Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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FIGHTING WORDS WES MORGAN interceptions at home against the Irish, which could have been the spark an impotent Spartans offense needed to get back in the contest. In this year's installment of the Notre Dame-Mich- igan rivalry, the Wolverines were in- tercepted each of their last five pass- ing attempts in the first half, which is unthinkable. In the latest outing, Notre Dame Michigan State dropped at least two benefitted from the lead hands of Miami sophomore receiver Phillip Dorsett, who dropped a pair of deep touchdown passes that were right on the money on the Hurricanes' open- ing drive. For an Irish team that hasn't trailed in a game once this year — the only Football Bowl Subdivision team that can make that claim — it got a lit- tle help Saturday in Chicago. Though Notre Dame would have probably still gotten the job done had Miami scored first, there's no way of really telling how an early deficit would have af- fected sophomore starting quarterback Everett Golson, whose confidence might have already been shaken after a poor performance against Michigan prior to the bye week and a dose of discipline, which cost him the start against Miami for being late to a team meeting. Not only did the Hurricanes blow it the two penalties that aided them on their first drive and that's it," Miami head coach Al Golden said. "There's no excuse. We had too many penalties, too many drops. We lost our poise at times. We didn't play well enough in this environment against a really good team. … Certainly we aided them on their first drive, and that's a team that doesn't need a lot of help." That's a key different between this year's Irish program and the one that shot itself repeatedly in the foot in 2011. When Notre Dame desperately needed good luck last year, it not only didn't come, the opposite was served in heaping helpings. This season, any good luck enjoyed by the Irish just makes a good team even better. "You definitely notice it," fifth-year senior defensive end Kapron Lewis- Moore said of the team's reversal of fortune. "Everybody notices that. And if things do go bad, you just have to play the next play. There are times when the offense might have a turn- over, or the defense might give up a big play, but this group of guys, with our leadership, we've really focused on being mature." "It's nice to be on the other side of it," to start the game, they roughed Irish punter Ben Turk after an ineffective first drive that gave the ball back to Notre Dame and resulted in a touch- down seven plays later. Miami added a personal foul two plays after hitting Turk. "We had some drops and obviously fifth-year senior center Braxston Cave added. "I feel like we've prepared our- selves for that to take place." It also feels like Notre Dame is get- ting to close to being able to remove luck from the equation altogether. ✦ Assitant Editor Wes Morgan has been with Blue & Gold Illustrated since February 2011. He can be reached at wmorgan@blueandgold.com