2011 Opponent Preview - Game 2: Notre Dame

Mascot:  Fighting Irish

Location:  South Bend, IN

Founded:  1842

Enrollment:  11,816

2010 Record:  8-5 (won Sun Bowl 33-17 vs Miami)

Coach:  Brian Kelly (Assumption '83) 179-62-2 Overall

Returning Starters:  18 (8 Off, 8 Def, 2 ST)


2011 Roster

2010 Overview

The Fighting Irish had their ups and downs over the course of their first year under new coach Brian Kelly.  They began the season with a win over Purdue but then dropped three in a row to Michigan, Michigan State, and Stanford.  Kelly righted the ship to win his next three contests, first on the road against Boston College and then back home against Pitt and Western Michigan.  That was followed by two more losses to Navy and Tulsa, before winning out the remainder of their schedule over the likes of Utah, Army, USC, and Miami in the Sun Bowl.

Michigan and Notre Dame obviously played each other last year, so we will go into some depth on that game, and both teams played MSU and Purdue so we'll look at those two as well.  Head to head first, some stats.



Another classic Michigan-Notre Dame game, this one in South Bend.  Denard has a career day with 502 total yards propelling Michigan to the win.  Looking at the numbers, Michigan ran the ball well and ND threw the ball well.  Not surprising since that was the strong point of each team and what their offenses were geared towards.  Total Offense was almost identical.  The stat that should really jump out at you is the Turnover Margin (TOM).  Michigan had a rare game in which it didn't turn the ball over and they enjoyed three Irish mistakes.  Unsurprisingly, that's the difference in the game.



The Purdue game was the first game of the season for the Irish, not to mention the first game period for Kelly, and took place in South Bend.  Michigan traveled to West Lafayette for their game against the Boilers.  Both teams win by 11 and put up similar yardage totals.  What jumps out at me is that Michigan only gave up 132 through the air and 256 total yards while allowing 2-11 on third down.  Without actually looking, this must have been the best statistical game for the defense last year.  Probably by far.  Those numbers are even respectable.  Turnovers didn't give either team much of an advantage, although it is worth noting that Michigan and Purdue managed to break even despite each turning the ball over FIVE times.  Yikes.  Notre Dame did not have a notable game in any aspect statistically, but that isn't odd considering it was the first game of year and Kelly didn't want to show anything with Michigan on the schedule the following week.



Both teams lose to Sparty, although ND shouldn't have - at least not on the play they did.  If you don't recall, MSU ran a fake FG in overtime for a TD, but the play clock had clearly expired before the ball was snapped and the play should not have counted.  Clock shenanigans in East Lansing?  Hmm, where have I heard that before?  Michigan gets pounded by Little Brother in A2, both on the scoreboard and in the stats.  Both teams lose the TOM and are significantly outgained on the ground.  Again, recipe for disaster every time.



I did not include the head to head into the averages so this is just the average from Purdue and MSU.  Michigan ran the ball better, ND threw it better.  ND scored more, gave up less, was better on third down, and was better on turnovers.  These stats seem to not bode well for Michigan, but then again who won the game head to head?  Exactly.  Any Given [Saturday].


2010 Film

Some thoughts on the offensive side of the ball.  First of all, I really like the route combinations that Brian Kelly's offense uses in the passing game.  They are creative and designed extremely well and that is one of the main reasons why his passing attack has been so effective everywhere he's been.  These combinations are designed to stress the defense, especially the secondary but also the linebackers, and forces defenders to have to read the route combinations and make smart decisions quickly or someone is going to be wide open. You will notice there are crossing and/or shallow routes on just about every pass play forcing linebackers that really don't like to play the pass and generally aren't very good at it to do so.  This is smart football.

I also noticed/remembered that Dayne Crist can move very well.  He can slide and give himself more time in the pocket as well as just tuck it and get upfield.  He has decent speed and moves his feet well.  I did not remember him being quite that fast and adept running with the ball.  He will even pull it on the Zone from time to time with success.  The main part of their running game comes on both the inside and outside Zone plays.  There are some variations that they will throw in like designed cutbacks (good look at that at the 3:30 mark) as well as a counter play here and there.  As I said, you must account for Crist on the Zone because he will pull it and has the ability to hurt you if you fall asleep on him.

Defensively, the Irish like to twist and stunt their defensive lineman a lot.  This is useful on passing downs to try and confuse the offensive linemen and will often result in pressure on the quarterback.  As I said, they do this a lot which means they are going to get caught doing it on a run play from time to time and if those d-linemen don't read run quick enough, they can and will run themselves right out of the play and create large running lanes.  This must be taken advantage of.  On the back end, I see a lot of zone, even in blitzing situations.  There were several zone blitzes of varying effectiveness but I did not notice much Cover Zero blitzing.  This isn't too uncommon as this was the first game and defensive coordinators tend to be uncomfortable doing that too much early in the season.

