Rakes Report #153: Wash my head when I've been sinnin', wash my knuckles when they bleed (The Pittsburgh Review)
~optional musical accompaniment~
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1) It makes perfect sense going into a game that’s traditionally tight we would focus on the flaws of our own team, worrying about how Notre Dame’s passing game would do against a Pat Narduzzi defense that forces you to throw in order to be successful. What we maybe did not spend enough time thinking about was what it would look like if Pittsburgh, with no running game, trotted out their back-up quarterback against a Clark Lea defense. The gory tableau left on the banks of the Allegheny by the Irish defense was spooky season appropriate, as the Panthers could muster nothing over the course of 60 minutes in an absolute rout.
2) The Pitt running game was bad coming in and could get nothing going, sitting in negative yardage for a good chunk of the game. Quarterback Joey Yellen wasn't great in his start against Miami last week (48 percent completion, 6 yards per attempt) but he threw a touchdown and no picks. On Saturday, he completed just 37 percent of his passes at a 3.7 yards per attempt clip and threw three interceptions. He made a couple of really nice third down throws on the first drive but if your thinking was “Joey Yellen cannot do this all afternoon” you were absolutely correct. He was put into a tough position because, again, Pitt cannot run the ball, but a week after bottling up Tutu Atwell the Irish defense erased Jordan Addison (3 catches for 40 yards a week after going 8 for 147 against the Canes). Pittsburgh ended up with 162 yards of offense, 11 first downs and 12 penalties.
Is Kyle Hamilton too fast? He was flagged for a questionable pass interference because the receiver he was covering was too slow. We know Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah is too fast and he gamely hung with a wide receiver in coverage for his pick. Nick McCloud’s interception didn’t have much to do with speed but it was very impressive as he skied for the ball along the sideline and came down in bounds. Bo Bauer had a pick thrown directly to him but hey we still give credit for being in the right place and leaping to make the grab. MTA was looking a lot sprier as he works his way back to full health and it was fun to see activity from both Isaiah Foskey and Ovie Oghuofo. Just a complete and total suffocation.
I understand the rule is that if Notre Dame looks good that means the other team is bad but Louisville put up 48 on Florida State this weekend after scoring just seven in their previous game. I know Irish opponents thus far aren’t exactly impressive but they’ve still totaled all of 20 points after half time, good for a four points per game mark after intermission. Over the last two games, Notre Dame’s opponents have made it to the red zone one (1) time. If you prefer advanced stats, they’re at 8th in the SP+, which cares about how you play as much as who you play so the competition is factored into the formula. Folks? They good.
3) Buried the lede a bit here because Ian Book and the offense did exactly what we wanted them to do, going over six yards per play against a good Panthers unit before garbage time kicked in. Book’s second touchdown pass to Ben Skowronek made all the highlight reels because it was an impressive play by the transfer to turn 3rd and 14 into a 73-yard touchdown but go back and look at their first connection: Book stands comfortable amid the maelstrom of the Pitt defensive line and fires down the middle to a point where only his tall receiver could go get it. Book was really good, putting up 352 yards of offense by himself and averaging just over ten yards per toss. Also don’t overlook his keeping of the first drive alive by converting the first third down of the game with his legs.
Michael Mayer had his breakout, with five catches for 73 yards and a leaping touchdown. Javon McKinley made the most of some improvisational work from Book while both Avery Davis and Kyren Williams did some damage underneath. Not much going in the running game when you look at the total stats, but they were again efficient on converting short yardage situations, including the hilarious C’Borius Flemister caravan late in the game. (You know Kyren is a great running back because when one defender hits him in the hole and he doesn’t spin/fall forward for another couple yards there is a sense of mild surprise because he does that so much.) There were also some neat play designs, with play action toss fakes and just general creativity in spreading out the field and attacking Pitt everywhere in a game where many thought the Irish would struggle to scrape past the 20-point mark. (The Irish also converted all three Panther turnovers into touchdowns, which is nice complementary football.) You know the offense was humming when complaints are about when the back-up quarterback came into the game and the plays he ran after doing so.
Following the game, Brian Kelly announced that Kevin Austin would miss the remainder of the season after reinjuring his foot at practice last week while during the game Braden Lenzy pulled up with a hamstring injury of unknown severity. They were the best chances for traditional deep threats and I’m not sure how much the Irish can get out of Lenzy the rest of the way, which means Tommy Rees is going to have to cobble together the best offense he can using only giant guys who jump high but likely won’t get much separation, smaller guys underneath and a top-tier run game. I don’t think it’s going to be pretty most of the time but I’m kind of excited to see what he can MacGyver together? Smash-mouth football that mixes in some lob shots and misdirection should be good enough against all but one team on the schedule, and it might work against them, too.
4) Smooth day on special teams: Jonathan Doerer hit a short one and Foskey had the most casual blocked punt for a touchdown you’ll see, strolling into the end zone to claim his prize just before the half following some awful game management from Narduzzi. The offensive line had a couple penalties, including a mystery personal foul on Liam Eichenberg where we still don’t know what happened. The officiating was pretty bad, between the bogus pass interference on Hamilton and the lack of intentional grounding called when it was clearly intentional grounding. This is less frustrating to discuss when you win by six touchdowns.
