Post Game Observations........

[FightingIrishLover7]

I'm a little concerned that Kelly might have wasted a year developing a QB.

Other than that, we improved everywhere especially running and defense.

 

[phgreek]

Laser accurate comment above.

I was at the game (posting from hotel room now) and I couldnt believe how Stanford DOMINATED the line of scrimmage(on BOTH sides of the ball). it was men against boys out there tonight. The defense as a whole may have had good plays here or there, but I saw NO pressure on the QB tonight, Luck was able to sit back and survey the defense and throw MANY 'pitch and catch' throws. (how many stanford guys were WIDE open.....geez). Super disappointed in the game tonight. i felt like they gave it away.

I'm still in the 'emotional post game state' so I am not going to post anything more that I might regret later.

...Glad you got to be there...Sorry it turned out like it did...had to be painful at times...hope you drank

 

[BGIF]

Laser accurate comment above.

I was at the game (posting from hotel room now) and I couldnt believe how Stanford DOMINATED the line of scrimmage(on BOTH sides of the ball). it was men against boys out there tonight. The defense as a whole may have had good plays here or there, but I saw NO pressure on the QB tonight, Luck was able to sit back and survey the defense and throw MANY 'pitch and catch' throws. (how many stanford guys were WIDE open.....geez). Super disappointed in the game tonight. i felt like they gave it away.

I'm still in the 'emotional post game state' so I am not going to post anything more that I might regret later.

They owned the trenches. We won some battles but the war was their's.

ND's D has no sacks and 1 QB Hurry according to the game stats. There was some pressure (the Luck INT) but not much. Luck's manuverability had something to do with that he sidestepped Lynch in what looked to be a sack and stepped out of the grasp of Williams (?) to avert another loss.

 

[BGIF]

Milestones

Milestones

Floyd broke Tate's Season Reception Record for catches (93) with 86 grabs.

Floyd went over the 1,100 yd mark for a season.

Eifert became the 5th ND TE to go over the 1000 yd career mark (with a year to go).

Eifert broke Ken MacAfee's TE Season Pass Catching record of 54. Eifert has 57.

Eifert #2 Single Season TE Reception Yds, 713, behind MacAfee's 797.

Te'o (307) and Smith (301) passed Zibby at 300 for career tackles. Te'o also passed Crum (304) to take over the 9th spot on the list.

Hendrix had his first TD pass and his first INT.

Ruffer has a better FG% from 40 yds out that from 40 yds in. Go figure.

Rees #2 Single Season Completion %, 65.9 behind Clasuen's 68.0

Rees, #1 Career Completion %, 64.4.

 

[BGIF]

UnFun Stats

UnFun Stats

Notre Dame Fighting Irish vs. Stanford Cardinal - Recap - November 26, 2011 - ESPN

What Blitz?
Andrew Luck found his tight ends for three touchdowns while being blitzed against Notre Dame. He was completed just over 58 percent of his passes to all receivers against the blitz coming into Saturday. Against the Irish, Luck topped hit almost 88 percent.

Stanford vs. Irish, Passing vs. Blitz
Luck* --------Rees/Hendrix
Comp-Att 7-8 4-11
Yds/att 15.4 5.8
TD-Int 3-0 0-0
Long 55 25
*4-4, 97 Yards, 2 TDs when targeting TE Coby Fleener

NEXT LEVEL: Notre Dame's offense had 33 of its 68 plays (48.5%) go for no gain or a loss of yards on Saturday night. It was their highest percentage of negative or no gain plays on the season, and their highest since a loss to USC in November 2008 (53.0%). Notre Dame quarterbacks were sacked five times, losing 44 yards and a fumble.

 

[4irishnation]

ND's D has no sacks and 1 QB Hurry according to the game stats.

The difference is a Senior QB 1st pick in the draft, 2 top 10 OL, a running game that pounds the ball down your throat with those 2 TE sets. We got it handed 2 us tonight.

 

[tdnjesus]

Did anyone else see the post game by BK. I was laughing the whole time I watched it he was dodging QB questions like he wasMuhammad Ali. Every answere was a bull!@#$ answere.

 

[taylor16]

Inexcusable game from the O-line and special teams. On another note, what are the chances Eifert leaves the program early?

 

[Old Man Mike]

I'm running over to help care for Mom so I didn't have chance to read everything, so I apologize if this has been said: concerning the O-Line --- It was asked if Cave could have been that important. Some responders went on to say that they were just not very good, by direct allusion, even with Braxton. OK, this is just wrong.

Cave doesn't just occupy one fifth of the space in the middle. His job was to also call the defenses, thereby orienting the whole five to their possible shifting assignments. Without him, Trevor Robinson had to do this, since Golic couldn't. With this change you are bound to get different assessments pre-snap and different "chemistry".

Secondly, Cave had gotten very good at disguising his behavior just pre-snap [he wasn't in the first half of last season]. We do not know if Golic can handle that subtlety yet; it is certainly possible that he gives the snap away sometimes.

Center is charged with more alterations in who and how you block than any other O-Line position. Just watch all the different things those guys have to do post-snap (instead of just watching the ball all the time) to understand the positional demands. I'll bet Mike, Jr. is missing a lot of these reach blocks or ad hoc pick-ups --- no gripe to him; he is a second team guy doing the best he can.

Our O-Line has proved all year that it is very good and composed of tough guys. Martin, Watt, and Cave made a tremendous left side. Robinson stepped up his game. Dever has never quite gotten to their level, but he is adequate. Now, Cave goes down and the right side is now vulnerable and it shows sometimes [although we still do "alright" generally]. Big surprise!!

It stuns me that game-loss-crazed persons will turn on absolutely everyone on our team with cheap shot remarks after a tough game against a team which is acknowledged as one of the physically toughest in the country. If I wanted to stew about our team, the O-Line would be one of the last elements I was smearing crap upon.

 

[NDOM]

Post game thoughts?

We finished where I said we would finish and people trashed me. So do me and alot of us here a favor and PLEASE do NOT predict a BCS game for us next year because it's just NOT going to happen people.

I will say this: Next year is pretty much going to be the same as this year with the schedule we play.

So don't even bother mentioning those 3 letters B.C.S.!

 

[Dizzyphil]

Post-Game/Post-Year observations:

Please Coach Elston, go to the school of Frank Beamer's Special Teams Play.

and that's all I got to say about that...



Diz

 

[Long Time Irish]

I'm running over to help care for Mom so I didn't have chance to read everything, so I apologize if this has been said: concerning the O-Line --- It was asked if Cave could have been that important. Some responders went on to say that they were just not very good, by direct allusion, even with Braxton. OK, this is just wrong.

Cave doesn't just occupy one fifth of the space in the middle. His job was to also call the defenses, thereby orienting the whole five to their possible shifting assignments. Without him, Trevor Robinson had to do this, since Golic couldn't. With this change you are bound to get different assessments pre-snap and different "chemistry".

Secondly, Cave had gotten very good at disguising his behavior just pre-snap [he wasn't in the first half of last season]. We do not know if Golic can handle that subtlety yet; it is certainly possible that he gives the snap away sometimes.

Center is charged with more alterations in who and how you block than any other O-Line position. Just watch all the different things those guys have to do post-snap (instead of just watching the ball all the time) to understand the positional demands. I'll bet Mike, Jr. is missing a lot of these reach blocks or ad hoc pick-ups --- no gripe to him; he is a second team guy doing the best he can.

Our O-Line has proved all year that it is very good and composed of tough guys. Martin, Watt, and Cave made a tremendous left side. Robinson stepped up his game. Dever has never quite gotten to their level, but he is adequate. Now, Cave goes down and the right side is now vulnerable and it shows sometimes [although we still do "alright" generally]. Big surprise!!

It stuns me that game-loss-crazed persons will turn on absolutely everyone on our team with cheap shot remarks after a tough game against a team which is acknowledged as one of the physically toughest in the country. If I wanted to stew about our team, the O-Line would be one of the last elements I was smearing crap upon.

I thought, and am just asking, that in Kelly's offense it was the QB's job to call the O-line blocking scheme?? I know a few times I saw Robinson pointing things out to Hendrix, but I thought this was because of the experience level of Hendrix.

Also I hope all is well with your Mom....

 

[enrico514]

Post game thoughts?

We finished where I said we would finish and people trashed me. So do me and alot of us here a favor and PLEASE do NOT predict a BCS game for us next year because it's just NOT going to happen people.

I will say this: Next year is pretty much going to be the same as this year with the schedule we play.

So don't even bother mentioning those 3 letters B.C.S.!

^This

ND fans need to be realistic.

Next year's schedule is tough/brutal but I expect the team to be competitive in all the games.

 

[rtrn2glory]

couple of thoughts...whatever it's worth.

a mobile QB doubles your playbook
thought d line held up ok, considering all the injuries
this is a 5 maybe six win team without michael floyd
te'o needs to stay another year.
worst game of zach martin's career and it came at a bad time.
really liked the stunting that stanford's defense did and i wonder why we cannot do something similar
imo there is no QB controversy...hendrix is the man, ride to die
i think we found out last night how good/how important braxton cave is
golic will not be back for a 5th year
open field tackling was awful

liked how the team battled.
thought the lack of an experienced signal caller cost us.

we need a win over Fla St. to have the same momentum we had last year after the bowl season.

 

[Patulski]

Did anyone else see the post game by BK. I was laughing the whole time I watched it he was dodging QB questions like he wasMuhammad Ali. Every answere was a bull!@#$ answere.

He reiterated what he said all year: He's trying to build a tougher football team. Unfortunately for him, all anybody wants to talk about is the QB. Kelly, a guy who's known for developing QB's, knows it's bull crap. Only novices and fools believe this team was a QB away from being a NC team. Kelly has got to put up with stupid QB questions week in and week out. I commend him for talking about what matters, and saw a tougher football team this year. We're not elite yet, but if he keeps recruiting well, and gets more disciplined play on the field, we're going to be a better football program than we've been since Holtz.

 

[kmoose]

Floyd broke Tate's Season Reception Record for catches (93) with 86 grabs.

Floyd went over the 1,100 yd mark for a season.

Eifert became the 5th ND TE to go over the 1000 yd career mark (with a year to go).

Eifert broke Ken MacAfee's TE Season Pass Catching record of 54. Eifert has 57.

Eifert #2 Single Season TE Reception Yds, 713, behind MacAfee's 797.

Te'o (307) and Smith (301) passed Zibby at 300 for career tackles. Te'o also passed Crum (304) to take over the 9th spot on the list.

Hendrix had his first TD pass and his first INT.

Ruffer has a better FG% from 40 yds out that from 40 yds in. Go figure.

Rees #2 Single Season Completion %, 65.9 behind Clasuen's 68.0

Rees, #1 Career Completion %, 64.4.

But he makes A TON of bad throws.........just ask around.

 

[Al H.]

He reiterated what he said all year: He's trying to build a tougher football team. Unfortunately for him, all anybody wants to talk about is the QB. Kelly, a guy who's known for developing QB's, knows it's bull crap. Only novices and fools believe this team was a QB away from being a NC team. Kelly has got to put up with stupid QB questions week in and week out. I commend him for talking about what matters, and saw a tougher football team this year. We're not elite yet, but if he keeps recruiting well, and gets more disciplined play on the field, we're going to be a better football program than we've been since Holtz.

I think your correct about this. We're going in the right direction. All four losses this year were only a bad bounce, a poorly timed erroneous call or a **** poorly maintained field from being wins, or possible wins. And in all four games we were way off our stride on the O side of the ball with huge mistakes and flawed timing.
What can you say about punt returns in 2011?
The elite team in the country this year is in Baton Rouge! We aren't ready for them yet, or 'Bama or Oregon; but Houston, Boise, even the Virginia's, we can give them all a game. Looking forward I'm starting to get jacked up about the possible FSU game later in the year. GO IRISH!!!

 

[pumpdog20]

Defense did ok, but we should have won that game. Too many missed throws that would have either scored or been a large gain. Lots of missed tackles especially behind or at the line of scrimmage.

This program can hang with the big boys; looking forward to next year to see if they can make the leap.

 

[philipm31]

But he makes A TON of bad throws.........just ask around.

He does. 12 INTs, 5 fumbles(17 TOs from ONE boy!!), and he was a major, major reason we lost to MICH, USC and STAN.

Sorry, but completion % is overrated when you cannot force the defense to play you honestly and cannot get your best WR, Floyd into open space. The differences between Hendrix and Rees is easy to see. Mobility, arm strength, abilty to create plays, and most importantly for BK's offense, heis a TOUGH runner who can escape the pocket and make plays with his feet and arm.

Again, Tommy's completion % stats are pretty overrated. Anyone can complete 60% of their passes if 90% of them are 10 yards or shorter. Clausen's % was more impressive because he threw the deep ball a LOT more than Rees did...because he could. Longest completion Rees had in the air was what? 30, maybe 40 yards? In last year's game against MICH DC completed a throw to Rudolph for 95 yards that went at least 50 yards in the air.

With Hendrix, BK might finally have the kind of QB he wants, not one he is stuck with out of necessity.

Tommy Rees was an okay QB, but he is NOT the future of ND football and I think this entire season showed that we stuck with him far too long. FAR too long.

 

[philipm31]

Defense did ok, but we should have won that game. Too many missed throws that would have either scored or been a large gain. Lots of missed tackles especially behind or at the line of scrimmage.

This program can hang with the big boys; looking forward to next year to see if they can make the leap.

No offense, but ND can NOT hang with the big boys. I love the Irish and they seem to be getting better, but saying ND can hang with the big boys is just not true. There is no way they would hang with any of the elite teams in the BCS right now. NO WAY.

I think that next year should give us an idea if they can, but this year just proves how far the gap is between ND and the Top5-10 teams in the country. The gap is HUGE right now.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

No offense, but ND can NOT hang with the big boys. I love the Irish and they seem to be getting better, but saying ND can hang with the big boys is just not true. There is no way they would hang with any of the elite teams in the BCS right now. NO WAY.

I think that next year should give us an idea if they can, but this year just proves how far the gap is between ND and the Top5-10 teams in the country. The gap is HUGE right now.

No offense, but this is yet another ignorant statement from you.

Take a look at this season's Defensive F/+ rankings. ND's defense is currently ranked 19th nationally; we should get a nice bump in that category once the Stanford game is factored in since we held them to their lowest point total of the year.

Our defense is better than 7 of the teams currently in the top 20, and will likely be better than about half of them after the Stanford game is factored in.

LSU and 'Bama are unsurprisingly #1 and #2, and they're miles ahead of #3 PSU. Our defense isn't on par with theirs, but no one's is; they're on another planet right now. After those two, our defense compares favorably to any of the top teams.

 

[returnofthemack]

The corners next year will probably be more athletic, but I know we'll miss the tackling ability of Gray and RJ.

 

[NDinL.A.]

Tommy Rees was an okay QB, but he is NOT the future of ND football and I think this entire season showed that we stuck with him far too long. FAR too long.

Hendrix wasn't ready. Crist was soft. Rees wins games. Period. At Notre Dame, you can't sacrifice today for tomorrow. This isn't Wake Forest. The fanbase is too insane, the spotlight too big, the pressure to win now is too great.

There was no way BK could win with the fans. No way. Some wanted Rees, others wanted Hendrix, others wanted Crist. Rees won games that quite frankly I don't think Hendrix would have, games like Wake, Pitt, and esp Michigan (anyone who puts that loss squarely on Rees doesn't know a thing about football or didn't watch that game).

He went with Rees. Rees won. When Rees was obviously not going to win, he went with the change. People tend to romanticize what Hendrix did, but he was errant and threw on awful pick - just like Rees. (But believe me, I'm pumped about his performance - he gave us an added element we desperately needed.)

The only complaint I have with Kelly is that I wish he had given Hendrix more snap in those blowouts. Instead he went with Crist, which the Crist supporters lauded (again, Kelly can't win no matter what he does with his QB's). I would have liked to have seen Hendrix play in those spots. Other than that, Kelly went with the guy that would win games, which is exactly what I wanted...

 

[jason_h537]

-Andrew Hendrix showed a lot to be excited about. Not ready to proclaim him the future yet, but he should start the bowl game.

-Floyd stepped up when we needed him

-Hats off to the D, they had their backs to the wall early and swung back. Put the offense in a position to tie the game early, and even down 3 scores played lights out in the second half.

-Rees's limitations have been showing for weeks now, the defense has been able to bail him out. Yesterday against a legit BCS team, ND was exposed. No shame in losing how they did to a clearly superior opponent.

-Pretty disappointing in the o-line last night. They looked intimidated as well.