One thing the ND defense does seem vulnerable to is the bootleg.  Obviously they will be more attentive to that with Denard in the game than they were against Purdue here, but the boot and waggle plays were both available on multiple occasions.  In fact, Purdue seems to cause problems for ND whenever they move the QB whether it be on a bootleg or a sprintout or even just a half roll.  Good to know.  Also:  Manti Te'o is good at football.  Very good.  Know where he is at all times.

Much of the same here.  Shallow and crossing routes.  Movement on the defensive line.  One thing I noticed more in this game is that the ND defense really overpursued a lot, opening sometimes gaping cutback holes for Edwin Baker and company.  A good example of this is at the 2:56 mark.  MSU is lined up in an offset I right and the call is a stretch to the strength.  ND aligns defensively in a 4-3 under.  There are a lot of mistakes by individuals on the defense here, but for the purposes of not being overly detailed, I'll keep it fairly simple.  The 3-tech DT (away from the TE) allows himself to get scooped by the LT which allows the LG to release almost immediately to the second level and seal the overpursued WLB.  The NT did well with his first step and does not allow the C to swap hats with him.  The result is a huge cutback hole, a 16 yard gain, and a first down near the red zone.  Maybe this is just something MSU is good at doing to their opponents because they did the same things to Michigan with even greater success.  Probably a little from both sides.

One other thing that plagued ND a little bit in this game was poor communication in the secondary.  Players are passing off their receivers to the next zone without communicating to their teammates on the back end.  A good look at this occurs at 3:18 on the same drive.  MSU gets a wide open receiver for a TD to tie the game.

Offense

Notre Dame has fully moved into Brian Kelly's passing spread from the pro style they utilized under Charlie Weis.  Kelly likes to spread the defense out to create mismatches with his receivers and uses creative route combinations to get guys open.  Short passes with an emphasis on YAC yardage are the name of game.  Ideally, nickle and dime passes will move the chains and force the defense to tighten up, at which point they can hit you over the top or take a short pass and turn it into a big gain with their athletic receivers.  The running game consists almost completely of the Zone play, both inside and outside, with some wrinkles thrown in to change things up.

At QB, the Irish return Dayne Crist for his senior season and he is expected to be the starter.  Last season, Crist was responsible for roughly two-thirds of the ND passing yards and a little more than half of the TD passes thrown.  Specifically, he completed 59.2% of his throws for 2033 yards with 15 TDs and 7 picks.  He did struggle with injuries a bit last year as you probably recall from him missing large parts of the Michigan game.  When Crist couldn't go, sophomore to be Tommy Rees filled in and put up similar type numbers.  Rees completed 61% of his passes for 1006 yards with 12 TDs and 8 INTs.  Their passer ratings were almost identical as well.  I expect that Crist will be the man this season when he's healthy, but it doesn't seem, at least statistically, that the Irish will be in too much trouble if Crist struggles with his health again this season.  Having a capable backup, as Michigan fans are well aware, is invaluable to the success of a football team and ND has a good one waiting.

The rushing attack loses about half of its 1646 yards gained last year with the graduation of Armando Allen (finally) and Robert Hughes, but they do return leading rusher Cierre Wood for his junior year and his expected backup (?) senior Jonas Gray.  M fans will recognize Gray's name from his recruitment when he was in high school at Detroit Country Day.  Neither of these guys had all that many carried last year, as is expected in Kelly's offense.  Wood had 119 carries for 603 yards (5.1 ypc) and three TDs, while Gray carried 20 times for 100 yards (5.0) and did not find the end zone.  Wood was used a bit as a receiver out of the backfield and hauled in a respectable 20 balls for 170 yards and a pair of scores.  I expect that there will be a solid split between these two guys very similar to the way Wood and Allen shared time last year.  Kelly doesn't seem to be too concerned about having one guy carry the load, preferring to rotate and keep fresh legs in the game.  Both of these guys are very talented and athletic and I wouldn't be shocked to see them both in the game at the same time in a full gun look.

At wide receiver, ND returns their best player IMO in Michael Floyd....maybe.  Last season, Floyd hauled in 79 passes for 1025 yards and 12 TDs and is a major threat from anywhere on the field.  Off the field issues this off-season created some doubt as to whether he would play for the Irish in his senior season.  Floyd was suspended indefinitely in March after being arrested for DUI.  Two months later, Kelly was a little more specific about his suspension saying that Floyd will either play in every game, or not at all:

We’re looking at Mike as an ‘all in or not’ situation. In other words, he’s changing his life or he’s not. If he changes the way he’s lived his life, he’ll play every game for us. If he doesn’t, he won’t play one down here at Notre Dame.

