Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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rushing yards per game in their three previous wins, but whatever was missing clicked into place Saturday night in Chicago. A more patient pack younger teammates fol- low suit. Wood said he and the of ball carriers, paced by Wood, collected a total of 376 yards on the ground against Mi- ami — the second most for a Notre Dame team in this millennium. All four running backs that played scored touch- downs. Wood had two, plus 118 yards in his first huge performance of the season. "I was past overdue," rest of the running backs took a big step forward this week in practice, learning how to wait for a play to develop before attacking the holes in Notre Dame's revamped rushing scheme. That patience paid off fre- quently while rolling through Miami's 112th- ranked rushing defense, but never more clearly than on Wood's 37-yard run that kicked the Irish offense into a higher gear. the 1,000-yard rusher from a year ago said fol- lowing the game. "It's just a matter of when I get the ball. I know I can make plays. It's just a matter of when the opportunity presents it- self." He had all the oppor- tunities he could handle in the second half of Saturday's game. Notre Dame handed Wood the ball on 15 of the first 18 plays in the third quarter. He delivered by grinding through two scoring drives that pushed a close game out of hand before bow- ing out to watch his this year," head coach Brian Kelly said. "And he, too, had a great week of practice, prepar- ing himself to do what we've asked him to do, and saw that kind of success." Sophomore George "He had not done that a pair of 100-yard rush- ers in the same game for the first time since 2002. He ended as the game's leading rusher with 123 yards on only 10 carries. Sophomore Cam McDaniel finished the fourth quarter with 55 yards of his own and a one-yard touchdown run to put the cherry on top of a dominating performance. Senior Theo Riddick started the game with a short score on Notre Dame's first possession. He bruised his elbow in the second quarter and watched the rest of the game from the sidelines. The clock-draining Atkinson III took over for Wood with a 55-yard touchdown run of his own in the final minute of the third quarter. At- kinson got to the edge of the defense on a sweep and left everyone in the dust on his way to the end zone. That run put him over the century mark on the ground and gave Notre Dame run game made it a relatively easy night for Notre Dame's defense. The Irish held a Miami offense chock full of playmakers to a total of 285 yards and just a field goal on the scoreboard. For the third straight game, the Irish didn't al- low a touchdown. "That's an incredible feat for our defense," Kelly said. Miami junior quar- terback Stephen Mor- ris, who had thrown for 1,002 yards in his pre- vious two games, was limited to 201 yards