Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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CHALK TALK BRYAN DRISKELL N otre Dame's first foray against the triple option was a smashing suc‑ cess. On Sept. 19, the Irish hosted Georgia Tech, whose head coach — Paul Johnson — is the founding father of the triple option that Navy runs. Georgia Tech led the nation in rushing yards in 2014, averaging 342.1 yards per game. The Yellow Jackets were considered a bigger and faster version of Navy. Defensive coor‑ dinator Brian Van‑ G o r d e r a n d h i s staff put together a brilliant plan and the Irish players executed it excep‑ tionally well. Notre Dame held Geor‑ gia Tech to just 216 yards on the round en route to a 30‑22 victory that was not quite as close as the final score indicated. T h e N a v y a n d Georgia Tech ver‑ sions of the triple option are closely related. Each looks to spread out the defense, both want to isolate defenders for reads, both try to create as much confusion and guessing by the defense as possible, and each attacks with simi‑ lar option angles. The similarities will give the Notre Dame defense a foundation to build upon in its preparation for Navy. However, the significant differences between the two offenses will force the Irish to prepare differently for Navy. NAVY IS MORE QUARTERBACK CENTRIC Georgia Tech redshirt junior quar‑ terback Justin Thomas is a dynamic athlete that Notre Dame had to con‑ tain. Midshipmen senior signal‑caller Keenan Reynolds is not as explosive ath‑ letically, but when it comes to running the option the Navy quarterback has no equal. Reynolds is an option wizard who makes it very diffi‑ cult for defenses to track the football. With Reynolds un‑ der center, the Navy offense is far more quarterback‑oriented than the Yellow Jackets' triple option. Since the beginning of 2014, Thomas has carried the ball an average of 13.2 times per game. During that stretch Reynolds has averaged 22.4 runs per game. Navy has a wider variety of designed Navy's Option Presents A Unique Set Of Problems For Irish Navy senior quarterback Keenan Reynolds is the NCAA's all-time leader in rushing touch- downs by a quarterback with 73 through Sept. 26. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA