense, we control the clock, we put up 3 or 4 TD’s.

Well, Wake Forest beat BC 3-0. No it wasn’t baseball and BC would beat Wake Forest by a lot more than 3-0 in Hockey, I know Wake Forest doesn’t play hockey. ND will challenge the fortitude of the CFP committee by winning 27-10. I was going to say, “I can’t figure out why ND can’t destroy marginal opposition,” but then I remembered, everyone gets up to play ND like it is their last game of their career and their grandparents will burn in hell absent maximum effort. It is indeed all of ND’s opponent’s “Super Bowl.”

Nope. Under no circumstances would this be a signature win.

My prediction is that BC scores more than 17 points, which as the article states, is the most they’ve scored on an FBS opponent all season.