Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/311901
UNDER THE DOME Bowling Over Cancer Roughly two dozen Irish football players took a study break for a good cause the day before final exams in South Bend. The team hosted a meet-and-greet morning at a local bowling alley to raise money for rare disease research May 3. For the second year in a row, senior linebacker Joe Schmidt spearheaded the event inspired by Sam Grewe, a high school freshman "adopted" by the Irish team in 2012 when he was battling osteosarcoma. Schmidt said more than 50 local fans — including Grewe — showed up to bowl that day. He expected to raise "a few thousand dollars" when the total is tallied. "It's so much busier [than a year ago]," said Schmidt, a former walk-on who worked his way into a CHARTING THE IRISH STUCK ON THIRD The biggest statistical dip Notre Dame's defense took be- tween its nation-leading 2012 group to a middle-of-the-pack 2013 was efficiency on third downs. The Irish fell 49 spots in the Football Bowl Subdivision rankings from 36th to 85th by allowing opponents to convert 44.2 percent of their third downs. Those extra chances ended up hurting Notre Dame dearly on the scoreboard. The Irish defense allowed 32 touchdowns last fall, and all but six of them came after an opportunity to get off the field on third down. On half of those touchdown drives, opponents converted at least two third-down plays to reach the end zone. New defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder said his idea of a good pass rush isn't measured by sacks, but by how often the defense can make a quarterback uncomfortable. By those standards, the Irish struggled last season. On third-and-long plays (seven yards or more to go), when a good pass rush would presumably keep a passing play from fully developing, opponents converted 31.8 percent of the time — or nearly one out of every three attempts. On third-and-10 specifically, the Irish gave up first downs 46.2 percent of the time, which was worse than their overall success rate. Eliminating some of those drive-extending plays with a good pass rush could help Notre Dame keep the points down in 2014. Opponent Touchdown Drives In 2013 Third downs converted on each of the 32 TD drives the defense allowed Four 2 Three 2 Two 12 One 10 None 6 THIRD DOWN SUCCESS AT DIFFERENT DISTANCES 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11+ 73.9% 54.5% 66.7% 53.8% 35.3% 26.7% 40% 30.8% 27.3% 46.2% 22.6% Distance To Go and Percent of Successful Conversions