Oct 24 | Pittsburgh

[EifertPower]

Positives
Ben Skowronek made some big plays
Defense completely stopped the Pitt run game
Defense had 3 INTs
ND had no turnovers
Confirmation that Michael Mayer is a stud
Book made good decisions running and was elusive
ND put the game away in the last 4 minutes of first half and showed killer instinct
Foskey blocked punt broke Pitt's spirit.
Love how Kyren always seems to fall forward and get a couple of additional yards after contact.

Negatives
Book wasn't very accurate
After hearing the news Austin is out for the season Lenzy also gets hurt. Who is our deep threats now that force safety coverage?
Defensive ends dont seem to be getting as much pressure on QB as I wouldve thought they should
Return game on kickoffs and punts is non-existent
Dont trust our secondary against a good QB like Howell and Lawrence. Pitt QB missed some throws on open receivers

Open Questions
Why didnt Bracy play yesterday?
Why doesnt Pryor get more playing time? He comes from OSU and has experience in a position we are weak in (secondary) and yet they use him sparingly as a backup linebacker. I'm confused.

Thoughts
With Lenzy and Austin out, I think someone like a Keys will have to emerge or else we will become predictable and defenses dont have to worry about a deep threat
We need better punts from our punter. It seems he never flips the field and his only decent punts are the result of good bounces after it lands
Given the receiver injuries and the RB depth, should they consider moving Jafar's position. I seem to recall being very impressed with him a couple of years ago and he was dangerous in space but doesnt seem to be the same player
Foskey is a guy who can make splash plays. He needs to get more playing time

 

[Blazers46]

Who would have thought a 45-3 thumping and ND moves down a spot.

 

[Cackalacky2.0]

I like when we win all three phases.

 

[irishtrooper]

Who would have thought a 45-3 thumping and ND moves down a spot.

No kidding. I suppose being such a popular team and brand is double edged. People remember your games longer..... Probably a correction from Louisville

 

[Dizzyphil]

No kidding. I suppose being such a popular team and brand is double edged. People remember your games longer..... Probably a correction from Louisville

Ok - here's my reasoning on this statement. (this is in no WAY an offense to you Trooper)


Being 52 years in the tooth - in the 70s, and into the 80's until ESPN/Cable became available, you had three sports to watch on Saturdays.....


1. Local Wrestling
2. ABC Wide World of Sports (snippets of every sport, Basketball, CFB (mainly Oklahoma, Texas, Alablama (Bear Bryant) and some regional games and sports commentary from Jim McKay

3. Notre Dame football


So. you either hated or loved the Irish and watched, or you watched because it was really the only game on and it was shoved down your throat... basically.


The Irish was a power-house team from the 60's, 70's and very late 80's early 90's, may have had another (2) NC's in the early 90's if not for 2 or 3 plays... literally.


People, I know that are my age was just tired of hearing about the Irish ALL the time when they were kids and not fans. Had to find a radio station to hear the game of their team or find out the score on the 'tickerboard' during the Irish games.



You might have been lucky for a local station in your area be able to cover your team. It's like the Irish are/were the Cowboys of the Pros... either you love them to death or you hate them to death...



All my opinion...

 

[tko]

Epic shield issues by Narduzzi made this game even more special.

 

[KPENN]

Open Questions
Why didnt Bracy play yesterday?

He was ill(non-COVID related).

 

[NorthDakota]

Ok - here's my reasoning on this statement. (this is in no WAY an offense to you Trooper)


Being 52 years in the tooth - in the 70s, and into the 80's until ESPN/Cable became available, you had three sports to watch on Saturdays.....


1. Local Wrestling
2. ABC Wide World of Sports (snippets of every sport, Basketball, CFB (mainly Oklahoma, Texas, Alablama (Bear Bryant) and some regional games and sports commentary from Jim McKay

3. Notre Dame football


So. you either hated or loved the Irish and watched, or you watched because it was really the only game on and it was shoved down your throat... basically.


The Irish was a power-house team from the 60's, 70's and very late 80's early 90's, may have had another (2) NC's in the early 90's if not for 2 or 3 plays... literally.


People, I know that are my age was just tired of hearing about the Irish ALL the time when they were kids and not fans. Had to find a radio station to hear the game of their team or find out the score on the 'tickerboard' during the Irish games.



You might have been lucky for a local station in your area be able to cover your team. It's like the Irish are/were the Cowboys of the Pros... either you love them to death or you hate them to death...



All my opinion...

As someone who grew up in the 90's/2000's, many of us still basically had ND as our option on Saturdays. The Big 13 usually had a game on, the B1G did as well, the SEC maybe had a game on too. But until I got to college in 2010, there were only three certainties in life, death, taxes, and Notre Dame football being on TV.

