Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1305649
20 NOV. 7, 2020 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY LOU SOMOGYI T he preliminaries to No. 4 Notre Dame's (6-0) 2020 football sea- son concluded Halloween af- ternoon with a 31-13 victory versus Georgia Tech (2-5) at Bobby Dodd Stadium in Atlanta. The six Fighting Irish foes in the first half of this campaign combined for a 12-28 mark (.300 winning per- centage), with none recording a led- ger above .500. No wonder head coach Brian Kelly has admitted that his team has been "looking ahead," specifically to the coming weekend's showdown with No. 1 Clemson, which had to over- come a 28-10 deficit versus Boston College to eke out a 34-28 victory. The Fighting Irish defense, led by fifth-year senior defensive end Dae- lin Hayes' two crucial sacks, asserted its dominance and pitched a shutout through three and a half quarters (the first Georgia Tech score came on a fumble return by the defense) and limited the Yellow Jackets to 238 yards of total offense while recording nine tackles for loss, five of them sacks. Notre Dame's attack produced 426 total yards (227 rushing, 199 pass- ing). Fifth-year senior quarterback Ian Book completed 18 of 26 passes for all the yards through the air (and 46 more rushing), fifth-year se- nior wide receiver Javon McKinley grabbed five passes for 93 yards, and sophomore running back Kyren Wil- liams totaled 100 yards (76 rushing, 24 receiving) and scored twice on short runs. For Kelly and the team, though, they recognized they will be evalu- ated as a bona fide contender, or not, based on their performance versus Clemson. "These guys have done such a great job of winning consistently," Kelly said after the game in an inter- view with ABC. "They understand their level of play has to move up. Today was about the little details, and they have been great about the details. We'll clean those details up, because their spirit and want-to is great, and we're excited about this football team. "This thing runs through Clemson. You assume you're going to have to beat Clemson at least twice. You're going to see them again, so … we have to play a little bit better." Main Event Awaits Thoughts quickly turn to Clemson following methodical 31-13 win at Georgia Tech