5) Winning Is Hard/Schadenfreude Round Up: Penn State is often compared to Notre Dame as being on the next tier under the elites of the sport and perhaps a quarterback away, which I think is a fair and justifiable point to make. However, the Irish haven’t blown any fourth quarter leads to Indiana lately, so they have a slight leg up in the competition as of this moment. (I don’t want to trash the Hoosiers, who are a solid program, but there was a comedy of errors and missed opportunities to close out a game in which Penn State held the ball for two-thirds of the proceedings.) If the Nittany Lions cannot rally to defeat Ohio State on Saturday, they will begin their season 0-2. A tough break.
Speaking of the Buckeyes, they trailed Nebraska 7-0 to start the game and were tied at 14 late into the second quarter before putting on the jets and absolutely wrecking the Huskers. Clemson held only a 27-21 lead over Syracuse in the third quarter but ended up with a comfortable win after Dino Babers committed a cardinal coaching sin (wasting a second half timeout in order to punt on fourth and short losing by six as a big underdog). Alabama had no trouble with Tennessee, who has now lost three straight by double digits.
Minnesota got to fly under the radar to start last season but they got the spotlight to open 2020 and were whacked at home by Michigan, although we should note the Gophers were missing key players due to COVID protocols. Virginia Tech lost its sixth game as a ranked team to an unranked opponent under Justin Fuente, which doesn’t seem ideal. Iowa State lost a close one to Oklahoma State in a Big 12 showdown. Auburn needed a minor miracle to escape Ole Miss. Florida State followed up their big win over North Carolina by getting smoked at Louisville. SPARTY LOST AT HOME TO RUTGERS, turning the ball over seven times.
6) One thing Kelly has done a really nice job of during his time at Notre Dame is taking care of what we will call, uh, Nuisance Games. Since the start of the 2010 season, the Irish are 17-1 against Purdue, Boston College and Pittsburgh, teams that have tripped up previous Notre Dame head coaches throughout the ages. (Kelly is also 12-4 against Navy and Sparty, and was kind enough to consign the quartet of losses to 2010 and 2016 in a sort of disappointment gerrymandering.) You don’t reach the pinnacle of the sport solely by beating those teams but you can quickly impede your ability to climb by losing to them, so another bit of extreme competency that can be overlooked.
After the game Kelly was pretty forthright that they’re starting to ramp up for the November 7 clash with Clemson:
Just playing to win games is not good enough anymore. We need to elevate our compete level. We need to coach better. We need to play better. We need to play at an elite level and it starts with playing at a level that allows you to not all of sudden play your best when you have to, but have that ready to go because you're playing at a high level and that hasn't been the case.
That was the challenge. And that's risky, right? In some instances, people would say, 'Well, you're looking ahead.’ We are looking ahead a little bit. We needed to get this football team to understand that they are really good and we needed to up our compete level in all three phases. We did that today.
…
The point is that we have to elevate our play if we want to have any chance of getting to our goal, and that is to win a championship, so we just change the way we approach this game and it really benefited our guys. I told them don't worry about the scoreboard. I really don't care about the wins or losses as it relates to this game itself. I care about how you elevate your play. Play fearless. Go get the football. Attack all the time because we're going to need to look like this down the road if you want to fulfill any of your goals.
You may recall that immediately after the demolition of an Iowa State team that was expected to be a capable bowl opponent, Kelly basically said, “Yeah, going 11-2 and winning the Camping World was nice, but we have bigger goals.” That was the same trip in which he announced that he wanted the Irish to start recruiting at a higher level than they had been during his tenure. Now, it’s one thing to say “We want to recruit top five classes, beat Clemson and win a championship” and it’s another thing to actually do that but right now we’re in a position where Notre Dame is 28-3 since the start of the 2018 season — an objectively great run of football we all should be enjoying week in and week out — but also openly aspiring to greater heights. They might not reach them but I’m not sure we can ask for a whole lot more than “Be really successful while also striving to be even more successful,” but it can be difficult to balance contentment and complacency with all things in life, including sports, so we will do our best to manage expectations.
Before the showdown with Clemson, however, Notre Dame has one more potential landmine in Georgia Tech. The Yellow Jackets are in year two of the post-triple option revamp under Geoff Collins and while they started the season strong with a win in Tallahassee and competitive showing with Central Florida, the last couple weeks have not been kind. They’re giving up 200 yards rushing per game, they turn the ball over a lot and they’re starting a talented dual threat quarterback who also happens to be a true freshman. Going on the road is tricky but after facing a top offense and top defense in subsequent weeks the Irish now face a team that’s ranked an even 60th in both SP+ offense and SP+ defense. If Tech can hold onto the ball and Jeff Sims can make some plays with his legs this could be interesting for a while, but hopefully the Irish are set in making another statement in advance of the biggest game to be played in South Bend since October 2005.
7) I wanted to conclude by offering condolences to the family and friends of the two Notre Dame students who were killed early Saturday morning after being struck by a car while walking. This semester and entire year have been a nightmare between COVID restrictions and the lack of breaks in the fall academic calendar and now to have this on top is just so much to ask of a campus that’s been through so much. I am not sure what more to offer after such an unspeakable tragedy but we will keep those affected in our thoughts.
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