Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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tunate that he did that. I was just trying to im- provise." Daniels has played looser and been more ef- fective in Notre Dame's last two wins against Oklahoma and Pitts- burgh. He made a team- and career-high seven catches for 86 yards against the Panthers. "I love having those guys on the field, espe- cially the young guys, because they provide a great mix with our vet- erans," head coach Brian Kelly said. "It's fun to coach them." Daniels was a large ankle injury for much of the year. He said he thought he played his most complete game of his college career thus far. "I think so, not just re- ceiving and catching but I think all around, block- ing, I feel like I had my best game," he said. The sophomore is now fourth on the team with 23 catches for 353 yards. part of Notre Dame's screen package for the first time this week. The Irish turned to him four times during the game on quick passes right around the line of scrimmage. He turned three of them into first downs and two of them went for more than 10 yards. He also caught a pass flight defense didn't post the statistically dominant numbers it usually does on Satur- days. The Irish gave up a season-high 26 points to the Panthers, but did control one stat that proved to be a game changer. They stopped 13 of Pittsburgh's 14 third-down conversion attempts on the day. "Third down is the THE MONEY DOWN Notre Dame's top- over the middle of the field on Notre Dame's first scoring drive. The play was initially ruled a fumble, but a video replay showed his knee was down before he let go of the football. Dan- iels has been nursing an money down," senior linebacker Manti Te'o said. "Third down is that critical down. We want to get our offense back on the field. That's our opportunity to come away with a stop so that our offense can come back and put some points on the board. We really take it seriously." sive front was at its best on third downs against Pitt. The Irish sacked senior quarterback Tino Sunseri five times, and three of them came on third downs. Sopho- more defensive end Stephon Tuitt and ju- nior outside linebacker Prince Shembo both got to Sunseri to force punts with big hits. Fifth-year senior defensive end Kapron Lewis-Moore also picked up a sack on the first third down of the game. He took a diving swipe at Sun- seri's feet in the back- field, which eventually tripped up the quar- terback short of a first down after he stumbled forward for a few yards trying to regain his bal- ance. "We just kept play- Notre Dame's defen- ing our game," Lewis- Moore said. "We had to get some pressure, and I think we did that very, very well." Notre Dame's offense converted 10 of its 20 third-down attempts, including sophomore quarterback Everett Gol- son's six-yard run in tri- ple overtime that set up the game-winning score on the next play. ✦