Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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28 OCT. 14, 2023 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED season-long third down conversion percentage through Week 6, Charlotte, had a mark of 25.0. The Irish are as bad as it gets on third down at the moment. Maybe it can't get any worse. But it cer- tainly seems like a long shot for it to get much better overnight. "A lot of self-reflection we're going to have to do," Notre Dame head coach Mar- cus Freeman said. "A deep dive into exactly where these shortcomings happened." IRISH UNPREPARED Early in the fourth quarter, on the kickoff after Louisville redshirt junior running back Jawhar Jordan's second touch- down, the Cardinals' kick cov- erage team was too fired up to slow down. The kick was a touchback, but they kept run- ning to the right corner of the end zone and motioned the nearby fans to get loud. The fans obliged. That was the passion and inspiration Louisville played with all night. Notre Dame never found it. Worse, by head coach Marcus Free- man's own admission, the Irish were unprepared to play. "Our guys weren't prepared, for whatever reason," Freeman said. "We got to take a deep dive and figure out what it was." It was apparent from the opening kickoff and into Louisville's first offen- sive drive, which began after graduate student quarterback Sam Hartman's first interception of the season. The Cardinals, led by Jordan's 6 touches for 37 yards, looked faster than Notre Dame. They routinely beat the Irish to the edge, or to whichever spot they needed to go. Louisville looked like it came ready to play. The same cannot be said for Notre Dame. The shock of that first series, graduate student linebacker JD Bertrand believes, was difficult to overcome. "I think going back to that first series, we just need to start fast, because they don't have that momentum going into the game," Bertrand said. "I mean, it's hard when a team puts seven up on that first drive." The sluggishness carried over to Notre Dame's offense, too, especially up front. The Irish could not run the ball, in large part because the Cardi- nals just kept attacking downhill. They didn't quit, keeping their energy up the entire game. Louisville's defensive front dominated the Notre Dame offensive line, being the faster, more physical and more aggressive team. The Notre Dame offense, save for one big play on a 36-yard touchdown pass from Hartman to freshman wide LOUISVILLE VS. NOTRE DAME QUARTER-BY-QUARTER COMPARISON Louisville 1st Qtr. 2nd Qtr. 3rd Qtr. 4th Qtr. 1st Half 2nd Half Total Time of Possession 9:51 4:47 6:50 9:56 14:38 16:46 31:24 Third-Down Conversions 1-2 1-4 3-5 0-3 2-6 3-8 5-14 Fourth-Down Conversions 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 Average Field Position LOU-31 LOU-38 LOU-28 ND.-36 LOU-36 LOU-45 LOU-41 Notre Dame 1st Qtr. 2nd Qtr. 3rd Qtr. 4th Qtr. 1st Half 2nd Half Final Time of Possession 5:09 10:13 8:10 5:04 15:22 13:14 28:36 Third-Down Conversions 0-2 1-4 1-4 1-3 1-6 2-7 3-13 Fourth-Down Conversions 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-2 0-0 0-2 0-2 Average Field Position ND-19 ND-22 ND-41 ND-28 ND-21 ND-33 ND-28 PLAY CHART (NO. OF PLAYS) Yards LOU ND Nega ve 7 10 0-5 35 35 6-9 11 9 10-19 8 8 20-29 1 3 30-39 0 1 40-49 1 0 50 or more 0 0 RED ZONE EFFICIENCY (INSIDE 20-YARD LINE) No Poss. TD FG Score Louisville 3 1 2 0 Notre Dame 1 1 0 0 BIG PLAYS (25 YARDS OR MORE) Notre Dame • 2-7 UL36 Hartman pass to Faison for 36 yards and a touch- down 1-10 ND24 Hartman pass to Thomas for 28 yards to UL47 2-10 UL47 Hartman pass to Evans for 26 yards to UL21 Louisville • 1-10 ND45 Jordan run for 45 yards and a touchdown Graduate student linebacker JD Bertrand noted that the Irish's sluggish start was hard to recover from. PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER MISCELLANEOUS NOTES • The all-time series between Notre Dame and Louisville is now tied 2-2. The two schools have split the two games that were played at L&N Stadium. • Sophomore defensive end Joshua Burn- ham made his first career start at Notre Dame. He was in the lineup to start the game because normal starter Jordan Botelho had to sit out the first half against Louisville due to a tar- geting foul he was flagged for against Duke, Sept. 30. • Sophomore tight end Eli Raridon saw his first game action in 357 days. Prior to the Lou- isville game, the last time he played in a game was against BYU in Las Vegas on Oct. 15, 2022. • Senior cornerback Clarence Lewis made his first start of the season in place of graduate student Thomas Harper. It was Lewis' 22nd career start but his first since the Marshall game in September 2022.