Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1484072
BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM NOV. 19, 2022 9 UNDER THE DOME 1 Team in the country had three running backs with 85 or more carries through Week 10 of this season: Notre Dame. Sophomore Audric Estime led the way with 117 attempts, followed by sophomore Logan Diggs with 112 and Chris Tyree with 85. The Irish have not seen three backs post 100 carries each since Randy Kinder (143), Marc Edwards (140) and Autry Denson (137) did it in 1995. 3 Is the number of times a first-year Notre Dame head coach has defeated a top-five team. Marcus Freeman joined that exclusive list with the Fighting Irish's 35-14 win over then-No. 4 Clemson Nov. 5. Prior to that only Terry Brennan and Charlie Weis had done it. Brennan took down No. 4 Texas 21-0 in his first game as a head coach with the Irish on Sept. 25, 1954, while Weis led Notre Dame to a 17-10 victory at No. 3 Michigan on Sept. 10, 2005. The win over Clemson was Freeman's third victory over a ranked team this season (No. 16 BYU and No. 16 Syracuse were the others). Only Brennan in 1954 (four) has more ranked victories in a debut season at Notre Dame. 4 Victories vs. top-five teams for Notre Dame since 1996 (in 24 games): Sept. 5, 1998 (22) Notre Dame vs. (5) Michigan W, 36-20 Sept. 10, 2005 (20) Notre Dame 17 at (3) Michigan W, 17-10 Nov. 6, 2020 (4) Notre Dame vs. (1) Clemson W, 47-40 (2OT) Nov. 5, 2022 Notre Dame vs. (4) Clemson W, 35-14 6 Scholarship wide receivers for Notre Dame, following graduate student Joe Wilkins Jr.'s decision to enter the transfer por- tal Nov. 7. He was the second Irish player to leave the team during the season — joining senior defensive tackle Jacob Lacey, who an- nounced his decision Oct. 6. Wilkins only played 27 offensive snaps this sea- son while working back from a foot fracture suf- fered in March. The North Fort Myers (Fla.) High School product spent five years in the program and played 370 offensive snaps in 24 appear- ances. He caught 11 passes for 124 yards and 2 touchdowns in his career. 10th Career double-double for sophomore point guard Olivia Miles in Notre Dame's 88-48 victory over Northern Illinois in its sea- son opener Nov. 7. Miles led the Irish with 17 points and 10 rebounds, plus notched 6 assists and 6 steals. 21 Point margin of victory vs. then-No. 4 Clemson Nov. 5 was the largest for the Fighting Irish against a top-five team since Oct. 21, 1995, when Lou Holtz's 17th-ranked squad posted a 38-10 victory over No. 5 Southern Cal. 25 / 1 Odds for the Notre Dame women's basketball team to win the 2023 NCAA Tournament, per BetOnline. That tied for the eighth-best odds in the country with Iowa State, behind only defending national champion South Carolina (3/2), Stanford (5/1), Iowa (6/1), Tennessee (8/1), Texas (10/1), Connecticut (12/1) and Louisville (20/1). 90.9 Defense grade for Notre Dame freshman cornerback BENJAMIN MORRISON for his outstanding performance against Clemson Nov. 5, per Pro Football Focus. The Irish rookie also received an elite 90.5 coverage grade en route to being named PFF's Defensive Player of the Week and True Freshman of the Week. "Notre Dame true freshman cornerback Benjamin Morrison took over a starting spot for the Irish a few weeks into the season, and he quickly became a target for opposing offenses, including the Clemson Tigers in Week 10," PFF noted. "In the end, Clemson regretted doing so. Morrison's performance in Notre Dame's win will end up arguably the best single-game outing of any first-year player in 2022." Per PFF, Morrison saw 13 targets in coverage and allowed three first downs while tallying an interception to put the Irish in the red zone and another that he took 96 yards for a score. It was just the second pick-six against a Clemson offense since the 2017 season, and it was just the third multi-interception game for a defensive back against the Tigers that PFF has on record. 5,849 Combined career points on the roster for the Notre Dame men's basketball team entering the 2022-23 campaign — the most ever by a Mike Brey-coached squad to start a season. The Fighting Irish backcourt (guards only) have combined for 4,694 of those points, making them one of just four Division I teams with more than 4,000 points and 500 3-point field goals (cour- tesy of Matt P l i z g a f r o m Pitt): Rk. School 3FG Points 1. UAB 578 5,170 2. Missouri 524 5,069 3. Notre Dame 700 4,694 4. Pittsburgh 516 4,329 3.22 Million viewers and a 1.8 rating for the Clemson- Notre Dame game on NBC Nov. 5. That ranked fourth among college football games in Week 10, behind only Tennessee- Georgia (13.06 million, 6.7 rating), Alabama- LSU (7.58, 3.9) and Ohio State-Northwestern (4.76, 2.7). ✦ BY THE NUMBERS PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER