Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1044500
www.BLUEANDGOLD.com NOV. 5, 2018 9 UNDER THE DOME 1 Ranking of Notre Dame in ESPN's "Strength of Record" entering the Navy game Oct. 27. Not to be confused with strength of schedule, which was No. 24, SOR measures how strong a team's record is, given its schedule. It's based on the chance of an average top-25 team having the team's record or better, given the opponents the team has played (and where) to date. The Irish rating was an eight percent chance of an average top-25 team starting 7-0 versus the 2018 schedule. 3 Notre Dame defenders that were selected to at least one midseason All-America team: senior lineman Jerry Tillery, senior linebacker Te'von Coney and junior cornerback Julian Love. Tillery was tabbed as a first-team performer by Sports Illustrated and The Athletic, while Love was a first-team pick by SI and second-team choice by The Athletic. Coney was the lone Irish representative on the Pro Football Focus team. On Oct. 22, Love also was named a semifinalist for the Jim Thorpe Award presented annually to the nation's top defensive back. The last time Notre Dame had All-Americans at every level on defense was 1990 with three consensus choices in lineman Chris Zorich, linebacker Michael Stonebreaker and cornerback Todd Lyght, the current Irish cornerbacks coach. 13/2 Odds of Notre Dame winning the 2018 national title entering the Navy game Oct. 27. It went up from 19/2 a week earlier. Only Alabama at 1/2 and Clemson at 5/1 were higher. 16 Players on the 2018 Notre Dame roster who are from the state of Illinois as the Fighting Irish prepare to clash with North- western in Evanston, Ill. Florida and Cali- fornia are second with 11 apiece. No other state has had more football players play at Notre Dame than Illinois, with the number nearing 500. Alphabetically, this year's crew includes senior wide receiver MILES BOYKIN (Tinley Park), senior defensive tackle Micah Dew- Treadway (Bolingbrook), freshman safety/nickel Houston Griffith (Chicago), sophomore walk-on tight end Jack He- nige (Hinsdale), freshman wide receiver Micah Jones (Guree), sophomore tight end Cole Kmet (Lake Barrington), junior cornerback Julian Love (Westchester), senior walk-on linebacker Kier Murphy (Rock Island), senior walk-on guard Lo- gan Plantz (Frankfort), senior walk-on linebacker Robert Regan (Darien), sophomore wide receiver Isa- iah Robertson (Bolingbrook), senior left guard Trevor Ruhland (Cary), junior long snapper John Shannon (Lake Forest), senior linebacker Jimmy Thompson (Hin- sdale), freshman long snapper Michael Vinson (Winnetka) and fifth-year senior tight end Nic Weis- har (Midlothian). 37-9-2 Series advantage Notre Dame has over Northwestern, with only six other schools facing the Fighting Irish more often in football. The two schools had played each other regularly — 15 times in the 18 years from 1959-76, including nine straight from 1968-76 — before the series was halted. Northwestern has won at least two games in a row in the series twice. The first was from 1959-62, when head coach Ara Parseghi- an's Wildcats defeated head coach Joe Kuharich's Fighting Irish all four sea- sons. The second is the current streak of two in 1995 (17-15) and 2014 (43-40 in overtime), both at Notre Dame Stadium. Northwestern's Pat Fitzgerald was an All-American linebacker in the first and the head coach in the second. 57 Years old Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly turned Oct. 25, making him the second-oldest head coach ever for the Fighting Irish. Lou Holtz retired in 1996 at age 59 years and 10 months. 1976 The last season Notre Dame played Northwestern on the Wildcats' campus, resulting in a 48-0 Fighting Irish victory. Since then, Notre Dame has played Northwestern only five times, with the 1992 and 1994 contests held at Chicago's Soldier Field, while the other three (1993, 1995 and 2014) were held at Notre Dame. $500,000 Amount 2015-17 Notre Dame running back Josh Adams is collecting in a loss of value insurance policy as a result of hurting himself before the NFL Draft and going undrafted. This was confirmed by insurance advisor Ronnie Kaymore of KPM Sports. ✦ BY THE NUMBERS PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA