Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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struggled to score touch- downs from the red zone throughout the year. The offense has reached the end zone on only 26 of its 52 trips inside the 20-yard line this season. On six red zone chances against USC, the Irish came away with only one touchdown. Notre Dame's inability to fin- ish kept the game close until the end. "Not getting touch- Kyle Brindza made more field goals (23) this sea- son than anyone in the history of the program. That's not a good sign for the Irish offense. Notre Dame has ROOM TO IMPROVE Sophomore kicker downs came back to make it a little bit more difficult on us, and I knew it would," head coach Brian Kelly said. "We're still in the pro- cess there. We're not there yet. "When we start cook- Senior tight end Tyler Eifert couldn't quite come down with this fade pass in the end zone, but he caught four other throws for 69 yards in the Irish victory. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA that will grow as rookie quarterback Everett Golson continues to im- prove. Against the Trojans, of them was a nine-yard touchdown run. "We're going to go ing down in the red zone, we're going to be really good." Kelly reiterated state- ments he has made in the past about the need for greater precision and accuracy in close quar- ters near the end zone. He said that's something Kelly leaned heavily on Golson, often leaving him alone in the back- field and abandoning the run game that fre- quently brought them within scoring range. Golson threw six passes and ran the ball four times in the red zone against USC. Notre Dame's running backs combined for a total of six touches. Senior Theo Riddick, who broke tack- les all night to extend runs, had only three car- ries inside the 20. One back next week and look at the tape and figure out what we can get bet- ter at and do that during the week," Riddick said. "We have time. Coach Kelly is going to set up something to actually let us score touchdowns. We have to get better at that in the red zone." secondary has done a remarkable job of keep- ing the offense in front of them this season. USC tested the Irish corner- Notre Dame's young WARNING TRACK POWER