 

[OlympiaIrishFan]

My observations again after watching the game twice:

BK needed to had to pull Tommy earlier, he was scared in the pocket and couldn't get out of the way of defenders. And really Tommy blew the game with the fumble in a possible score and a horrible pass (being scared again) to our RB wide open to the end zone. As I said and other here said the best QB was on the bench this season. 12-5 when he takes the most snaps. And he has beaten exactly 1 top flight team in his career. 1--Michigan State. NO, not USC with Mitch Mustain. So, that starting record crap is exactly that.

Our Oline was out matched and I thought we would never be that out played. Keep recruiting top flight Olineman BK. We need them.

The Jonas injury hurt us last night, but Wood played super hard.

Floyd is an absolute stud, as well as Eifert.

GET Toma PT!!!!! He makes plays

Our Defense got better as the game went on, but we need speed in the in the defensive backfield. I am very concerned with the lack of football smarts of OTHER safety!!


We lost by 14, but without Tommy Turnover blowing it--it should have been closer.

Lynch and Nix are beasts!!!!!! And Teo, for the Teo is a float out stud. He is a 1st rounder I don't care what others say. He is a stud!!!

I love seeing our young guys getting PT.

Again, Tommy has a hard time against good teams. If a team has a really good D he struggles big time. Lack of arm strength/no running ability/lock on 1 guy and not quick enough to look at the 2nd or third option is hurting us. I am happy to see Andrew look solid, because he has better tools. He is fine against teams like Navy, Army, Wake, Maryland, etc. Bad defenses Tommy will kill you, but if they are good he will kill us!

Hope Tuitt gets better.

I hope we get a non-great defense in the bowl game, because if Tommy plays we are in trouble.

That field killed Woods cut backs, did our equipment people not put longer cleats in??

Overall embarrassing 1st half, better second.

Go Irish!

 

[4irishnation]

But he makes A TON of bad throws.........just ask around.

FINALLY SOMETHING YOU SAY MAKES SOME SINCE SMH BOUT TIME

 

[Irish Rogue]

I was surprised how standfords d-line controled the game. Blanton will redeem himself in the Bowl game as will the oline. Looking forward to the Hendrix/Golsen show in 2012.

 

[Honey Nut Irish]

My observations from the last row of Stanford Stadium:

-Good to see Hendrix finally get some real action. I have to question why Kelly doesn't get him any time in the last couple weeks, and then plays him against Stanford? He did a good job for the situation he was in though.

-Defense did a good job of containing Stanford when they brought pressure. I felt Diaco only rushed 3 far too much in the first half.

-I was yelling for us to go for it on 4th down prior to the missed fg, apparently they didn't hear me down on the field. That was obviously the closest we were going to get to 6 pts (or any points...) the way things were going early on.

-New helmets are much better looking in person than on TV.

-All those false starts in front of a fairly quiet crowd were embarrassing. Crowd was maybe 50% ND.

 

[Kak7304]

Hendrix wasn't ready. Crist was soft. Rees wins games. Period. At Notre Dame, you can't sacrifice today for tomorrow. This isn't Wake Forest. The fanbase is too insane, the spotlight too big, the pressure to win now is too great.

There was no way BK could win with the fans. No way. Some wanted Rees, others wanted Hendrix, others wanted Crist. Rees won games that quite frankly I don't think Hendrix would have, games like Wake, Pitt, and esp Michigan (anyone who puts that loss squarely on Rees doesn't know a thing about football or didn't watch that game).

He went with Rees. Rees won. When Rees was obviously not going to win, he went with the change. People tend to romanticize what Hendrix did, but he was errant and threw on awful pick - just like Rees. (But believe me, I'm pumped about his performance - he gave us an added element we desperately needed.)

The only complaint I have with Kelly is that I wish he had given Hendrix more snap in those blowouts. Instead he went with Crist, which the Crist supporters lauded (again, Kelly can't win no matter what he does with his QB's). I would have liked to have seen Hendrix play in those spots. Other than that, Kelly went with the guy that would win games, which is exactly what I wanted...

Good post. Do you (or any other posters out there) think that Kelly would have chosen one of the young guns at the start of the year if this were some other program and "growing pains" were acceptable? A QB like Hendrix could have won a game Tommy didn't but also could have lost one or two that he did win.

 

[cLaRk_JoNeS]

I really wish that we had more speed in the back 7. It doesn't seem like any of our LB's are good in pass coverage...even Fleming(who had a solid year IMO)looked like he ran about a 4.9 40 on that INT return.

whats even sadder is that he was pulling away from teo, who was trying to block.