You can expect to see him on the field this season.  Theo Riddick also returns and I expect this guy to have a breakout season.  The 5'11", 198 pound junior out of New Jersey is the type of guy that will flourish in Brian Kelly's scheme and he showed flashes of that  last season.  He is electric and dangerous.  Watch out for him.  As a footnote to the receiving group, thank God Kyle Rudolph is gone.  That guy was a nightmare.

The offensive line returns four of five starters from last year's team,  losing only Guard Chris Stewart.  Senior Guard Trevor Robinson, senior Center Braxston Cave, Junior Tackle Zack Martin, and 5th year Tackle Taylor Dever all return to anchor the OL.  Andrew Nuss and Chris Watt will probably fight it out in fall camp to fill Stewart's vacant LG spot.  Returning experience on the offensive line is priceless and the Irish return 63 career starts.

I would expect the offense to take a pretty large step forward in year two of the Brian Kelly regime.  A senior QB, four returning starters on the OL, and athletes all around tend to mean success anyway, but factor in the offensive mind of Kelly and year of experience in his system and opposing defenses might be in a lot of trouble in 2011.

Defense

CB Darrin Walls, OLB Kerry Neal, and NT Ian Williams take a combined 94 starts out the door with them to graduation.  Other than that, ND returns the rest of its defense.  For the most part, ND runs a base 3-4, but like most teams, they are multiple.  Manti Te'o is the leader of this defense and may be the best player on the football team.

Ethan Johnson and Kapron Lewis-Moore return to bookend the defensive line in their senior seasons.  Lewis-Moore particularly can be a menace on the edge.  Senior Sean Cwynar started a handful of games at NT last year when Williams was banged up and is expected to slide into the full time starting roll.

Juniors Te'o and Carlo Calabrese return to their spots at ILB and senior Darius Fleming will man his OLB job once again.  The other OLB spot looks to be Steve Filer's to lose.  I've already gushed a bit about Te'o, but the other two returning starters here can play too.  If Filer can live up to his recruiting hype from a few years ago and lock down that other OLB spot, this should be the strength of the defense.

5th year Safety Harrison Smith anchors the ND secondary and returns his 93 tackles and seven picks from a year ago.  Beside Smith on the back end may be junior Zeke Matta, who started eight games last year, or it may be the starter for last year's season opener Jamoris Slaughter.  This will be a heated battle in the fall.  CB Gary Gray returns for his final season on one edge of the field, but the other is up for grabs.  Robert Blanton manned the nickle back spot for ND last season and has the most experience, so he may be the choice there, but if DC Bob Diaco likes Blanton at the nickle back and wants to keep him there, look for former highly sought after recruit Lo Wood to emerge at the other corner.

A lot of experience returns here and with an All-American like Te'o right in the middle of it, this could be a very good defense.  Keeping key guys healthy will be big though (duh) as the backups are pretty green behind them.

Special Teams

David Ruffer returns to his kicking duties for his last season after hitting 37 of 40 PATs and 18 of 19 FGs with a long of 50 yards.  Seems strange to me that he seems to struggle more with the extra point than with his FG attempts but the kicking atrocities in AA the last several years eliminate any room for me to talk about kicking in any manner.  Junior Ben Turk returns after averaging 38.3 yards per punt last season.  If you're wondering why his name sounds familiar like I was, his uncle Matt punts for the Houston Texans.

2011 Spring Game

The annual Blue-Gold game took place on a rainy April 16th and was televised on Versus.  Pretty bland stuff as is the usual for a spring game but a good look at their basic stuff.  Crist and Rees were pretty pedestrian and didn't play a whole lot as they combined for 12-25 for 95 and an INT by Rees.  Early enrollee Aaron Lynch was disruptive all day from the DE spot and looks like a beast in the making.

LOL ETC.

I had to include this video posted just before the Michigan-ND game last season.  This jackass embodies all the typical ND fan's delusional superiority and smugness and, well, jackassery that I find so amusing.  Yes, there are plenty of people that say the same thing about Michigan fans and their attitudes and I've seen that as well, but there's nothing quite like this idiot.  I'll just let him speak for himself.  Enjoy.

____________________________________________________________________________________________

Once again I have to give thanks for the use of the 2011 Notre Dame Football Spring Prospectus.  It is packed with way more info on all the coaches and players, stats, articles, etc.  If you want more info I highly recommend you head that way.