The chatter finally ends on Monday night for Notre Dame and Ohio State. Both teams have plenty of experience hoisting the trophy but the Irish have been waiting for four decades to lift another one. Below are some numbers that show how that might happen:
Who Runs It Better?
Trying to compare the two team’s ground games might point to Ohio State having more balance between its top two backs but any difference is likely negligible. Both teams will try to establish the run as early as possible and hope that achieving some level of success will translate into eating up clock time.
Notre Dame’s Jeremiyah Love has been banged up coming down the stretch but that perception didn’t appear to hamper the standout back against Penn State. He managed to break four tackles to help give the Irish their first lead of the game, taking a page from the playbook of his fellow back Jadarian Price.
Love and Price will tote the ball for the majority of runs on first and second down, but the running skills of quarterback Riley Leonard will almost exclusively on third and, potentially, fourth down. Leonard’s 39 carries on third nearly triple the combined effort of Love and Price. On fourth, Leonard has seven successes in 10 tries, though Love has been spotless in his three efforts.
Ohio State doesn’t have a mobile quarterback like Leonard, so on first and second down, TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins will likely get the majority of carries if the Buckeyes follow their season-long trend. If the Buckeyes find themselves in a third-down situation, that quarterback, Will Howard, is likely to take to the air or carry the ball himself. For fourth down, Judkins is the most likely ball carrier.
Third Down Data
Between the two teams’s defenses, Notre Dame has been better at either forcing a fourth-down situation or an opponent punt. The Irish have only allowed their foes to move the chains on third down 61 times out of 205 attempts for a success rate of 29.9 percent. To be fair, the Buckeyes have been solid in this area at 75 conversions allowed in 216 attempts, good for a success rate of 34.7 percent.
Still, the longer the powerful Ohio State offense stays off the field, the better chance Notre Dame has of walking off with a victory. This season, the Irish have stayed below that average in six games and below the Buckeyes’ number on 10 occasions. In comparison, Ohio State has beaten its season average seven times and bettered Notre Dame’s average in five contests.
When it comes to the respective offenses in this category, the numbers are virtually identical, with Notre Dame succeeding 71 of 172 times, a success rate of 41.3 percent. The Buckeyes are only microscopically better here, moving the chains 72 of 173 times, good for 41.6 percent.
The postseason has seen the Irish being put in more of these situations, beginning with the 13 times against Indiana. That was followed by a new season-high of 14 against Georgia, a mark that only lasted a week before the 17 against Penn State. However, the Orange Bowl numbers had this silver lining: the Irish converted 11 times, for a season-high rate of 64 percent.
That issue hasn’t been felt by Ohio State in its three postseason clashes, though its level of success hasn’t been as prolific. The Buckeyes had 30 third-down calls during this time frame, an average of 10 per game, but they’ve only succeeded 11 times. Notre Dame would love to see a repeat of Ohio State’s six-for-16 effort during the Buckeyes’ debacle against Michigan.
Block That Kick
Big plays on special teams could end up being the difference with each team having a positive and negative aspect attached to their season-long performances. Notre Dame’s knack for blocking either punts or kicks has resulted in them blocking six opposing efforts.
Yet the flip side has seen those foes block Irish kicks, mostly when kicker Mitch Jeter was either out of the lineup or getting his bearings back in November. One of the pre-injury blocks took place when Jeter was trying a desperation 62-yarder in the Irish’s loss to Northern Illinois.
On the other side, Ohio State has only managed to block two kicks all season. However, the Buckeyes present a huge challenge to Notre Dame’s success in this area because they have yet to be on the receiving end in this department. Those two blocks came during consecutive easy wins over Purdue and Northwestern.
When blocks have been avoided, the Buckeyes have managed to achieve perfection on extra points, while in the area of field goals, they’ve put up points on 11 of 15 tries for a success rate of 73 percent. Jeter and company had success on all but one of their 73 extra-point attempts. Finally, while Jeter may have only hit 13 of his 20 field goal tries, his replacements only managed two field goals in six tries.
