Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1526412
28 SEPT. 14, 2024 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED "We can be a good team," Cross said. "I have full confidence in that." Notre Dame was not a good team against Northern Illinois. The Huskies were better, on both sides of the ball. NIU possessed the ball for 22:17 out of 30 second-half minutes. The Hus- kies were more than two times more efficient throwing the football than the Irish, 9.9 yards per attempt versus 4.9. This was not a fluke, by any stretch. "They just outplayed us," graduate student safety Xavier Watts said. "We missed tackles, some missed assign- ments. They popped a couple plays on us that hurt us." Throughout the week, Freeman in- sisted Notre Dame was taking this game seriously. Even after the game, he pointed to "sharp" practices Thursday and Friday and insisted that the early week practices after an emotional win were as "tough" as they needed to be. But he also admitted the obvious: Notre Dame was not prepared enough to play this game. "We've got to go back and evaluate the way we prepared and figure out ex- actly the mishaps that occurred in the preparation," Freeman said. "I've always said performance is a reflection of prep- aration. We've got to figure out where we failed in preparation." Notre Dame's only option moving forward is to learn from its loss to NIU and fight back. NOTRE DAME VS. NORTHERN ILLINOIS QUARTER-BY-QUARTER COMPARISON Notre Dame 1st Qtr. 2nd Qtr. 3rd Qtr. 4th Qtr. 1st Half 2nd Half Total Time of Possession 9:52 7:47 3:50 3:53 17:39 7:43 25:22 Third-Down Conversions 2-3 1-5 0-1 0-1 3-8 0-2 3-10 Fourth-Down Conversions 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 Average Field Position ND-29 ND-33 ND-28 ND-31 ND-31 ND-30 ND-30 Northern Illinois 1st Qtr. 2nd Qtr. 3rd Qtr. 4th Qtr. 1st Half 2nd Half Final Time of Possession 5:08 7:13 11:10 11:07 12:21 22:17 34:38 Third-Down Conversions 1-3 1-3 2-4 1-4 2-6 4-10 6-16 Fourth-Down Conversions 0-0 0-0 0-1 1-1 0-0 1-2 1-2 Average Field Position NIU-31 NIU-12 NIU-30 NIU-40 NIU-23 NIU-34 NIU-28 PLAY CHART (NO. OF PLAYS) Yards ND NIU Nega ve 4 3 0-5 32 36 6-9 14 14 10-19 8 7 20-29 0 1 30-39 1 0 40-49 0 1 50 or more 0 1 RED ZONE EFFICIENCY (INSIDE 20-YARD LINE) No Poss. TD FG Score Notre Dame 1 1 0 0 N. Illinois 2 0 2 0 BIG PLAYS (25 YARDS OR MORE) Notre Dame • 2-3 NIU34 Love run for 34 yards and a touchdown Northern Illinois • 2-5 NIU17 Hampton pass complete to Brown for 83 yards and a touchdown • 1-10 NIU45 Brown run for 28 yards to ND27 • 1-10 NIU45 Hampton pass complete to Brown for 43 yards to ND12 There was nothing fluky about Northern Illinois' win over Notre Dame, the Huskies thoroughly outplayed the Irish. PHOTO BY MICHAEL MILLER MISCELLANEOUS NOTES • The attendance was 77,622 — the seventh consecutive sell out in Notre Dame Stadium (the final game of the 2022 season vs. Boston College was not a sell out). • Notre Dame is now 110-95-2 all time in home openers. • Freshman running back Aneyas Williams saw the first game action of his collegiate career against Northern Illinois. He had 1 carry for 4 yards. • Freshman linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa made a career-high 7 tackles, while sophomore wide receiver Jaden Greathouse notched a career-high five receptions. • Graduate student wide receiver Kris Mitchell made his first start in a Notre Dame uniform and the 26th of his college career.