3-0

[Microwahevo]

I think we get in with 1 loss. Assuming that loss is to USC

With one loss, yes. Whether it's Clemson or U$C, doesn't matter IMO. There are enough games against opponents we SHOULD beat after that U$C game that a loss there could still enable us to vault in top 4.

We are still a long way from that though.

I'd like to finish with one name....Jaylon. What a fuckin stud this guy is. Showed what amazing cover skills he has along with everything else. I'm so glad he's been a part of this team.

 

[KnuteRoc]

WOW, did I get teleported in bizarro world?

A very, very solid game put together by the Irish. I'm not sure if I just bought a li'l too much into the Tech hype or what but BVG earned his money today. Excellent scheme and Johnson was too late in adjusting. We played disciplined, minded our lanes/assignments and hit really hard. A few errors here and there but minimizing errors against the triple option is huge, especially when those errors don't really cost you dearly.

Offensively, I'm satisfied with Kizer for the most part, he showed some youth but he didn't beat himself. I still hate seeing so many read-options, don't like seeing Kizer on designed runs on downs like 2nd and 10 and I still don't like not seeing more involvement from the likes of Robinson, Hunter and Jones. Brown had a couple butter-finger plays but he also had some good clutch catches.

Prosise... what can you say? For a converted WR, he seems to have bought in wholesale to his role. A 91yd run for a TD, setting the record at ND stadium, in ALL of glorious history of not just our team but of every good/great team that has come to South Bend, that's special. Late in the game when we came in with 2 TE and announced our intention to run the ball was a proud moment for me, I'd just wish Kelly would do this more often, this OL is too good to wait 3 quarters to truly push our weight around.

I'm happy to have been wrong about the Irish being able to stop this option attack considering our recent history of failing to do so. I truly now have only one worry about Navy, injuries.

With USC going down, Bama being down, OSU looking very beatable, TCU showing no defense, we're moving on up just like the Jeffersons. While it's much too soon to think of Playoffs in light of our injuries and what that means for our team in general, gotta admit, we have as good a chance as any. Georgia really looked good today and Ole Miss seems very tenacious and scrappy.

While I don't take UMASS lightly, we should be clear favorites and I'd like to see some things really get worked on or even expanded upon (mostly for Kizer) before we face Clemson at their house.

Agree with all of you that the score does not reflect the best, we dominated this game and quite frankly it kind of pisses me off to see a scrolling text on ESPN saying we "outlasted" GT. I do hope the suits actually look at the game instead of browsing scores and headlines when evaluating us against the rest.

CONGRATS Irish, a very well earned W.

 

[purguy12]

great win. we will be ranked 6th or 5th. USC losing hurts.

 

[KnuteRoc]

Not necessarily bigGuy. Think about the long term. If we beat both USC and Stanford, good for us in evaluation time. If we lose to USC and beat Stanford, it presents an interesting quandary, Stanford beats USC, USC beats us, we beat Stanford. If that ended up being the case, then the Clemson game would likely be more of a determining factor in evaluations. It didn't necessarily matter who won between them, we need to beat one of the two of them should we have a loss. If we win-out, we'd be in, period.

Look at who all fell today. OSU-MSU that late could really kill one of their seasons. Bama might rise back up but their offense looks like it needs a lot more work than ours does. TCU has no defense. Baylor - idle. Georgia looked quite good. Fla St. ehhh. I wouldn't want to see us have to face Golson but I think we could beat 'em.

If we lose 2 we're out, so until we do, I really wouldn't worry too much about USC losing. They're probably good enough to put some losses on other PAC-12 teams, Oregon's already lost, Arizona State's already lost. The SEC will probably be beating each other up a bit more, but LSU could be sneaking right up along with Ole Miss.

We're not in a bad position and USC losing to a Stanford team that I expect will play a lot more like they did today throughout the season doesn't hurt us. It's actually a promising idea, we owe them a L and today showed me that our team can compete with them.

 

[poewelch84]

Not necessarily bigGuy. Think about the long term. If we beat both USC and Stanford, good for us in evaluation time. If we lose to USC and beat Stanford, it presents an interesting quandary, Stanford beats USC, USC beats us, we beat Stanford. If that ended up being the case, then the Clemson game would likely be more of a determining factor in evaluations. It didn't necessarily matter who won between them, we need to beat one of the two of them should we have a loss. If we win-out, we'd be in, period.

Look at who all fell today. OSU-MSU that late could really kill one of their seasons. Bama might rise back up but their offense looks like it needs a lot more work than ours does. TCU has no defense. Baylor - idle. Georgia looked quite good. Fla St. ehhh. I wouldn't want to see us have to face Golson but I think we could beat 'em.

If we lose 2 we're out, so until we do, I really wouldn't worry too much about USC losing. They're probably good enough to put some losses on other PAC-12 teams, Oregon's already lost, Arizona State's already lost. The SEC will probably be beating each other up a bit more, but LSU could be sneaking right up along with Ole Miss.

We're not in a bad position and USC losing to a Stanford team that I expect will play a lot more like they did today throughout the season doesn't hurt us. It's actually a promising idea, we owe them a L and today showed me that our team can compete with them.

I agree they can beat and play with anyone and the outcome of the Stanford and USC game doesn't hurt the schedule one bit.

 

[purguy12]

at least we didn't play like bama. Lets go irish

 

[KnuteRoc]

Indeed, Bama looked unlike I've seen them look in years.

I'm just so thrilled and proud of the Irish today. Van Gorder must've really done some homework from last year's Navy game, I really liked how we blew up the middle to force the pitch early or confuse Thomas into holding too long. Their FB getting a few here and there wasn't really an issue, we needed to contain the edges and did just that. I was WAY off on my prediction of GT's total yards, I figured they'd have gotten a lot more than we gave up, especially in the passing game. He got a couple late as we seem to lax up but in the first half, they had like 0 yards passing at one point. I think now they've got keep building on it. Another cool thing was the early inclusion of Jones, there's SO MUCH potential for him in the offense, which would really ease Kizer's growing pains since we seem to use our backs for the extra blocker in most cases, Jones should really become the middle and intermediate and even seam target. I'd also like to see Brown maybe step up his game just a tad more so Fuller doesn't just get bracketed to hell every game against any solid Defense. Agree too with whomever it was that said Prosise is the heart of the offense at the moment. Absolutely thrilled with his attitude and effort, not to mention that talent and speed. I think he MUST stay healthy.

 

[purguy12]

Yes VD and the D did a great job. Just sucks we let up 2 TDs late in this game. VD can't be happy about that.

 

[purguy12]

USC losing hurts the Irish.

 

[Lillyliverd]

I felt like coaching would be the difference in this game and I was pleased with the coaching other than the defensive melt down at the end of the game. The GT game showed that we do indeed have top quality players and when the coaches do their jobs, we look like a good team.

Special teams are still a weakness.

 

[jjc2009]

USC losing hurts the Irish.

Not really. They lost to a team we play later in the year. Assuming we beat both it will not matter much this loss.

 

[awclayton]

that was a fun game to be at. crowd was great, not many tech fans there. it was disappointing at the end, basically giving them 2 TDs. clemson will be tough, mobile qb, good defense. i think if kizer and company can go down to clemson and win it will be a huge confidence boost and i think this team could defenitely be a playoff team. going down to clemson, cant wait to see that atmosphere.

 

[purguy12]

I

that was a fun game to be at. crowd was great, not many tech fans there. it was disappointing at the end, basically giving them 2 TDs. clemson will be tough, mobile qb, good defense. i think if kizer and company can go down to clemson and win it will be a huge confidence boost and i think this team could defenitely be a playoff team. going down to clemson, cant wait to see that atmosphere.

I agree, That game will tell me how this team will do. A win and we can go 11-1 or 10-2. Make one of the big bowl games.

 

[purguy12]

Dru tore his ACL on the other knee. So now he has torn both Knees ACL's. WOW. We now have 6 players out for the year. Thats an avg of 2 players a week for season ending injuries.

Crazy.

 

[poewelch84]

Also Notre Dame moved up to #6 jumping Georgia and having Ole Miss jump them to #3.

 

[ND_loyal son]

I've gotta say I like our chances. Granted, the Irish have been known to play down to the level of their competition from time to time, so I don't assume that any game will be a given win including UMASS. With that said, what seems like some of our stiffest competition, looks beatable if we play our game and don't turn the ball over.

Clemson hasn't looked great. They struggled with an average Louisville team. It won't be easy going into their house in two weeks and coming away with a win, but I didn't think we'd control GT like we did this week either. I guess I feel like Clemson seems pretty beatable.

I didn't see the U$C game, but I read that Stanford just out muscled them. JuJu and Adoree are great athletes, but supposedly Stanfords OL and DL dominated the Trojan's lines throughout the night. I'd imagine our OL and DL are at least as good as Stanford's? We may simply be able to present a physical style of play that they can't handle, and we get them at home. In addition, we do have speed like we haven't had in the past on defense that may be able to neutralize U$C's speed to some extent?

Stanford - not sure what to think about them. They beat U$C, but looked pretty bad in a loss against Northwestern. Hopefully they'll keep winning and will give an opportunity to get a big win against a ranked team in our regular season finale.

Procise has been amazing, but going forward I'd like to see the freshmen get a few more carries, if nothing else just to keep Procise healthy all year. Give them a total of 8-12 carries a game so CJ doesn't get too beat up. I'd also like to see Robinson more involved in the passing game. I know he dropped a WR screen or two yesterday, but he's a big target and could be someone we could count on on 3rd downs to keep the chains moving.

GO IRISH!

 

[Irish7478]

I went into the season predicting ND would go 11-1 and qualify for the playoff. I still think that is a possibility, although I actually now think that 12-0 is a real possibility (based more on the fact that Clemson, SC and Stanford aren't looking that impressive........yet).

Injuries continue to scare me. It seems like none of our guys ever get hurt for a week or two, it's always for the whole season. We are extremely thin at QB, RB, and several spots on defense. If we can stop any more injuries I really think could be the year. I like the fact that Kizer gets UMASS before we head off to Clemson. Hopefully Wimbush and the freshman RBs can get some reps and Kizer gets a little more comfortable running the offense.

As you may know by now, I am always optimistic when it comes to ND. But this is the year...trust me.

 

[CreepCreep2014]

Not going to go crazy with my thoughts, you all basically nailed them. So here are 5 things.

1- If I was a head coach, rule #1, celebrate with your feet on the ground.
2- I hate the option, hate it even more if it's your offense. If your entire offense is based on the option, you should not have a football team. Untalented teams use the option, glad ND finally stopped it!
3- Jaylen Smith is starting to be that "guy" we thought he could be (beast).
4- Glad to see ND use the middle of the field and use it's TE.
5- End of the game was on the coaches, that should never, ever happen!

 

[purguy12]

Not going to go crazy with my thoughts, you all basically nailed them. So here are 5 things.

1- If I was a head coach, rule #1, celebrate with your feet on the ground.
2- I hate the option, hate it even more if it's your offense. If your entire offense is based on the option, you should not have a football team. Untalented teams use the option, glad ND finally stopped it!
3- Jaylen Smith is starting to be that "guy" we thought he could be (beast).
4- Glad to see ND use the middle of the field and use it's TE.
5- End of the game was on the coaches, that should never, ever happen!

1- I agree with you. When ever u are in the air u are off balance and anything can happen.
2- I think option teams get away with a lot. I don't know why Refs don't call more on them for a lot of cheap shots.
3- He has been a beast for awhile now.
4- I agree
5- 100% agree. U play until the clock says 0 on it. That almost turned into a disaster. No way an Option team throw score that quick through the air.