The Irish Roundup

Against Purdue last Saturday, true freshmen and sophomores accounted for 48 of Notre Dame’s 71 rushing yards (67.6% - sacks not included) and 268 of their 377 receiving yards (71.1%). This continued what has clearly been one of the stories of the season for the Irish: they start a true freshman at quarterback in Jimmy Clausen, and each of their three leading rushers (James Aldridge, Armando Allen, and Robert Hughes) and four of their six leading receivers (Robby Parris, George West, Duval Kamara, and Golden Tate) are just one or two years removed from high school. On the season, 362 of Notre Dame’s 391 rushing yards have come via true freshmen or sophomores, as have 582 of their 822 total receiving yards - numbers good for 91.2% and 70.8% of the team’s offensive output in those categories.

How do these numbers stack up to other Division I programs, whether national championship contenders or teams in “rebuilding” mode? [NOTE: While I've done my best not to include redshirt sophomores in these statistics, I've probably made some mistakes somewhere. Where possible, I've also tried not to include sacks in the rushing totals, though that doesn't really work for teams with dual-threat quarterbacks.]

Let’s start with top-ranked LSU and USC. The Tigers start an upperclassman at quarterback in Matt Flynn, and while their #1 rusher is an upperclassmen, each of the five players who follow him in total rushing yardage are true freshmen or sophomores. Still, though, only 750 of LSU’s 1117 total rushing yards, or 67.14%, have come from underclassmen - much less than Notre Dame’s 91.2%. Meanwhile, among their receiving corps, LSU has only two underclassmen with more than 100 receiving yards on the season, and true freshmen and sophomores account for a total of 416 of their 1084 total receiving yards, or 38.4%.

USC, meanwhile, also starts an upperclassman at quarterback, but four of their five leading rushers are true underclassmen. On the whole, true freshmen or sophomores account for 71.2% of USC’s rushing yards, still far less than the percentage for Notre Dame. Only two Trojan underclassmen have 99 or more receiving yards, though, and underclassmen account for only 330 of 898, or 36.8%, of their total receiving yards.

It also seems worth looking at a few other programs with third-year coaches. One such team is the Florida Gators, who start a true sophomore at quarterback in Tim Tebow. Tebow is also the team’s leading rusher, and fellow sophomore Percy Harvin leads the team in receiving yards and is also their third-leading rusher. But on the whole, the Gators’ offense is still much less dependent on underclassmen than Notre Dame’s: 71.4% of their rushing yards come from true freshmen or sophomores, to go with 53.6% of their receiving yards.

The Fighting Illini of the University of Illinois are also in their third year under head coach Ron Zook. They start a true sophomore at quarterback in Juice Williams, but three of their four leading rushers - Williams is #2 - are upperclassmen, and underclassmen have accounted for only 267 of their 1278 rushing yards (20.9%) so far this season. Meanwhile, the leading receiver for the Illini is freshman Arrelious Benn, with 286 yards on the season, but overall their underclassmen have accounted for only 55.6% (438 of 787) of Illinois’s receiving yards.

Finally, let’s take a look at the University of Washington, in their third year under former Irish head coach Tyrone Willingham. The Huskies start a true sophomore at quarterback in Jake Locker, and he is also the team’s leading rusher. But Locker is the only UW underclassman with substantial rushing yardage, and true freshman and sophomores have accounted for 503 of the Huskies’ 804 yards on the ground so far, or 62.6%. Moreover, all of Washington’s top receivers are upperclassmen: true freshmen and sophomores have only 17 receiving yards so far this year for UW, a mere 1.97% of their 861 total.

Here’s a chart detailing those statistics:

What these numbers make clear is that Notre Dame’s offense is MUCH more reliant on true freshmen and sophomores than other programs. Moreover, the fact that the Irish have fallen behind in each of their games so far this year means that very few of these numbers are based on performance in “mop-up duty”: ND’s depth chart lists a true freshman or sophomore at either first- or second-string for every offensive position except center. Thus far this year, a huge portion of the offensive burden has been placed on players only one or two years removed from high school - and judging by how things have gone, there is no reason to think this state of affairs won’t become even more pronounced as the year goes on.

