Cavalier Corner Digital

TRAPPED T here once was a man with a large plot of land. There have been and still are many such men, but this particular man didn't like visitors. The land was well wooded with one long, windy path leading to the clearing where he built his home. It was a pleasant and inviting path, and this would not do for the man who was anything but. MURPHY'S LAW DAN MURPHY He didn't have the time to build a gate. He didn't have the shovels to dig a moat. But he did have a plan. He posted a sign just a few yards down that path and in the biggest, boldest, most menacing letters he could muster he wrote: "WARNING: TRAP AHEAD." For years, poachers and thieves and un- wanted in-laws started up his path and bulged their eyes at his menacing sign. Some left immediately. Others would shuffle cautiously onward. They would leap at every twig that slid or snapped un- der their feet. They paced back and forth and darted their bulging eyes from side to side trying to spot the hidden ambush. And eventually, every one of them turned and threw an angry look over their shoulders, while retreating back down the path un- able to take the anguish. Each time the man would howl with joy. He smiled at his own cunning trick. For there was no trap on his pleasant, invit- ing path, only the one he had set in their minds. Notre Dame lit its path to its first BCS game in six years like an airport runway last week with a win over then-No. 17 Stanford. The undefeated Irish should be double-digit favorites in four of their next six games. If they can win all four, the this week while classes are on hold for the mid-semester break? "Nope," Irish head coach Brian Kelly said. "I think it's a trap game each week if you think that you can take a breather — if you think you can go, 'Ah, I can take a breather now, it's mid-semester break.'" Logic seems to dictate that the more a team discusses a trap game the less of a trap it becomes. How could BYU pos- sibly surprise Notre Dame after a week of this talk? As the old uninviting man will tell you, it's not the Cougars that need to sneak into South Bend, it's doubt. Will each Irish misstep sound like a twig snapping beneath their cleats? Will each BYU completion compress the coils of a phantom spring-loaded trap? Notre Dame has won its first six games despite making plenty of mistakes, and the biggest threat of a trap comes from thinking that this Saturday will be any different. "Our kids turn on the film and look at BYU and go, 'That's a good football team,'" Kelly said. "We are not turning on the film and looking at a team where the kids go, 'Oh, these guys can't play.' They are physical, play hard and play for four quarters." Less than 90 seconds into his first press The Irish insist they will not overlook junior defensive back Daniel Sorensen and BYU, but they will need to avoid being their own worst enemy on Saturday. folks at the Fiesta Bowl — who have al- ready visited two Notre Dame games in person — would be happy to host them. All they have to do is keep from trapping themselves. The warning signs for this Saturday's game against Brigham Young are as loud as they will be all season. The Cougars have the type of defense that leaves them a few big plays away from victory on any PHOTO COURTESY BYU given week. They are sandwiched between a ranked Stanford team that had beaten Notre Dame three straight years and Okla- homa, an unfamiliar top-10 offensive jug- gernaut. There's a good chance that both of those games will play host to ESPN's modern-day circus, College GameDay. BYU pales in comparison. Does it make it any easier that Notre Dame will step outside its normal routine ✦ PAGE 20 conference of the year back in August, Kelly busted out one of coaching's oldest clichés, saying his team would have to conquer a difficult schedule "one game at a time." Give him credit, it's been a con- sistent mantra ever since. It's worked thus far to the point where it almost sounds like more than space-filling coachspeak. This Saturday's game will be the biggest test so far this season for how pervasive the one-game-at-a-time attitude is in Notre Dame's locker room. Not because the Irish are in danger of overlooking Brigham Young, but because they are in danger of looking too closely. ✦ E-mail Dan at dmurphy@blueandgold.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @BGI_DanMurphy.

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