Griffiths: Notre Dame could be 7-0 heading to Oklahoma

Cliff September 17, 2012 0

By DOUG GRIFFITHS
ISL Correspondent

Before the season started who thought Notre Dame would be undefeated hosting Michigan?

Outside of Irish die-hards, not many who follow college football liked Notre Dame’s chances of being 3-0. Yet that’s exactly where the Irish stand after beating Navy, Purdue and No. 10 Michigan State.

Saturday’s victory in Spartan Stadium has catapulted Notre Dame to No. 11 in this week’s Associated Press poll and now there’s talk of the Irish possibly being 7-0 when they travel to Oklahoma to face the Sooners Oct. 27.

Of course Michigan, Miami (Fla.), Stanford and BYU will have something to say about that.

However, given the fact how well the Irish defense has played and how impressive quarterback Everett Golson has been, it’s getting more difficult to see how the Wolverines, Hurricanes, Cardinal and Cougars will beat them.

Certainly, Brian Kelly doesn’t want to hear such talk as he continues to keep up the coach’s mantra of ˜one game at a time,’ but after witnessing Notre Dame’s dominating performance on the road against perhaps the Big Ten’s best team, it’s easy to make a case that the Irish will in fact be 7-0 headed to Norman.

Kelly and his staff are hard at work this week trying to keep their players grounded as much as possible. Easier said than done, right?

In fact, it didn’t take long for Kelly to get his message across to the Irish following the Michigan State game. Some of his players admitted in the Spartan Stadium locker room that their coach tried to bring them down to Earth a little bit after the game.

I wanted to kind of set the landscape for where we are, Michigan coming in this week, then we have a bye week, Kelly admitted.

I was really trying to give them a bigger picture of where we are, keep the focus. Stay on task. Then you’ve got the week off and we begin the second third of the season.

In Kelly’s words, he’s already begun drilling down again on the distractions and avoiding the noise that comes with being 3-0 and preparing for a prime time home game against a nationally ranked opponent.

You have to, the Irish boss said. They’re 18- to 21-year olds. You need to continue to remind them about where they are, how they got here. There’s no other real recipe than just staying focused on day to day because of the way we’ve operated here. If we start changing that now, we’ll be in for some issues later.

So first things first, the Wolverines will come to town wanting to beat the Irish and definitely wanting to make amends for their poor showing in their last primetime showdown this season when Alabama embarrassed them.

Michigan will present a major challenge that Notre Dame hasn’t faced this season – an extremely mobile and athletically gifted quarterback. Irish fans don’t have to be reminded just how deadly Denard Robinson can be. They vividly recall his last trip to the House that Rockne built.

Two years ago, Robinson nearly won the Heisman Trophy against the Irish. He finished with a staggering 258 yards rushing, including 152 in the second quarter alone, and two touchdown runs. In addition, Robinson threw for two other scores and accounted for 258 yards through the air. Plus, he directed the game-winning touchdown drive, which he capped with a 2-yard scoring run with 27 seconds left to give the Wolverines a 28-24 victory.

It goes without saying that if the Irish want to beat Michigan, it will have to do a much better job containing him. If the first three games of the 2012 season are any indication, expect Notre Dame’s defense to rise to the occasion and do just that and then the talk of being 7-0 in late October will really start heating up.

With that said, IndySportsLegends.com provides you with its weekly report card on the Irish.

QUARTERBACKS A-

I know this is an awfully high mark for a quarterback that completed only 43.8 percent of his passes, but considering he accounted for both of Notre Dame’s touchdowns – one passing and one throwing – and more importantly didn’t turn the ball over I think Golson is more than worthy of a superior game.

How many first-year starting quarterbacks go in and excel on the road in a Big Ten environment?

Golson’s play continues to resemble more of an upperclassman than a rookie. His decision-making against the Spartans was rock solid. When pressured, he simply throws the ball away. And doesn’t seem to force passes, something you can’t say often even with veteran signal callers.

The arm strength he showed on the 36-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter was nothing short of amazing. There aren’t too many quarterback who can roll right, throw across his body on the road and deliver a perfect strike in the end zone. Golson did just that and is play was worthy of a very high mark.

RUNNING BACKS C

We knew running room would be hard to come by against MSU’s stout defensive front and it was.

Although it was certainly nice to see Cierre Wood back and making his usual nifty runs. His 56 yards led the way for Notre Dame and his 5.6-yard average wasn’t bad at all considering he was making his 2012 debut.

Now the Irish have three backs that would start at most schools, but they need to bring up the 3.6 yards per carry average, especially if they aspire to be a BCS bowl team.

RECEIVERS/TIGHT ENDS C+

The thing that was impressive here were receivers other than tight end Tyler Eifert stepped up and were productive.