None of this is meant to excuse an 0-5 start that is the worst in Notre Dame’s history. This team has underperformed, and they have no-one but themselves to blame for that. But comparisons like this certainly help to put things in perspective.

I promised on Thursday that I’d run down anything interesting to do with ND’s depth chart, so here goes:

• At the right guard position, Chris Stewart and Dan Wenger are listed as the two backups to Matt Carufel. This is no change from last week, but what’s notable is that both Stewart and Wenger are going to be missing this weekend.
• As I noted on Thursday, with the departure of Konrad Reuland, freshman Mike Ragone is now the official third-string tight end. There were some reports from the MSU game that Ragone was seeing the field ahead of Reuland anyway, though, so this isn’t a huge deal.
• Derrell Hand, who started last week when Justin Brown was out with an injury, is still listed as the #3 LDE, behind co-#1’s Brown and Dwight Stephenson, Jr.

Other than that, there’s not much doing there.

A quick update on the injury front, though: as I mentioned earlier this week, Charlie Weis has said that Dan Wenger, who has a left leg injury, will definitely miss today’s game, and will be back by next Saturday at the earliest. Meanwhile, Justin Brown, who sat out against MSU and reportedly still looked a bit hobbled in practice this week, is going to be a game-time decision today.

Also worth noting: the South Bend Tribune managed to get in touch with Chris Stewart on Friday, and here’s what he had to say:

I’m trying to be careful not to say too much right now, because everything’s up in the air. I’m just trying to figure everything out first and then move forward.

Clearly a good sign for fans who’d like to see the young man return to the team. The official ND position is that Stewart has left the team for “personal reasons,” with Weis’s blessing.

---

Meanwhile, I know it doesn’t quite count as Notre Dame news, but I thought it was worth sharing this snippet from a USA Today profile of Cal-Berkeley superstar running back Justin Forsett:

For Justin Forsett, February 2004 arrived with no place to sign on the dotted line.The 5-8 running back assumed he was headed to Notre Dame, but the Irish offered scholarships to two bigger running backs. Which was news to him.

It would be easy to say Forsett, now a senior at California, had the last laugh. Notre Dame is 0-4. The school where he landed is 4-0. But holding grudges isn’t Forsett’s nature.

“It was a tremendous blessing for me to end up where I am,” he says. “At the time I couldn’t see it. I didn’t know where I’d be after Notre Dame turned me down, and it definitely hurt. But God works in mysterious ways, and there couldn’t be a better place than here.”

So how did Forsett get from nowhere to here? From castoff to Cal’s most valuable player so far as the No. 6 Golden Bears head into Saturday’s critical game at No. 12 Oregon?

Before signing day in 2004, Notre Dame’s running backs coach at the time, Buzz Preston, visited Forsett and his father, Rodney, and mother, Abby, at his high school, Grace Prep in Arlington, Texas. According to the Forsetts, Preston said Notre Dame would have a scholarship for him.

“We left the meeting feeling wonderful because we were on our way to Notre Dame,” says Rodney, a minister.

About a week before signing day, Justin called Notre Dame, then coached by Tyrone Willingham. “I hadn’t heard from them in a while,” he says. “They told me they didn’t need me anymore.”

Preston, now at New Mexico, says the Irish never offered Forsett a scholarship. It wasn’t for lack of ability; the Irish simply were looking for taller backs.

This much was certain: Forsett was blindsided by the news. “Forsett loses lone offer,” read the headline on the Rivals.com recruiting site on Jan. 28, 2004.

After signing day passed, Forsett’s high school coach, Mike Barber, a former NFL player, feverishly sent more highlight tapes to coaches around the country. None of the schools in Texas or Florida, where Forsett played his first two years of high school football, were interested. “Nothing. Nobody. Even Baylor didn’t want him,” Rodney says. South Carolina State was an option, but Forsett’s goal was to play Division I-A.

Forsett’s highlight tape landed at Cal.

“We watched his tape and thought this is too good to be true,” coach Jeff Tedford says. “There’s got to be something wrong with this kid. There’s a skeleton in the closet somewhere. So we thoroughly investigated everything about him and brought him here with his father, and he’s the greatest kid you ever want to meet.”

(snip)

When needed the most, Forsett has shined. In Cal’s opening win against Tennessee, Forsett ran for 156 yards on 26 carries. Last week against Arizona, Cal’s offense stalled when Forsett was nursing ankle and quadriceps soreness. After the Wildcats scored 17 unanswered points, Forsett lobbied to go back in and led the Bears on their final touchdown drive.

Forsett is the Pacific-10’s second-leading rusher (121.0 yards a game), behind only Oregon’s Jonathan Stewart (125.8). He’s also tied for the conference lead with seven touchdowns. “He’s been a guy who’s carried the load for us so far,” Tedford says.

Not to beat a dead horse or anything, but if what Forsett says is true, then it’s appalling: not just because an offer was pulled from a kid who’s turned out to be this talented, but because of the incredibly shady way in which it was done. Next time somebody starts telling you about Willingham’s classiness, make sure to bust this one out.

Oh, and next time you see Junior Jabbie or Travis Thomas get dragged down for a loss, remind yourself that at least they’re tall.

(HT: GoshenGipper.)

---

Finally, a quick thought on today’s game.Earlier this week I argued that the key to beating Purdue is running the ball effectively. I think this was only half right: the other crucial component if the Irish have any hope of winning is stopping the pass. This BGS post talks about the improvement of Purdue QB Curtis Painter from last year - when he led the nation in interceptions - to this. When I first read it, I thought that his improved numbers - 68.7% completions, 16 TDs, and only one interception through four games this year - might be due to Purdue’s weak schedule, but a bit more research proved that wrong: at this point last year, with an equally woeful foursome of opponents to start the year, Painter had thrown only 8 TD’s and had been picked off five times. Make no mistake about it: the Irish are going up against a good QB tomorrow, and a downright scary offense.Notre Dame fans are fond of pointing out that the team ranks eleventh in the nation in pass defense so far this year, but that statistic is a bit misleading, especially given both (1) the ease with which teams have run the ball against the Irish and (2) the degree to which these first four games have been blowouts. And as the South Bend Tribune pointed out today, when we consider pass efficiency defense, the Irish rank only 52nd nationally. The opening drive of the second half against Michigan State, which saw the Spartans convert through the air on 3rd-and-9 and 3rd-and-17 and then for a sixteen-yard touchdown, was a case in point of ND’s struggles against the pass this year. Ryan Mallett threw for three touchdowns against ND two weeks ago, and MSU scored four through the air last week. Tomorrow’s game will be a huge indicator of whether first-year defensive coordinator Corwin Brown is making progress with this team. Expect to see plenty of frosh LB’s Brian Smith and Kerry Neal (profiled in today’s SBT, by the way), who played well in passing situations against the Spartans, but - according to Charlie Weis in his Sunday press conference - aren’t quite ready to play consistently against the run.No matter how effectively ND runs the ball today, unless the Irish can hold Painter to no more than three TD’s passing and perhaps pick off a pass, Purdue will almost certainly win going away.

---

With that happy thought in mind, though, let’s take a look back into the history of the Notre Dame-Purdue series, courtesy of YouTube …[NOTE: For some reason, I've been having trouble embedding YouTube clips since we switched the site over from Blogger, so I'm just providing links for now.]We begin in 1964, Ara Parseghian’s first year as head coach of the Irish, as John Huarte leads the Fighting Irish past Bob Griese’s Boilermakers. (You can see a copy of the program here.) Notre Dame would go on to go 9-1-0 that year, their only loss coming at the hands of the USC Trojans. Lindsey Nelson has the call here.Next up is 1966, the year the Irish won their first national title under Parseghian. This game - a picture of the program is here - started off well for the Boilermakers, as Leroy Keyes returned an interception for a touchdown. But on the ensuing kickoff, Notre Dame’s Nick Eddy took one of his own to the house.This game also saw the famous duo of QB Terry Hanratty and wideout Jim Seymour, whom Time magazine would call “the hottest young passing combination in the US,” hook up for three long passes, all shown here.Up next is 1973, with highlights from West Lafayette. Notre Dame would go on to win the national title that year as well, under head coach Dan Devine.

Four years later, in 1977, a young Joe Montana would come off the bench to lead the Irish to victory in what would be yet another National Championship season.

Next up, let’s fast-forward to 1996, as Allen Rossum - who looks SICKENINGLY fast in this clip - returns the opening kick for an Irish touchdown.

The next three clips - from 1999, 2003, and 2004 respectively - remind anyone who may have forgotten why Bob Davie and Tyrone Willingham were fired. Ugh. I was there for that last one, and I think it is burned into my retinas for eternity. Ugh.

We can end on a positive note, though, with highlights from the last couple of years.

Anyway, enough messing around on the web. Time to start some proper pre-gaming.

Go Irish!

I know it’s been discussed before, but it’s worth emphasizing: if Notre Dame is going to beat Purdue this weekend, they’re going to do it by running the ball successfully. Here’s a breakdown of ND’s last four games against Purdue: two losses under Tyrone Willingham in 2003 and 2004, and two wins under Charlie Weis in 2005 and 2006.

What these numbers make clear is exactly what most of us already thought: if you run the ball successfully against the Boilermakers, you can win the game, and if you don’t, you can’t. (Let me re-emphasize this point for all those bemoaning how historically bad our offense has been this year: in 2003 and 2004 Willingham managed an average of 57.5 rushing yards a game against PURDUE.)

When asked about his game plan for Saturday, Coach Weis said on Tuesday that a key aspect of it is “that you have to try your best to try to keep their offense off the field.” Interestingly, though, a closer look at Purdue’s numbers from last year doesn’t necessarily bear out the specific importance of possessing the ball for long periods of time. Here’s a game-by-game rundown of Purdue’s wins and losses from the 2006 season, with their opponents’ rushing statistics and time of possession:

So these numbers don’t indicate a strong relationship between POSSESSING the ball, and so keeping the Purdue offense off the field, and beating the Boilermakers. They do, though, reemphasize the importance of gaining serious yardage on the ground, and also give further support to a point I made yesterday: namely, that Purdue is REALLY BAD at defending the run. (316 rushing yards given up to ILLINOIS?!)

Come Saturday, then, the best hope for Irish fans rests on the backs of the four horses.

(This builds on something I posted a month or so ago at IrishEnvy, but it updates the numbers and goes in a bit of a different direction.)

As most people know, Notre Dame’s current group of 19 committed players for their 2008 recruiting class is ranked #1 overall by both Scout and Rivals. As anyone who follows recruiting will be quick to remind you, though, the programs that have been the best at recruiting in recent years - Florida and USC in particular, with just 8 and 14 total commitments respectively - are just getting started, so it’s hard to say where ND’s class will be ranked overall when National Signing Day rolls around.

Nevertheless, we can get some sense of how to answer this question by comparing ND’s class as it currently stands to Charlie Weis’s recruiting classes from the past two years. At present, four of ND’s committed players have received five stars from Scout.com, eleven have received four stars, and four others have received three stars. Meanwhile, Rivals has given five stars to just one ND commit, but fourteen others have four stars and the final three have three stars. As the following table shows, those numbers stack up pretty well against ND’s classes from the past two years:

One thing this chart makes clear is that according to both recruiting services, the average star rating of an ND recruit has gone up each year under Weis, to the point where now our average recruit is just about a four-star player. (For comparison’s sake, the average star rating in Tyrone Willingham’s banner year of 2003 was 3.52 from Scout and 3.41 from Rivals.) So while our number of genuinely elite, five-star players still hasn’t reached the level of a Florida or a USC, our overall player quality is more than respectable.

