Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM NOV. 12, 2022 9 UNDER THE DOME 2 Fighting Irish football players had Pro Football Focus grades over 90 through eight games this season. Sophomore left tackle Joe Alt led the way with a 91.4 — the No. 1 mark in the country among offensive linemen — while junior tight end Michael Mayer posted a 90.5 — No. 3 among all tight ends nationally. No other player on the Irish offense had a season grade over 75.3. 3 First-team All-ACC selections — graduate student forward Olivia Wingate, sophomore midfielder Korbin Albert and defender Eva Gaetino — for the Notre Dame women's soccer team, tying it for the most in the league with North Carolina and Florida State. Gaetino was tabbed as the ACC Defensive Player of the Year, and Albert also earned ACC Midfielder of the Year honors, while Notre Dame's Nate Norman was selected as the ACC Coach of the Year. In addition, senior forward Maddie Mercado and graduate student goal- keeper Mackenzie Wood earned a spot on the league's third team, while defender Leah Klenke was named to the ACC All-Freshman team. 8th Was where ESPN's Charlie Creme ranked Notre Dame sophomore point guard Olivia Miles on his list of top 25 women's college basketball players entering the 2022-23 season. "While it feels like Miles still hasn't approached her full potential, she has already blossomed into one of the nation's top point guards," Creme noted. "Perhaps the most dynamic passer in the country, Miles finished second to [Iowa's Caitlin] Clark in assists per game and was named first-team All-ACC as a freshman. With her length and speed, Miles thrives in transition as both a distributor and finisher. If offseason work helped improve her 3-point shoot- ing (27.0 percent), Miles has first-team All-American potential." Miles was also tabbed as a Preseason All-American by The Ath- letic, along with Iowa's Caitlin Clark, South Carolina's Aliyah Bos- ton, Stanford's Haley Jones and Connecticut's Azzi Fudd. 20 Rushing attempts apiece for sophomore AUDRIC ESTIME (123 yards rushing) and Logan Diggs (85) vs. Syracuse on Oct. 29 marked the first time that two Irish running backs logged 20 carries in the same game since a 20-14 win over Pittsburgh on Oct. 11, 2003. In that game Julius Jones carried the ball 24 times for a program-record 262 yards while tallying touchdowns runs of 25 and 49 yards, and Ryan Grant had 27 rushing attempts for 84 yards. 70.7 Percent stop rate — the percentage of a defense's drives that end in punts, turnovers or a turnover on downs — for Notre Dame foot- ball through eight games this season, per The Athletic. The Irish ranked 29th nationally in that category and were allowing 1.72 points per drive. At the end of October, Notre Dame was among the most improved Power Five teams after being ranked just 57th at the end of September: Rank (Stop Rate) Rank (Stop Rate) Defense Through Sept. Through Oct. Change Texas 69th (64.6%) 33rd (69.7%) +36 Missouri 61st (67.5%) 26th (70.9%) +35 Clemson 47th (69.8%) 13th (73.9%) +34 Notre Dame 57th (68.1%) 29th (70.7%) +28 Kansas State 52nd (69.2%) 25th (71.1%) +27 233 Rushing attempts (46.6 per game) for the Notre Dame football team in the five contests from Sept. 24 to Oct. 29, which ranked seventh in the country. In that five-game span, the Fighting Irish averaged 228 yards rushing per contest, which was the 13th-best average in the nation during that stretch. 366 Combined career games played in a Notre Dame uniform for men's basketball graduate students and team captains Dane Goodwin, Nate Laszewski, Cormac Ryan and Trey Wertz, entering the 2022-23 season. $81,400 Was raised during Notre Dame's "Cleats For A Cause" initiative, unofficially per the event's silent auction on GiveGrove.com. Fighting Irish players wore special cleats with the logo of one of four local charities printed on them during the 44-21 victory over UNLV in South Bend Oct. 22. The cleats were auctioned off to raise money for those charities: the South Bend Center for the Homeless, the Boys & Girls Club of St. Joseph County, the YMCA of Greater Michiana and Cultivate Food Rescue. Junior tight end Michael Mayer's cleats had the highest bid ($4,900) among all Irish play- ers when the bidding ended at midnight on Oct. 31. Head coach Marcus Freeman wore special shoes, mean- while, and those had a bid of $7,000. Mayer's sale will benefit the YMCA, while Freeman's will be split among the four. ✦ BY THE NUMBERS PHOTO BY JOSHUA BESSEX