Eifert was a non-factor being held to without a catch. Nonetheless, his counterparts delivered with 14 catches for 178 yards, none more impressive than John Goodman’s one-handed snag in the end zone to give the Irish a 7-0 lead.

Robby Toma and TJ Jones also deserve mention. Toma had a team-high five catches, while Jones had a team-best 59 yards receiving (one more yard than Toma).

OFFENSIVE LINE B

After having a tough go of it against the Boilermakers, the Irish o-line responded with a good showing.

Golson was sacked just one time, an impressive figure the line had to deal with the likes of Spartan end William Gholston.

The line also opened up more running lanes than they did against Purdue although the Irish backs did a good job of cutting back to find daylight, too.

DEFENSIVE LINE A-

Notre Dame’s front four dominated the line of scrimmage and in so doing really disrupted Michigan State’s offense.

Because Spartan quarterback Andrew Maxwell didn’t have much time to throw – he was sacked four times – MSU couldn’t turn to its vertical passing game.

There were plenty of stars up front for the Irish, but none that made more of an impact than Prince Shembo, who Notre Dame rushed as a rush linebacker lining up from an end spot. Shembo was spectacular, recording nine tackles (second on the team), with two tackles for loss and a sack.

Louis Nix III did his usual job of plugging up the middle lining up over the nose of the ball. He added five stops.

And how about freshman Sheldon Day? When his number was called, the Indianapolis product delivered with a sax of Maxwell and he followed that up with a pass break up. Look for the defensive end to get more playing time as the season moves along.

LINEBACKERS A

We’re getting used to seeing the Irish linebacking corps play stellar football and that was again the case in East Lansing.

Any time you hold a terrific back like Le’Veon Bell to 77 yards rushing on 19 carries – a 4.1-yard average – you’re playing very good run defense.

The backers, led by Manti Te’o’s game-high 12 tackles (twice as many stops as any MSU defender) and Dan Fox’s five tackles), flew to the ball. They seemed to be all over the field, prompting color analyst Kirk Herbstreit to comment how much quicker he thinks this year’s Notre Dame defense is compared to recent years.

SECONDARY A-

The defensive backfield has an argument to make for an A+ when you consider they played yet another half without a starter as safety Jamoris Slaughter when done with a season-ending injury.

Young or not, the Irish secondary did the job, holding Maxwell to a completion percentage around 50 percent and not letting any receivers behind them. MSU’s longest pass play was just 23 yards.

Not only does this unit of the team continue to play like a much older one, but they’re quickly becoming known for their ability to tackle in the open field. They don’t miss many tackles and don’t let receivers get much yardage after the catch.

Losing yet another starter, will challenge this group, but if they continue to play like they have, scoring on Notre Dame’s defense will only get tougher.

SPECIAL TEAMS A

Notre Dame’s specialists were special again.

After kicking the game-winning field goal against Purdue, Kyle Brindza connected on both his tries from 29 and 47 yards out.

But the Special Teams Player-of-the-Game had to be punter Ben Turk. Not only did he average 42.4 yards on his eight boots, but he buried four inside the 4-yard line.

The coverage teams were good, too, allowing just 6 yards on one punt return and 24 yards on a kickoff run back.

COACHING A-

Kelly gets high marks again. As you would expect, he has a very good feel for this team, using the various talented pieces he has at his disposable in what seems to be exactly the right way.

Spending extra time in practice with Golson is paying dividends because the young signal caller seems to have a very good grasp of the game and doesn’t seem to get rattled at all.

Kelly also did a good job rotating his three running backs, basically splitting the carries between Wood and Riddick and still getting George Atkinson III five touches.

The game started off on shaky ground when prior to the game’s first offensive snap, Notre Dame tight end Troy Niklas ran onto the field drawing an illegal substitution penalty. Then the Irish looked very disorganized and had to take a time-out before even snapping the ball.

After those two initial miscues, Notre Dame played a very clean game and the game plan was executed nearly flawlessly.

OVERALL A

I did predict the Irish to win, but no way did I think it was be in convincing fashion, but it was.

When the Irish went up 14-0 in the second quarter, you really felt like the game was over, especially with the way the defense was playing.

You would be hard-pressed to find a more impressive showing by a Notre Dame team on the road against a top-10 opponent recently.

In fact, it was the Irish’s first road win over a top-25 team since 2005.

This win was impressive on Saturday night and it remains so about 48 hours later. Now the question will be whether the Irish use it to be a springboard for the rest of the season or will they be satisfied with it and be tripped up by say Michigan. Don’t expect the latter to be the case, not with this team and not with this defense.

Also: Notre Dame rolls Michigan State