Rakes Report #172: Armageddon's back in town again (The Toledo Review)
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~optional musical accompaniment~
1) This is certainly more a title to follow a defeat but considering how much that felt like a loss — and if Toledo had taken a dive at the precipice to run out the clock and kick a game-winning field goal, it would have been — we can get a bit dramatic, as all the win streaks (regular season, home, against unranked teams, as a favorite) were under fire. Notre Dame is 2-0 through two games, which is objectively the best record you can have at that point but if they continue to try and dance through raindrops like they have so far this season that zero is going to tick up over the next two months. Still, it’s much better to be having this conversation about what the Irish are good at (a bunch of stuff, but only intermittently, and perhaps not enough to sustain a top-tier campaign) and what they are bad at (one glaring thing that could submarine the whole operation if it doesn’t improve) after a victory than the other way around.
This summer when Vegas odds and some advanced stats systems said the Irish seemed primed to lose multiple games, some folks believed they were in grievous error. Again, this was a team that lost four of its offensive linemen (three top 100 draft picks), the best linebacker in the country, two NFL defensive ends, a nasty and versatile tight end, a great defensive coordinator and the winningest quarterback in school history, which is a lot to overcome no matter how well you recruit and develop. On top of all of that, they’re now down two left tackles, have generated what we will politely call a quarterback discussion and have seen a scythe taken to their linebacker room, turning a team strength into something that’s barely hanging together. There is a lot of work to do and no convenient time to do it with the gauntlet kicking off, a steep challenge for the staff, players and we the fans.
(Fun with math and some perspective before moving on: Per the SP+, the postgame win percentage for that heartburner was 91 percent for Notre Dame, which means if two teams played with those exact stats 100 times, the Irish would have won 91 one of them. The turnovers — particularly the pick six — hid how much the Irish dominated on a down-to-down basis. I’m sure this information retroactively makes your chest feel better than it did throughout the fourth.)
2) Let’s start with the defense, which was much better than they were in the opener until they weren’t. Marcus Freeman's unit allowed only a trio of first half field goals and was dominating to start the second half, allowing a single first down and forcing four punts on as many possessions. But then a Toledo offense that had been bottled up all day scored consecutive touchdowns when one more stop would have put the game away. They eventually did get the big stop to close things out, courtesy of a strip by MTA, but it was disheartening to see another fourth quarter collapse.
I’m not really interested in what the yards per play are for this defense if you remove the big plays (the BVGication we practiced during his tenure), because until we see otherwise, I’m just going to assume they’ll give up a pair of 60+ yard gains every game. Of course, if they stop allowing that to happen — very possible, as this is still a group learning a new scheme and in theory should get better at it — everything will be a lot better. J.D. Bertrand was tremendous, the corners seemed spry and Isaiah Foskey had another sack, but I still have some questions about the Freeman scheme, mainly “Why are linemen positioned as linebackers so often?” Under Clark Lea, you would see Julian Okwara, Daelin Hayes and company dropping to cover a section of the sideline, but this is something else entirely. I assume those spots are where Marist Liafau and Jordan Botelho would be if they were active, but they’re not, so hopefully Freeman can adjust. We’ll talk about Purdue at the end but Jeff Brohm is going to unload the kitchen sink and likely a number of appliances on Saturday, meaning discipline will be a must.
3) The primary problem against the Rockets for long stretches was the offense, which gave up only one fewer touchdown than the defense in their time on the field. But let’s start with the positive: Watching Kevin Austin in person is a very enjoyable experience, as he’s such a smooth operator capable of flashes of violent athleticism when he’s one-on-one down the field. Kyren Williams had a potentially catastrophic fumble but he again had an impact as a rusher and receiver. Chris Tyree had a 55-yard touchdown, Avery Davis was a factor (including some dandy improvisation as a passer) after a quiet opener, the freshmen got their first catches and Michael Mayer cut down on the errors that plagued him last week and came through with two touchdown catches to bookend the proceedings. Braden Lenzy had a couple grabs and showed his newfound physicality winning a great jump ball, albeit out of bounds.
This offensive line, though. Yikes a bikes. Jeff Quinn got dealt a rough hand with the recruiting class that immediately preceded his tenure and then saw his star left tackle go down early but it was so bad I don’t even quite know how to evaluate Jack Coan and Tommy Rees simply because there is only so much a quarterback and playcaller can do without blocking. It is some solace to remember that in Quinn’s first year the Irish spent the first two games being blown to hell by Michigan (thank you Brandon Wimbush) and pushed around by Ball State before working themselves into fighting form (even with the loss of Alex Bars for most of the season), but that feels distant with some nasty defensive lines looming.
One way that the 2018 line got better was the insertion of Ian Book and a number of RPOs into the offense, taking pressure off of the big guys and making things tougher on the defense. We saw something similar on Saturday with Tyler Buchner’s debut, the offense averaging over 11 yards per play with him on the field. He immediately breathed life into the attack, giving the Rockets another big factor to account for and acquitting himself quite well in a close game. But while Coan had the bad pick six and seemed slightly off under the relentless pressure, there’s certainly a place for a quarterback who can orchestrate drives like he did on the first and final ones of the game.
What does that mean going forward? As best I can tell, there are three non-Drew Pyne options.
a) Just keep playing Coan. This seems dangerous for Coan and the offense as a whole unless the line gets better because the run game will get stifled and pass rushes will be teeing off on him. Still, one nice thing from having two games of tape is that Rees should know what doesn’t work and can strip some pages out the playbook as he comes up with more screens, draws and quicker-developing shots for Coan that don’t leave him hanging out to dry.
b) Play only Buchner. Certainly would open up some things, but as mentioned above the Irish have a bevy of talented receivers and I do not know if Buchner will be able to take advantage of them downfield like Coan has. (I literally do not know – perhaps he can or get the ball to them in other ways, but we haven’t seen it yet.) The more tape there is of Buchner the more defenses can adjust and if he’s only capable of a small section of the playbook that could be trouble. Maybe he’s further along than we all realize and ready for an even larger role, but how will he handle more hostile environments?
c) Play them both like on Saturday. This is my preferred option, though admittedly a dangerous proposition. The Irish need to do something to keep their opposition guessing, and swinging between the RPO package with Buchner and a vertical passing game that mixes in some screens with Coan just might be the trick. Now the issue is if in the process of trying to confound the other team the Irish go on tilt themselves, stretching too thin and becoming subpar at everything. It seems like a manageable locker room problem and it’s a big gamble this early in the season but I just don’t know how much of a choice there is at the moment.
4) Shouts again to Jonathan Doerer, who calmly hit a 48-yarder to give the Irish a lead that should have held up at the beginning of the fourth. No demerits for missing a 55-yarder – I was initially against that decision to kick but it was a fourth and ten in no man’s land and Doerer was close. I think the better idea would have been to try and pop a draw on 3rd and 10 to get him a few more yards or get in go-for-it position. I was fine with the decision to go for it on 4th and one near the end of the first half, just didn’t love the playcall. If this team is going to play aggressive all year, be aggressive, but with a bit more creativity.
5) Was so nice being back on campus for a game, with top-notch weather, seats and company. It was definitely subdued, although I don’t know how much of that was “Playing Toledo” and how much was “There’s still a pandemic and the Stadium wasn’t requiring vaccinations.” I loved the John Carpenter rift after an early Mayer catch and am just now realizing how powerful our Mackey candidate is going to be come the Oct. 30 North Carolina game. Stadium definitely was not overly loud until parts of the second half, and it was kind of nuts to realize that not a single undergraduate in the place, from seniors on down, had witnessed a home loss since they enrolled. I also appreciate the shouting of the “Ay yi yi” during “Crazy Train,” which is now shockingly a decade old as an in-game jam. Shout out to the staff at LaFortune, who were handing out masks at the door.
6) Winning Is Hard/Schadenfreude Round Up: Fun one this week. No. 3 Ohio State lost as a two-touchdown favorite at home to Oregon even though the Ducks were missing their best player. We have expressed skepticism about Mario Cristobal previously and while we’ll see if he can survive a crappy Pac-12 but this is a helluva win. No. 5 Texas A&M was as heavily favored against Colorado as the Irish were against Toledo and had scored three (3) points until the final minutes of the game, where they managed to reach the end zone and survive 10-7.
No. 7 Cincinnati was tied 7-7 with Murray State at the half before pulling away. Remember how No. 9 Iowa State was pushed as a playoff contender this offseason? Well, they lost at home to Iowa. Clay Helton might have had his single worst loss as Trojans head coach, getting nuked at home by a Stanford team that looked woeful last week against a Kansas State team that was trailing Southern Illinois at the half. Steve Sarkisian’s honeymoon is over after No. 15 Texas got stomped at Arkansas. No. 21 Utah lost as a touchdown favorite at BYU and No. 22 Miami barely survived at home against Appalachian State. NC State was getting a bunch of hype as maybe the second-best team in the ACC so of course Dave Doeren immediately went on the road to Mississippi State as a short favorite and lost. Shoutout to Clark Lea, who won his first game as Vanderbilt head coach at Colorado State – hopefully the first of many.
And finally, Florida State didn’t go into a prevent defense despite only six seconds being on the clock and lost on the final play of the game (please listen to this) to Jacksonville State, dropping them to 0-2 and wiping out any moral victory credit Mike Norvell got for taking the Irish to overtime. Perhaps there was something to playing on Sunday night in such a dramatic affair that drained both teams, but at least the Irish survived game two. Also if you see Florida State lose on a walkoff to an FCS team and you can’t find joy in that because you’re fretting about what it means for the Irish, open your heart.
7) My junior year the Irish were No. 2 in the country, sitting at 2-0 and coming off a blowout win against a Top 20 Penn State team. They were hosting Michigan, a team they had defeated the prior two Septembers, and after the Wolverines the schedule opened up as a straight run to a season-ending Bush Push rematch at the Coliseum and then God willing a BCS title game appearance. It was a rout, but in the bad way: Alan Branch and LaMarr Woodley crushed Brady Quinn while Mario Mannginham and Mike Hart frolicked freely through the Irish defense.
We were devastated after, and that evening sat around Dillon drinking and being sad sacks. At one point during our moping my roommate Sean put on “Bad Day” by Daniel Powter, a surprisingly perfect musical choice to salvage a piece of the weekend, indeed the singing of a sad song turning it around. It’s been 15 years and every time I hear that song I still think of that game, which made it grimly funny when we got back to the truck after beating Toledo and I turned it on to hear “Bad Day” playing on Pop Rocks (highly recommend – Sirius XM Channel 12). I did a Dikembe finger wag at the display, pleased that the Irish had for at least one more week escaped the specter of the Canadian singer-songwriter and the crushing loss he represents.
On Saturday, Powter could take the form of a giant drum with an affinity for trains. Purdue has played really well through two games, taking care of a solid Oregon State team and blitzing UConn to the degree any respectable FBS program would. Notre Dame absolutely has the tools to put together a really good team, it’s just that they have to do that while taking everyone’s best shot for the next month and a half, with no chance to breathe until the bye and no game that isn’t a five-alarm danger until November. The one thing the Irish have going for them is that over the course of the first two games there were a bevy of inflection points where if a couple breaks went their way things would have been far more comfortable, so there’s the chance to get some improvement along the line with some juice from Buchner, a continued tightening up of the defense and a break or two so that we aren’t wrecks at the end of the game. Or, perhaps, Notre Dame is going to get wrecked, their precipitation dodging through two games set to come to a sudden and violent end. We’ll find out.
Let’s set aside concerns about rankings and playoffs and bowl games and everything and keep this micro at least through the bye: a) Win each game b) Get a little better each time out, to make a) easier. Go Irish, Beat Boilers. I’ll take any kind of 3-0.
A couple quick notes: There are two new shirts over at the store, both designed by the wonderful and talented Bridget Reynolds. One is for fans of the Netflix series “I Think You Should Leave” and the other is a fresh new Winning Is Hard. My two TeePublic recs: 1) If they have it in the color you want and you’re down to spend an extra few bucks, the tri-blend extra soft is the way to go. 2) To make up for that bump in cost, wait until they have one of their frequent sales unless you’re in a big hurry. I’ll flag those here and on Twitter or you can get on their mailing list.
Podcasts might be a little infrequent for the next few weeks as I catch up on a bunch of stuff post-vacation but I’ll try my best. The newsletters will continue being delivered on Mondays. I think that’s it? Take care of yourselves and each other.
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