Brian Kelly put the attempted comeback in Rees' hands for most of the way. And again, Rees has some strengths. But the Irish went to an empty backfield 60 percent of the time on passing downs with almost no payoff whatsoever. Rees is the polar opposite of "run threat," so all 15 snaps from an empty backfield were passes. Oklahoma sent five pass rushers at Rees 10 of 15 times and had reasonable success: Rees was 4-for-10 for 64 yards and was picked twice, once for a touchdown. A third incompletion was broken up by a defensive back, another was tipped at the line, and another was overthrown by a pressured Rees. Unable to scramble effectively to buy time, Rees found his options limited and his accuracy wanting.
And on top of that, the five times where Notre Dame went to a no-back formation and Oklahoma didn't blitz, Rees went 0-for-5, throwing passes well downfield (average length: 15 yards) with tiny to nonexistent windows for success.
The point of the empty backfield for most teams is quick, easy reads with quick, easy throws. Notre Dame takes a completely different approach and got away with it with the mobile Golson last season. But this attack in no way plays to whatever strengths Rees may have and puts a ton of pressure on him to make throws he can't make. In shorter catch-and-run situations on Saturday, Notre Dame found a little bit of success. On passes thrown six or fewer yards downfield, Rees was 5-for-8 for 41 yards. He was 3-for-3 for 33 yards in such passes to T.J. Jones. But he was just 2-for-5 on passes thrown 7-10 yards downfield, and he was just 2-for-9 on passes 11 yards or longer. His receivers got no separation downfield from Oklahoma defenders (in all, nine of 16 incomplete passes were either intercepted or broken up), and when they did, Rees struggled to get the ball there.
It's hard to say what this offense will or should look like moving forward. Kelly and Martin have tinkered quite a bit thus far -- the empty backfield was far more frequent on Saturday than it had been to date -- and don't seem to know what they trust Rees to do. They frequently brought backup Andrew Hendrix in to run the Irish's variation of the Wildcat, but Hendrix has not yet proven himself a credible passing threat (for the season: 1-for-6, nine yards). And without mobility at quarterback, Notre Dame's generally aggressive, downfield approach to passing doesn't make a lot of headway without an elite receiving corps. The checkdown options are minimal, it seems.
