Cavalier Corner Digital

Wrapped Up I t was the third quarter of a top‑10 matchup on the final Saturday of October when Oklahoma running back Damien Williams saw daylight and a chance to take the lead. But the sun sets quickly in the Notre Dame secondary. Williams caught an underneath crossing route on a pivotal third down in Notre Dame territory. He needed 12 yards for a first down. Freshman cornerback KeiVarae Russell was a couple steps behind. In front of him, Williams had two blockers murphy's Law dan murphy sealing linebackers and far more then a dozen vacant yards of grass. Russell closed the gap in the space of a stride and hacked Williams' shins out from beneath him. The unsuspecting back slammed face first into the turf eight yards shy of the first down. Add him to the list of those surprised this fall by the rag-tag Irish secondary's unfailing ability to tackle. Like it has been in several big games this season, eliminating big plays will be at the top of the checklist for defensive coordinator Bob Diaco and his group in Monday's BCS National Championship. Their opponent, No. 2 Alabama, averages 5.3 plays of 20 or more yards per game. They Irish have allowed only 29 such plays this year, the fewest of any defense in the country. They do it by offering no second chances. "I think it goes back to what we were trying to get accomplished from a defensive standpoint," said Kerry Cooks, the team's co-defensive coordinator and cornerbacks coach. "They're going to catch some balls on you. They're gifted athletes as well. It's OK, let them catch it, as long as there are Freshman KeiVarae Russell, originally a running back/wide receiver, moved to cornerback in the preseason, ended up as a starter, finished fifth on the team in tackles with 50 and helped the Irish defense only give up 29 plays of 20 or more yards — the best mark in the nation. photo by bill panzica no yards after contact. It's bang-bang, and we live to see another down." Notre Dame played in a handful of close games this season, some against teams a title contender should have beat soundly. They lived on the edge of victory and defeat, but they didn't cling to the winning side desperately. They squared their shoulders, wrapped it up and wrestled it to the ground with confidence. And they did it all backwards. Three of the team's top five tacklers this year are defensive backs. That should be a red flag. Never mind the fact that two of them — and three of the four starters in the secondary — didn't come to college to play defense. And they did it without two start- ers in the defensive backfield — junior cornerback Lo Wood, who was injured in the preseason and never played, and fifth-year safety Jamoris Slaughter, who was lost for the campaign with an Achilles tendon injury in the third game of the season, against Michigan State. "It just fits for us. I don't really know how I could explain it. It just fits for our scheme," said safety Zeke Motta, the one original defender left back there. Motta finished second only to linebacker Manti Te'o with 61 tackles in his senior season. Junior cornerback Bennett Jackson has 61 stops as well, and Russell ended his rookie regular season fifth on the team with an even 50. ✦ Page 24 Notre Dame turned its third-string offense into the 13th-ranked passing efficiency defense in the country by learning to tackle. When Cooks and the rest of the current staff came to South Bend three seasons ago, opposing offenses slipped away from the Irish like Jell-O from nails. It was a fundamental problem for the defense they inherited, and it has been methodically overemphasized ever since. "There's no doubt when we got here that was one of the issues that we identified that needed to be corrected," Cooks said. "The biggest thing to me is that you have to be willing to do it. You watch teams across the country and the first thing that you see is that the intent's not there. If you don't have the intent to be a good tackler then it's never going to happen." Athleticism is essential, too, especially in the open field. And as raw as it was after injuries early in the year, Notre Dame had plenty of athleticism. That was Cooks' first impression in fall camp when he saw Russell, the running back/receiver who readily flipped to defense to start his college career. The same goes for Jackson and sophomore safety Matthias Farley, both of whom spent a year at wide receiver before joining the secondary. Cooks and safeties coach Bob Elliott taught them how to maximize their speed with angles and leverage, and how to understand where to funnel a ball carrier. Elliott once taught the same techniques to Cooks as a young player at Iowa, and likely planted the seed of its importance in the head of defensive coordinator Bob Diaco, another Hawkeye product. "If you can't tackle, you're going to have a bad defense," Elliott said. Notre Dame can, and that's made a huge difference for the Irish this season. ✦ E-mail Dan at dmurphy@blueandgold.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @BGI_DanMurphy.

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