Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1165986
www.BLUEANDGOLD.com SEPT. 23, 2019 5 FAN FORUM SHORT-CHANGED Your short insert reference on short-yardage woes after the Louisville game perhaps should have been more in- sightful. Time after time we see Notre Dame line up on a third-and-one situation (or a fourth-and-one) and the other team has six to eight players in the box. A run up the middle is called. The outcome is easily pre- dicted. This hasn't just been this year, but it's been pretty much a constant for several years. Is the quarterback al- lowed to change the call? Has the quarterback ever been asked why the call wasn't changed? In the second quarter on fourth- and-four they did try a pass, but it was a bad pass that Chris Finke could catch but had to go to the ground to make the completion. The poor pass didn't even give Finke a chance to pick up the first down. Try to use your imagination and quit being pretty predictable. A third- or fourth-and-one shouldn't be as hard as we make it look. Pat Buckley Portage, Mich. Mr. Buckley, the fourth-down pass wasn't well executed, which happens, but when we asked Brian Kelly the next day about the third-and-short woes (two plays on third-and-one failed, as did two more on third-and-two) he said there needs to be a better collaborative effort especially from the staff. "It's not just on the players because those are loaded boxes and some of it comes down to individuals making plays against unblocked [players] as well," he said. "Are we calling the right plays? Do we have the right personnel in the game? "Are we going to what we consider our strength — and we're kind of learning all that in the first game so we can refine what our third-down package looks like moving forward." How much leeway a quarterback is given is not something that will usually be discussed publicly by a staff, but Kelly did note that on three of the third-and- short plays there should have been a pass instead to the perimeter. POOR GAME-DAY EXPERIENCE I am sure I am many who were so disappointed with the access and parking at Louisville. We arrived at 2 p.m. to find no handicapped parking anywhere near the sta- dium. The recommended student lot with shuttle service did not open until 5 p.m. We did go to the Ken- tucky Derby Museum for the pre-game, but upon leaving and looking for parking close to the sta- dium we were in traf- fic gridlock for over an hour and 15 minutes. At 6:30 p.m. we decided to return to Cincinnati — only to encounter detour after detour to get back to the expressway. Our takeaway: Notre Dame park- ing is so much better than most col- lege venues. I hope we never play another game in Louisville. Robert Griffith Southgate, Ky. Mr. Griffith, you were not alone re- garding this complaint. Hopefully it will be improved when Notre Dame makes its next visit to Louisville in 2023 (date still to be determined). BE HEARD! Send your letters to: Letters Blue & Gold Illustrated P. O. Box 1007, Notre Dame, IN 46556 or e-mail to: lsomogyi@blueandgold.com According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Notre Dame's visit to Athens, Ga., Sept. 21 will set a new Sanford Stadium record because of temporary aluminum bleachers that will be installed on the West End plaza. The official capacity of Sanford Stadium — normally 92,746 — instead will be 93,246 for that game. Just like Notre Dame allotted 8,000 tickets to the University of Georgia (normally it has been 5,000 for opponents), the Bulldogs are returning the favor, but had to make more room to do so. One difference is that whereas Georgia's entire 400-member "Redcoat Marching Band" made the trip to Notre Dame in Georgia's 20-19 victory in 2017, the Fighting Irish band will not make the trip. Here were some responses on our BlueandGold.com website, including the popular opinion that half of Notre Dame Stadium was comprised of Georgia fans. SeanPol355: I was at that game and although unfortunately there were too many UGA fans in ND Stadium, they were far less than 50%. But like fishing stories, the fish gets bigger with every telling. Crazy4ndfb: I was there too. I don't know exact numbers, but they were clearly louder than us. Looked and sounded like at least 40% to me and could have been 50. NDband2013: In the past the band has done one road game and the Sham- rock Series game. I was in the band when we went to Oklahoma in 2012. That was a long drive, but of course it's incredibly expensive to fly 400-plus people (counting staff and student managers). You have to keep in mind too that a lot of students in the band are science and engineering majors. It's difficult to have a game every weekend (home or away) and keep up with your studies (let alone a social life). Can you imagine booking commercial flights for 400 people? You don't even know who's in the band until the day before classes start. Jrndmd: It is a tremendous cost that they save for the bowl game. They also have to truck all of the equipment. When I was in the band, we went to Tennessee (1990) and it was a terrible bus ride to get there. Murnaneb: But Notre Dame is "irrelevant" and "overrated." FROM THE WEBSITE JOIN THE CONVERSATION! GET A 60-DAY FREE TRIAL WITH CODE IRISH60 .com The Irish struggled in short-yardage situations against Louisville, failing on two third-and-one and two third-and-two plays. Head coach Brian Kelly noted that his team needed a better collaborative effort, with players making plays and coaches putting them in position to do so. PHOTO BY MIKE MILLER