Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1526412
BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM SEPT. 14, 2024 23 NOTRE DAME PASSING OFFENSE: F Back-to-back games with at least 30 pass at- tempts for Riley Leonard. Back-to-back games without hitting so much as 170 passing yards, let alone 200. Leonard also had 2 interceptions and 0 touch- down tosses. His second pick came at the most in- opportune time with the Irish nursing a one-point lead near midfield with six minutes left. The next time he had the ball in his hands, he was losing by two with 30 seconds remaining. It seems the only success Notre Dame finds in the passing game with regularity are short stops over the middle. Yeah, those result in a net yards per attempt average just over 5. Clemson transfer Beaux Collins was once again Notre Dame's leader in receptions and receiving yards, and he only had 5 and 45, respectively. The offensive line let Leonard get sacked twice and was leaky for much of the game. This is not a good Irish passing attack right now. NOTRE DAME RUSHING OFFENSE: B- If you take away a pair of NIU sacks for 22 yards, Leonard had his second consecutive successful- ish outing as a runner. He carried 9 times for 39 yards not including the sacks, one of those totes was his first career Notre Dame touchdown run that got the scoring started midway through the first quarter. Sophomore tailback Jeremiyah Love ran 11 times for 79 yards. His 34-yard score in the third quarter that included a hurdle of an NIU safety was the highlight. Junior Jadarian Price only had 4 rushes for 24 yards, but look at that average — 6.0. Love's was 7.2. Yet they only ran 15 times combined in a game that never had a margin of more than six points either way. Notre Dame's grade here is getting dinged for not giving those two guys the ball more, even if the offensive line wasn't moving the pile up to standard. It's not like throwing 32 times was a bet- ter way to go about it. NOTRE DAME PASSING DEFENSE: C- You can't let NIU go 98 yards for a touchdown with 83 of those coming on the score itself, a busted zone coverage by freshman linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa and junior cornerback Benjamin Morrison, of all culprits, and allow the Huskies to tie the game at 7-7 in the first quarter after such a strong start by the Irish offense and a wacky kickoff play that pinned NIU at its own 2-yard line. That's what the Irish passing defense did. What the Irish passing defense did not do is gen- erate a sack, which would have been two weeks in a row with that being the case if not for one snap of heroism by graduate student defensive tackle Howard Cross III last week against Texas A&M. Notre Dame cannot generate a solid four-man rush, and NIU quarterback Ethan Hampton com- pleted enough passes to leave one of the nation's best units against the throw feeling like it could have done more to change the overall outcome. NOTRE DAME RUSHING DEFENSE: D The Huskies were the aggressors. The Irish were pushed back off the line of scrimmage in their own building. NIU ran 45 times for 190 yards. A 4.2 yards per carry average is not fantastic, but when you run it that much and still go over 4 yards per carry against a defense like Notre Dame you've done something right. Senior Antario Brown ran 20 times for 99 yards. Junior Gavin Williams gained at least 6 yards on seven of his 17 carries and finished with 59 yards. It was never supposed to be in the script for NIU to rack up nearly 200 rushing yards while Notre Dame only gained 123 on the ground, but that's what happened. And that's a big reason why the Irish are 1-1. SPECIAL TEAMS: F Mitch Jeter, the same kicker who went 20 of 20 on field goal attempts inside of 50 yards at South Carolina and 3 of 3 in Week 1 at Notre Dame, had two field goals blocked, one from 48 yards away on the final play of the first half and one from 62 yards out on the final play of the game. Australian punter James Rendell only averaged 36.8 yards on five kicks. The ball isn't coming off his foot the way everyone believed it would having come from Down Under. Forgettable day of special teams for the Irish. COACHING: F A letdown wasn't supposed to be possible. Notre Dame was supposed to roll and keep asserting itself as one of the best teams in the country. That didn't happen, and it starts with what did or didn't happen at the top. Marcus Freeman's second 16- 14 home loss to a vastly inferior opponent of his short tenure has to be pinned on him first, then we can talk about everyone else who had a hand in the deflating defeat. REPORT CARD BY TYLER HORKA Sophomore running back Jeremiyah Love was a rare bright spot for the Irish, carrying the ball 11 times for 79 yards and 1 touchdown. PHOTO BY MICHAEL MILLER