I was watching once the game was over, and was i the only one to notice that Clausen didnt seem to react very well to being around the other guys on the team. Many just seemed to ignore him IMO. I still, even after this game, have great concerns about our football team. Im hoping Weis ALLOWS Crist to compete with Jimmy for the starting job next year and in the spring. We played a sub-par defense, and still had trouble at times running the ball. I dont mean to be negative, but i seen many of the same mistakes that made our team 7-6 instead of a 9 or 10 win team. screen, screen, screen...what the hell is that? still didnt deliver the nail in the coffin. im concerned, and think that if hawaii would have changed QBs earlier, they may have had a better shot. any comments?
I'm currently a student at Notre Dame, and I understand why you are concerned. I've seen Clausen at parties standing in the corner with a kind of dumb look on his face waiting for people to come up to him and tell him how great he is (and too often, people do). I have classes with football players and I once asked Rudolph what he thought of Clausen. He said something along the lines of "I know some guys don't care for him too much but personally like him". That was a few weeks into the year.
HOWEVER, I think this week was sort of a breakout week in leadership for Clausen. As opposed to earlier in the year when he would just sit on the bench and let the fan blow his girly hair around, today he was standing on the sideline involved in the game even when the defense was on the field. He was moving around, interacting with other players, having a good time. Not to mention that clip ESPN kept showing of him on that wavepool thing with all the players watching and laughing. Also, if you check out this clip of the pre-bowl banquet, you see Clausen standing up with the team leaders showing some emotion with the crank me up chant:
Notre Dame vs. Hawaii has happened---in a fun sort of way
Certainly no Tebow yet, but I think he's starting to get that the quarterback position at Notre Dame is more than simply lobbing the ball up for Golden or Floyd. You're right -- hopefully Weis fosters a little competition and I think he will to some extent.
As for your other points -- I'm not sure I would call our defensive performance "sub-par". Those 3rd and long conversions infuriate me just as much as anyone else and I will never understand why they give a 10 yard cushion on 3rd and 8, but I think they played pretty well. And it doubly pisses me off how they go into a sort of prevent defense type mode where they give the free 8 yard passes all the way down the field. You've held them to 7 points playing tight coverage!!! why stop? I don't really count that last TD against the 2nd stringers.
And I agree with the above poster about the end of game rushing. Jonas was doing pretty well considering the defense knew exactly what was happening. If we kept Clausen in and kept winging the ball around we might have hit 60, but at this point -- with BCS rankings/style points and all not coming into play -- there was nothing to gain leaving our starters in the whole game and running up the score. We'd be better served to get some others--who we'll need next year--some more live game experience.