What’s in a way even more interesting, though, is that the total number of “points” given to this recruiting class by both services is already higher than the number of points received by either of our previous two classes, including the group from 2006 which was nearly half again as large as our current class. Obviously there might be a bit of inconsistency in terms of how points are assigned from year to year, but it’s instructive to compare the current class to the very top overall classes from previous years in this respect: in 2007, a total of 3,685 points would have been good for the #7-ranked class from Scout, and in 2006 this total would have been good for the #1 overall ranking. Meanwhile, Rivals would have given a class that received 2,226 points their #6 ranking in 2007 and their #8 ranking in 2006. (For comparison’s sake, it’s perhaps also worth mentioning that Willingham’s 2003 class earned 2,338 points from Scout and 1,756 points from Rivals, though inter-year variability in how points are assigned is probably even more extreme here.) Once again, the possibility of year-to-year inconsistency in the assignment of points makes these statistics a bit hard to interpret, but they do give us good reason to believe that even if Notre Dame doesn’t manage to land ANY more commitments for this year, the present group of 19 will be good enough for a top ten ranking from both services.

This last remark - that ND’s current recruiting class is probably “top ten” caliber even as it stands - raises obvious questions about how good it will be if the class grows larger. But that’s a post for another day.

Okay, so let me just say that I still think he’s a dickhead, but Forde isn’t entirely off here:

The Scourge of South Bend, And All Mankind

Of course all the accountability for Notre Dame’s historic offensive collapse rests with Ty Willingham (2). The Dash deeply regrets not coming to that conclusion last week. It doesn’t matter how many three-and-outs occur on the watch of the current head coach; just blame it on the last one.

The Dash has received a few hundred loving, affectionate e-mails from Fighting Irish fans insisting that they knew this horrific season was coming, thanks to the lack of recruiting by Willingham during his final two years in South Bend. Well, sure — now that you mention it, the preseason pessimism was rampant. Just look at this August post from The Rock Report, a Domer fan blog, which averaged out season predictions from more than 3,000 Notre Dame fans and concluded the Irish would go 8-4: “For ND fans, if things were to break right, we’re looking at a two loss season. If things were to break wrong, we’re looking at a possible five loss season. Four losses looks likely from an ND fans(sic) point of view, but that’s usually on the optimistic side.” If that doesn’t sound like a communal acknowledgement of a terrible season to come, what does? Though The Dash doesn’t see anything in there about: “If things break wrong, we’re looking at no offensive touchdowns through three weeks and a potential 0-8 start.”

In keeping with September revisionist history, Notre Dame fans have unearthed evidence that Hurricane Katrina (3), high gas prices (4) and defaulted home loans (5) also are directly attributable to Willingham’s tenure in South Bend, Ind.

Now the thing is, Pat, most of people’s preseason optimism - the predictions of at least seven wins and whatnot - were exactly that: optimism. That’s to say, they’re the sort of predictions that come from fans who want to expect the best from their program, and OF COURSE they’re going to exceed realistic expectations.

That said, it’s ALSO true that we fans have been saying for years that ND was going to pay for Ty’s poor recruiting with a down year or two. Did we underestimate how down the down years would be? Of course - but the idea that we didn’t expect that two MAC-level recruiting classes would lead to a drop in performance is just absurd. For every post you can find on a blog or message board predicting 7-10 wins for this year, you’ll find several others saying that this year (and next, to some extent) was going to be a tough year because of the lack of talent, a lack which is directly attributable to Willingham’s piss-poor recruiting.

THAT said, the fact that ND’s performance this year has been SO bad is clearly NOT Willingham’s fault. This team has looked lost, frightened, discouraged, and downright heartless in its first three games, and a huge part of the blame for that falls squarely on ND’s coaching staff. Should we be 0-3 right now, given our utter dearth of upperclass talent and the quality of opponents we’ve played? Probably. Should we have looked like the absolute worst team in I-A? Surely not.

Being mocked for our tendency to blame this season’s awfulness on Willingham may sting a bit, but it’s deserved. Unless our boys step it up come Saturday afternoon, we’ll deserve whatever scorn Forde and the rest of the ESPN crew throw our way next week as well.