Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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24 DECEMBER 2023 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED 1. That Performance Does Not Beat Good Teams Does it even need to be said? Notre Dame turned the ball over three times in the first half against Stanford. The Irish gave up two plays of 49 yards or more. They committed 3 penalties for 40 yards in the second quarter alone. Everything Notre Dame could do to keep Stanford within striking distance and even give them the lead at multiple points, it did. To its credit, Notre Dame got itself together and turned it around, scoring 42 unanswered points. The Irish left no doubt, if there was any to be- gin with, about who was the better team in that game. But would that performance have been good enough to beat any of the above-.500 teams on Notre Dame's schedule? Absolutely not. It certainly won't be enough to beat whomever the Irish face in their bowl game in late December or early January. 2. Give The Offensive Line Its Flowers Too often, when a running back has the day Notre Dame junior Audric Estimé has, all the atten- tion goes to running back. Estimé had an absolutely fantastic game to be clear, and deserves all the credit and praise he's receiving. But the Irish offensive line needs its due for clearing some massive holes against the stron- ger part of the Cardinal defense. Stanford's run defense is not good, but it's not as bad as Notre Dame's front five made it look. The Cardinal al- lowed 4.3 yards per carry before Week 13; the Irish averaged 7.9 yards on their 48 attempts. Junior left tackle Joe Alt, junior left guard Pat Coogan, sophomore center Ashton Craig, sopho- more right guard Billy Schrauth and junior right tackle Blake Fisher did a terrific job in the win. "You've seen them, this week, continue to stack on that performance last week," head coach Mar- cus Freeman said. "That unit is tough, because you're such a cohesive unit. When you add two new guys in Week 11 to the starting lineup, it's a challenge. But they put the work in, and they performed really well." 3. Notre Dame Pass Rush Overpowered Stanford Linebacker blitzes, four-man rushes, it didn't matter. Notre Dame's defense dominated the line of scrimmage, too, and hounded Stanford sophomore quarterback Ashton Daniels all game. The Irish sacked Daniels 4 times and compiled 8 quarterback hits. None were more eye-catching than when senior defensive tackle Rylie Mills bull- rushed freshman Cardinal guard Simione Pale into Daniels' lap and sacked him. Pale is 6-foot-4, 315 pounds, and Mills relocated him five yards into the backfield. This has been a consistent theme in the second half of the season, even when the sacks haven't been there. Notre Dame gets after the quarter- back. 4. Road Woes Remain Legitimate Concern I don't know what it is, and I don't think Free- man does, either. But something has to change with the way Notre Dame prepares to go on the road. Freeman didn't want to make it "only a road issue," he said earlier this week, but he did ac- knowledge that the Irish had not performed up to their standard when they left Notre Dame Stadium in recent weeks. It's hard to believe he feels they reached that standard against Stanford. "Our main message was to come out fast," Es- timé said. "We did come out fast, I'd say, but we had things that were shooting ourselves in the legs, like turnovers." This is not a hostile crowd issue, by the way. Irish fans made up the majority of Stanford Sta- dium, and it wasn't close. Obviously, Notre Dame will not play its bowl game in South Bend. And speaking of which … 5. Central Florida, Here Come The Irish Notre Dame secured a 9-3 record, which most experts assumed would happen after the Irish lost to Clemson Nov. 4. For the past couple weeks, the most prominent bowl projections all had Notre Dame traveling to either Tampa, Fla., or Orlando, Fla., to play in either the ReliaQuest Bowl on Jan. 1 or the Pop- Tarts Bowl on Dec. 28, respectively. It's unlikely that those projections will change much after Week 13. Some possible bowl opponents for the Irish include No. 20 Oklahoma State (9-3, beat BYU in Week 13), No. 19 Kansas State (8-4, lost to Iowa State) and, yes, No. 14 LSU. The Tigers, led by former Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly, are 9-3 and just beat Texas A&M. If that happens, buckle up. FIVE THOUGHTS BY JACK SOBLE The Fighting Irish defense recorded 4 sacks and 8 quarterback hits against Cardinal quarterbacks. PHOTO BY JIM HOLTAN