Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/187176
Under the Dome Quarterback Quotient Last year, Notre Dame quarterback Tommy Rees was college football's premier relief pitcher while complementing less experienced Fighting Irish starter Everett Golson. However, becoming the "ace" starter of the staff is a different animal. In back-to-back home games this year against Michigan State and Oklahoma, the senior Rees completed only 23 of 58 pass attempts (39.7 percent) for 246 yards with three touchdowns and three interceptions. The 104 passing yards against Oklahoma were the fewest in the four-year Brian Kelly era, and the lowest at Notre Dame since Jimmy Clausen's 41-yard performance in a 38-3 loss at USC in 2008. To at least provide an element of the read option into Notre Dame's playbook for the spread, senior Andrew Hendrix played his first significant snaps of the season, against the Sooners. He saw action throughout the first half and attempted one pass, an incompletion. "The way we presented it to Andrew is, 'Look, you've got to help us win,'" Kelly said. "His mindset has to be, 'I want to keep adding more to my plate' … I don't know that you can go into the game and say, 'I'm just happy with a half-dozen snaps.'" The Irish head coach said he would like Hendrix to push for the starting job, but first he must clean up several aspects of his game. The offense was penalized twice for motion penalties under Hendrix's watch during his brief stints, and he missed an open DaVaris Daniels on his one passing In an effort to add the element of the read option into Notre Dame's offense, senior quarterback Andrew Hendrix played his first significant snaps of the season against Oklahoma and rushed five times for 10 yards. photo by per kjeldsen attempt. Although Hendrix did pick up 10 yards on his five rushing attempts, he misread a zone read and was thrown for an eight-yard loss on a third-and-two play at the Sooners' 38 in the second quarter. "He's got be more effective in that role," Kelly said. "Then let's look to add on to that, and then maybe get to him thinking, 'Hey, I'm going to push Tommy Rees as the starter.'"