Some folks hate it, some love it. I have a suspicion that Notre Dame is becoming cool again. Younger generations are more about "experiences" or whatever and Notre Dame is uniquely situated in that regard among the blue bloods.

Brian Kelly will deserve a statue on campus for saving Notre Dame football before all is said and done. If he wins a national championship with Buchner I have a feeling it will be the first of multiple for ND over the next couple decades.

Saban is about done at Alabama and whoever follows him will struggle. Dabo has been riding FSU and Miami's irrelevance to titles. We are close.

 

[Circa]

No kidding. I suppose being such a popular team and brand is double edged. People remember your games longer..... Probably a correction from Louisville

Everyone is already saying eye test bullshit! The BIG10 blew it with there knee jerk wahhh waaahhhh Covid reaction and most everyone else manned up and put in the work! The fact that Ohio State won 1 friggin game and jumped anyone shows how biased the pollsters really are! It’s disgusting.
Only positive thing about this,... Our boys gotta have that chip on their shoulder now and embarrass Clemson twice!

 

[Dizzyphil]

I have a strong feeling many Irish fans will be upset come tomorrow.


O$U is probably going to blow out Nebraska. And even if ND covers over Pitt..... the pollsters will probably move O$U into the top 4.

Who would have thought a 45-3 thumping and ND moves down a spot.

No kidding. I suppose being such a popular team and brand is double edged. People remember your games longer..... Probably a correction from Louisville

My post is on page 3/4 of this thread. I knew this would happen. Some didn't believe Louisville was as good as they are.



Which honestly doesn't matter until Nov 7th when the Irish meet up with Clemson.



Scenario:


I would put serious money on anybody that wants to take it... if the Irish beat Clemson by less than 7 points and Bama and O$U are still undefeated - Midnight Nov 7th, the Irish would only be ranked 3rd...

 

[irishandy]

Just curious. Do you get on the game day thread during the game or do you wait until the day after and go back and read everyone’s knee jerk reactions (also construed as venting) the following day?

I watch the game I don't on the boards until after. Why?

 

[EifertPower]

College football rankings have always been silly, and this year with essentially no cross conference games and leagues playing different number of games and starting at different dates makes it even sillier.

Conference championships make even less sense. If ND beats Clemson on Nov 7 but loses to them in the ACC championship then the Nov 7 game was meaningless. It's also a possibility ND beats Clemson but loses to UNC then the ACC championship would likely exclude ND.

Basically, ND has to win the ACC championship to make the 4-team playoff and if they dont then they wont.

College football should just go with a model that places teams in 10-team conferences and have the regular season champ earning a birth to the playoffs and then a few "wildcard" teams to round out a 8-team or 16-team tournament.

 

[Dizzyphil]

As someone who grew up in the 90's/2000's, many of us still basically had ND as our option on Saturdays. The Big 13 usually had a game on, the B1G did as well, the SEC maybe had a game on too. But until I got to college in 2010, there were only three certainties in life, death, taxes, and Notre Dame football being on TV.

Some folks hate it, some love it. I have a suspicion that Notre Dame is becoming cool again. Younger generations are more about "experiences" or whatever and Notre Dame is uniquely situated in that regard among the blue bloods.

Brian Kelly will deserve a statue on campus for saving Notre Dame football before all is said and done. If he wins a national championship with Buchner I have a feeling it will be the first of multiple for ND over the next couple decades.

Saban is about done at Alabama and whoever follows him will struggle. Dabo has been riding FSU and Miami's irrelevance to titles. We are close.

I had a buddy that said I was wrong about my 'assumptions' of ND fans and those that hated the Irish....


I asked him, (TN fan) 'You have three kids, all the pics on the walls are of them in onesies of TN Vol sports gear'.... he said, 'Yea, so what?'....



He made my point without answering the question....



The Irish are becoming 'cool again' because BK has made the Irish relevant again..... kids born in 1999 are 21 now. As a Catholic, it's hard for me to believe that any Catholic HS kid that plays ANY sport and excels at academics is not trying to get in ND..... or Boston College for that matter.....


But I agree with you, I believe the Irish are starting to come back to the young generation....

 

[Irish#1]

OSU was ranked #3 In early preseason polls, so it’s no surprise they jumped. It is a little surprising they bumped us considering the beat down on Pitt.

 

[Chicago Domer]

Right now our chances of beating Clemson are slim to none. Beating them twice is a non-starter.

They played a mediocre game this weekend and still won by almost 4 tds.

If we play a near perfect game, we can stay with them for a half, but they just have too much talent. They will wear us down. Wish I was wrong but I don’t see anybody beating them.

 

[Dizzyphil]

Right now our chances of beating Clemson are slim to none. Beating them twice is a non-starter.

They played a mediocre game this weekend and still won by almost 4 tds.

If we play a near perfect game, we can stay with them for a half, but they just have too much talent. They will wear us down. Wish I was wrong but I don’t see anybody beating them.

why??

 

[Chicago Domer]

I saw in the stats on the score that Nick McCloud caught a pass for 21 yards yesterday. Is that an error? Was that actually Austin? Did Austin get injured in this game or before?

 

[PANDFAN]

I saw in the stats on the score that Nick McCloud caught a pass for 21 yards yesterday. Is that an error? Was that actually Austin? Did Austin get injured in this game or before?

Austin was injured Thursday didn't play..... McCloud had an int but no catches... Had to have been error

 

[Irishize]

I watch the game I don't on the boards until after. Why?

One thing I’ve learned about being on a message board during the game is it serves as a place to both celebrate & vent frustration in the heat of the moment. I think if you ask most who post during the game if they feel the same way post game, they’ll admit that they do not. So if you jump on the game day thread after the fact and choose to go back and read all the comments that were posted during the game, I’d take them with a grain of salt.

 

[ACamp1900]

why??

Wat?? Lol

 

[Luckylucci]

Very happy to see Book throw some of those passes. Hopefully it reinforces the notion that guys are open and he keeps trying to put the ball where his guys can makes plays.

I don’t think we need to belabor his inaccuracy too much. For him and this offense, I’d take a dip in accuracy if he can get to10yds/att consistently. That’s a nice number. And these types of scoring plays show why yds/att are so important. It’s 1-3 big plays, a lot of times scoring plays, per game that are the difference between 6 and 10. We gotta them today

Really excited to see Big Ben snag a couple of those passes. He needs to take over for Javon at the W.

Foskey is such an incredible talent. He’s unique in the sense that he makes plays regardless of what you ask him to do.

I’m glad the passing game worked out some of those issues at the expense of Narduzzi. However, I really hope we haven’t abandoned the play action. I have concerns about the consistency of this type of offense.

Against a bad offense, a really good/elite defense doesn’t just keep the points down. They turn them over. Which we did, multiple times. Pitt had no chance. It was a lot of fun to watch.

Having TMA back really mattered. I like the young guys a lot but it previously seemed noticeable that they just weren’t ready to play as many snaps as they had too previously. He played well.

Very cool to see Hinish with some swag during his homecoming. It was a big game for him coming back home and he put a little extra in it. His family deserves it.

Bo knows best. MOAR BO!

Mayer is the real deal. Without Austin, highlighting him was a great idea.

 

[Irish#1]

Right now our chances of beating Clemson are slim to none. Beating them twice is a non-starter.

They played a mediocre game this weekend and still won by almost 4 tds.

If we play a near perfect game, we can stay with them for a half, but they just have too much talent. They will wear us down. Wish I was wrong but I don’t see anybody beating them.

Beating Clemson once let alone twice is going to be difficult, but I disagree that it will be over in the second half. We have more depth on the D-line than we have had for a long, long time and Lea rotates guys to keep them fresh. We stay in the game until the end.

 

[Cackalacky2.0]

OSU was ranked #3 In early preseason polls, so it’s no surprise they jumped. It is a little surprising they bumped us considering the beat down on Pitt.

Our opponents are a combined 9-22 win-loss record. They were waiting for OSU to play a single game so they could put them in the top 4.

I was wondering how they were going to rationally incorporate the Big 10 into the polls considering those teams that have already played 5-6 games versus the Big 10 getting a full two more months of practice and preparation.....

Doesnt seem fair that they just insert a team into the polls and a playoff spot after 6 weeks of non-equivalent play but what do I know?

Imagine the craziness if BIG 10 teams gain ground in the polls while ND or other teams have played all their games and are idle. Imagine what happens if fuckMichigan creeps up to top5-6 and leap frogs ND while we are idle.

 

[Old Man Mike]

Michigan could very well do this.

 

[irishtrooper]

Michigan could very well do this.

Until they get their pants pulled down AGAIN by OSU. Frauds

 

[Old Man Mike]

But that won't p!ss IE off any less when they jump us.

 

[irishtrooper]

But that won't p!ss IE off any less when they jump us.

I agree. They have Wiscy and PSU as well. I’m not buying them being great just yet

 

[Irishize]

I agree. They have Wiscy and PSU as well. I’m not buying them being great just yet

I don’t get the consternation about the polls. Who cares? The only poll that matters is the CFP. Beat Clemson & there won’t be an worry over tOSU being ranked ahead of ND.

 

[tko]

weak azz ICON. ND media needs to step up.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Michael Bryan just published an Advanced Stats Review of the Pitt game over at 18 Stripes. Well worth your time: