Zen and the Art of Irish Blogging

Forgive me Father, for I have not blogged. It has been 261 days since my last post.

With so much happening in and around the Fighting Irish program, how in the world can any self-respecting blogger go silent for 8 months and 19 days? I have been asking myself the same question, off and on, for months.

The answer, I believe, is inner peace. Not inner peace about the world, or America, or even my own personal or professional life. But rather inner peace about the state of Notre Dame football. Over the past 261 days I realized that the reason I wasn't blogging is that I wasn't feeling the urgent need to write that has driven the OC Domer Blog since I started it 1,611 days ago (March 14, 2007). My motivation for blogging has generally been my personal angst about what the Fighting Irish were, and what they weren't.

In the spring of 2007 the Irish were coming off a 10-2 regular season and a Sugar Bowl appearance. But they had been hammered by USC in the regular season finale (44-24), and were pummeled by LSU in the bowl game (44-14). Brady Quinn was heading for the NFL and four young, untested quarterbacks were vying to replace him. Jimmy Clausen eventually won the job over Zach Frazer, Demetrius Jones, and Evan Sharpley. The three seasons of the Weis/Clausen era (3-9, 7-6, 6-6) did little to ease my Irish angst. Of course, the excitement of Brian Kelly's first season under the Dome made 2010 a great year to blog Irish football.

But something funny happened in over the final four games of last season: The Notre Dame football team started to play the way the Fighting Irish are supposed to play. Following back-to-back losses to Navy and Tulsa (can you feel the angst?) Notre Dame hosted the #15-ranked Utah Utes, and in miserable rainy conditions the Irish dominated. After the game I wrote about the experience of being there:

First, although I don't get to South Bend for a lot of games, the game against Utah was the first I can remember for a long while where I felt that the crowd was being vocal enough to give our team a true home-field advantage. It has seemed to me in recent years that the Notre Dame home crowd is generally pretty flat, and not too fearsome for opposing teams. But the crowd was into it last week (sparked by Robert Blanton's punt-block touchdown!) and I really felt that Utah was having trouble communicating and that they were rattled by the crowd. It was awesome!

Second, the scene after the game was unlike anything I had ever seen. I stormed the field as a student at Notre Dame, but I have never witnessed anything like the celebration last Saturday. It was clearly a catharsis. On one level it is silly for a 5-5 Notre Dame team to storm the field after a win over Utah. We're the Fighting Irish for crying out loud. On another level, this team, these seniors, those students have experienced tremendous adversity over the last four years and even in the last few weeks. They needed some good news like nobody's business. The first win over a ranked opponent for this senior class was a sufficient excuse to celebrate. The students poured onto the field, and it didn't take long for the ushers and security staff to switch from trying to stop it to just making sure nobody got hurt. The team and the band and the students were all partying together, and the crowd was so jammed in that the band couldn't march out through the the tunnel. So they just kept playing! The fact that my wife and I watched from the stands while both our kids were down on the field (somewhere!) just made it that much more special.

Third, and this is probably just the optimist in me, but the outstanding play of the defense and the efficient play of the offense (including the appearance of a power running game) really felt like a turning point for this team and for Coach Kelly's program. From the stands you could feel the confidence of the team grow as the game wore on. I sure hope we're able to look back at this game and say "We were there" when Coach Kelly and the Irish turned the corner.

The Utah game did feel like a real turning point in the program. That feeling was reinforced when Tommy Rees and the Irish went to the new Yankee Stadium and did what a Fighting Irish football team is supposed to do to a service academy team - beat them soundly (27-3).

A week later the Irish were in OC Domer country, playing the Trojans in the L.A. Coliseum. It was a glorious day of rain and unseasonably cold temperatures. Both teams were playing back-up quarterbacks in the game. It was only the four Irish turnovers that kept the game close, as the Irish out-rushed and out-gained USC, capping the game with a punishing 7-play, 77-yard drive featuring Robert Hughes power runs of 6, 12, 13 and 5 yards, the final rush for the game-winning TD. I stood with my wife in our typical end zone Coliseum seats with all the other Domers, the rain dripping off us, and I was very happy and excited. But I was also overcome with an intense feeling of relief. The Irish had finally snapped the streak of eight straight losses to the Trojans. To me, the world was once again restored to its proper balance. Notre Dame had gone into the Coliseum and had pushed the Trojans around, literally shoving them backwards the length of the field to score the final touchdown (20-16). It was clear to me standing there in the rain, cheering for Old Notre Dame as the clock wound down, that the Fighting Irish were back. Maybe not all the way back, yet. But Coach Kelly clearly knows what he is doing, and while there may be some bumps along the way, Our Lady's University finally has the right man for the job.

My feeling of inner peace with respect to the Irish was obviously boosted by their impressive performance in the Sun Bowl. Media darling Miami, with all that "speed", couldn't hang with Notre Dame on either side of the ball. The final score was 33-17, but the game wasn't that close.

Although I was hugely impressed with how the defense had matured over the final four games of 2010, and how Tommy Rees had stepped in and led the offense after Dayne Crist went down with injury, I didn't feel the urge to sit down and write about it. It's hard to be interesting when the substance of your posts boils down to: "Wow! We're really good! Did you see how good we looked!"

So where does the OC Domer blog go from here? I have been giving it a lot of thought. The Blue-Gray Sky set an awfully classy example of how a blog should probably just ride off into the sunset when the sense of urgency fades, and real life intrudes. But I don't think I can be that classy. The OC Domer will endure, but it will probably change from what my readers have seen over the past few seasons. I'll still be blogging, but posts will, I expect, be a little less regular. I probably won't write as many long game-preview posts or post-game analyses. I will be gracefully (I hope) bowing out of the weekly Irish Blogger Gathering. But when I notice something that moves me to offer my two-cents' worth, I'll be here. You'll probably see more non-football topics as well. (I know I have threatened that before).

The changes here don't mean I am less passionate about my team, or my alma mater. It just means that I'm more at peace with the state of the Fighting Irish, and that other aspects of my life will be getting a little more of my attention. At least for now.

A Little Blogkeeping

There are a couple of items I want to address before we can move forward with the 2011 season.

1. Congratulations to Tommy Rees, who has been named the winner of the 4th Annual OC Domer Player of the Year Award for 2010. What can you say? A backup QB who takes the reins of a team on the brink of collapse and leads it to wins over Utah, Army, USC and Miami is a no-brainer for this award. Past winners of the OCDPOTYA include David Bruton, Michael Floyd, and Golden Tate. Tommy is no less deserving of this prestigious honor just because I am months late handing it out. The runner-up for 2010 was defensive sensation Manti Te'o, with honorable mention going to kicker David Ruffer.

2. Congratulations to the winner of the OC Domer 2010 Fantasy Football League: OC Domer! I want to thank everyone who has participated in the OC Domer FFL over the past four seasons. I have really enjoyed running the league, and I hope everyone else had fun too. As part of the general reorganizing and re-prioritizing here at OC Domer HQ, I do not plan to organize/manage a league for the 2011 season. Not because I didn't enjoy it, but just because I want to use that time pursuing other interests.

Good Luck Coach Kelly

Six days from now a coin will be tossed into the Indiana sky, a football will be kicked down the middle of a perfectly manicured field inside Notre Dame Stadium, the Irish faithful on the wooden benches and on their comfy sofas across America will be holding their collective breath, and finally the answers will be revealed. The answers to our questions, certainly. But that isn't what Notre Dame fans really want. What we really want is the answer to our prayers. From Iraq and Afghanistan to London, Dublin, Haiti, Peru, Tokyo and Sydney; from Boston to Orange County and from Pasquerilla East to Carroll Hall, the Loyal Sons and Daughters of Notre Dame have been praying for the next Knute Rockne to lift us out of the purgatory of football mediocrity and restore the Fighting Irish to greatness.

Will Brian Kelly be the answer to all those prayers?

Will Coach Kelly dramatically succeed where Davie, Willingham, and Weis so spectacularly failed?

I eagerly embraced Boob and Ty and Charlie. I bought into the idea that Davie was a defensive genius and that he would bring enough speedy ath-a-letes from Texas into the program to maintain what Lou Holtz had built. I was totally sold that Ty Willingham was a young coaching phenom and molder of men who, as a black man himself, would be able to recruit to Notre Dame the talented players from the South who are often reluctant to attend a very white Catholic school in the wintry Midwest. I totally believed that Notre Dame alumnus Weis, with his NFL pedigree and Super Bowl bling, would stock the program with future NFL players and would win titles with his decided schematic advantage.

Yeah, well, not so much.

But am I bitter? Have I become a complete cynic? Truth be told the years spent wandering in the desert with Davie/Willingham/Weis have left a little bit of a bad taste in my mouth. My heart has been broken enough times that it honestly is hard to close my eyes and jump back in with both feet and my rose-colored glasses. I'll admit to dark moments of doubt. Am I living the impossible dream? Has Big Time College Football gotten to the point where a program that genuinely cares about giving its players a quality education can't compete on an elite level? Is the true student-athlete as endangered as the Dodo bird?

But it's nothing a little winning won't cure.

Is Brian Kelly "The Guy"? Here is what we know:

• Coach Kelly has twenty years of experience as a college head coach.
  
• He won two NCAA Division II Championships at Grand Valley State.
  
• He coached the Central Michigan Chippewas to a MAC title.
  
• He took the Cincinnati Bearcats to two straight BCS Bowl games.
  
• I repeat - he took Cincinnati to back-to-back BCS Bowl games.
• Coach Kelly grew up the Catholic son of a Boston politician and a huge Notre Dame fan.
• He talks a good game.

And that, for now is all we REALLY know. But it tells us a lot. It tells us that Coach was able to lift three different programs to a very high level. That's a Division II program, A MAC team, and a Big East team. That's three different schools and three different groups of players. Somehow, he was able to reach each of those teams and pull greatness from them.

He isn't a one-hit wonder, but he isn't necessarily a miracle worker either. When Kelly took over the head job at Grand Valley State in 1991, the Lakers were already a powerhouse, having gone 11-1 and 10-2 in 1989 and 1990. Under Coach Kelly GVS didn't crack the 10-win plateau again until 2001, Kelly's 11th season as head coach. But in 2001, '02, and '03 his team went 13-1, 14-0 (Div. II Champs) and 14-1 (Div. II Champs). Clearly, the years at Grand Valley State were the formative years for Brian Kelly as a head coach. He learned a lot of lessons, honed his craft, and built his "system." Whereas Bob Davie and Charlie Weis had to learn all the hard lessons of head-coaching while on the job at Notre Dame, Brian Kelly had thirteen seasons at GVS to figure it out.

At Central Michigan, Coach Kelly took over a program that had won 2, 3, 4, and 3 games in the four seasons prior to his arrival. A really struggling program. Kelly turned the program around, but it wasn't overnight. The Chips went 4-7 in 2004, just one win better than 2003. They went 6-5 in 2005, two games better than '04. And in 2006 they were 9-4 and won the MAC (although Kelly did not coach the Motor City Bowl as he had moved on to the Cincy job). But look at the progression: 1-game better in year one, 2 more games better in year two than in year one, and 3 more games better in year three than in year two. That is dramatic, accelerating improvement.

Kelly took over an improving Cincinnati Bearcats team from Mark Dantonio, who left Cincy to take the job at Michigan State. The 'Cats were 7-5 in 2006. In Coach Kelly's first full year there (he had coached the 'Cats to a win the International Bowl to end the '06 season), Cincinnati went 10-3 with a win in the Papa John's Bowl. That's a 3-game improvement in year one. The Bearcats went 11-3 and 12-1 in 2008 and 2009, winning the Big East, playing in a BCS Bowl, and finishing the season ranked in the Top 20 both years.

Looking at Kelly's history on the brink of his first season at Our Lady's University, one has to wonder: Is the task he faces at Notre Dame more like his challenge at Central Michigan? Or is it closer to what he inherited at Cincinnati? The Chippewas had been a bad football team for a number of years when Kelly got there, and it took a couple of years to really turn it around. The Bearcats, on the other hand, were an improving team under Dantonio and Kelly just jumped on the accelerator and was able to elicit dramatic improvement in year one.

While I am leery of leading with my heart, I think Coach Kelly faces more of a Cincy situation at Notre Dame than a CMU situation. While the team clearly under-performed in the Weis era, Charlie did do a pretty good job as a recruiter. There is talent in the program, and it just needs to be developed and coached. For all his woes, Charlie Weis took a team that was 6-4 in 2004 under Ty Willingham and went 9-3 in 2005. Charlie was on pace to leave a tremendous legacy at Notre Dame until he was hammered in 2007 by the voids in the roster left him by Ty Willingham. That isn't going to happen to Kelly. The cupboard in not bare in the wake of Weis' departure.

Although 2009 was bitterly disappointing, the 6-6 Irish lost six games by a combined total of 28 points. They lost by four points to Michigan in the Big House in a game they clearly should have won. They only lost to USC by a touchdown. And although Clausen and Golden Tate are gone from that team, almost everybody else returns. Dayne Crist was a highly touted quarterback recruit coming out of high school who many thought was better than Jimmy Clausen. Michael Floyd was every bit as good as Tate when healthy, and Theo Riddick and TJ Jones are play makers.

Can Coach Kelly take these players and close the gap? Can he figure out how to win the close games and how to finish strong in November?

Much has been written about the tempo, the speed, of football practices under Kelly. There is little doubt that he is maximizing the amount of work that can be squeezed from every minute of practice. And it certainly sounds like he is paying attention to the details, as he demands from his players. In the final practices of fall camp last week, the Irish were spending time on Coach Kelly's list of 49 unusual game scenarios, which he said has grown over the years from just 16 scenarios when he started at Grand Valley State. The scenarios run the gamut from how to call a timeout before a two-point conversion attempt, to the turtle punt, to taking a safety on purpose. I can't be the only one who remembers Jarious Jackson spraining a knee while taking an intentional safety against LSU in 1998, thus knocking him out of action for the USC game (a 10-0 debacle in the Coliseum).

I don't get to watch practices. There aren't any meaningful videos available of what the team is doing on the field. All we think we know about how the players are progressing comes straight from the coach's mouth. Coach Kelly says the team is working hard, and preparing well, and is close to being ready for Purdue. But with the exception of Lou Holtz, that's what head coaches always say.

One thing we do know is that the competition for a starting spot on this team is intense. Nobody can take a starting slot for granted. Or even a back-up spot. There is no seniority system, no undue loyalty to the upperclassmen. Talent will play. Fifth-year senior and Notre Dame law student Chris Stewart is being pressed hard by sophomore Chris Watt at left guard. Dan Wenger and Braxston Cave are neck & neck at center. Cierre Wood has blown past Jonas Gray and Robert Hughes at running back and is breathing down Armando Allen's neck. Walk-on Nate Montana appears to be #2 at QB, ahead of heralded recruits like Andrew Hendrix. TJ Jones is pushing Duval Kamara hard at the third WR position (and will pass him in my estimation). There is lots of competition at linebacker, with the vocal and talented Brian Smith on the outside looking in as he has been surpassed (for now) by Kerry Neal and Darius Fleming.

So we have some talented players working very hard and competing intensely for playing time. And we have a Head Coach who has a proven record of winning at the college level. It would seem that the ingredients for success should be in place. But now, with all eyes on Notre Dame Stadium in six days, it only remains to play the games.

Good Luck Coach Kelly.

Go Irish! Beat the Boilermakers!

Lou Two?

"The Shirt" has been unveiled, and the 2010 edition of the Blue & Gold Game is upon us. As we wait for the public premiere of the latest version of the Fighting Irish, I wanted to share my thoughts on what has essentially been the prologue of the Brian Kelly Era. I was hoping to make this post much more in-depth, but time constraints (it's already really late on Friday night) dictate that it be just a summary of my impressions. But I think you'll get the flavor.

Lou Two? It hit me like a ton of bricks about a week ago when watching some of Coach Kelly's post-practice remarks to the media that he sounds a lot like Lou Holtz. His remarks that day were particularly tough on Dayne Crist, criticizing his sloppy footwork and his technique in general. He also remarked that "right now we're not a very good football team" and lamented the need to motivate players who are lucky enough to be wearing a gold helmet and playing for Notre Dame. That dose of pessimism and poor-mouthing was vintage Lou. But the similarities don't end there. When Lou came to Notre Dame he found a group of players that thought a little too much of their own abilities, and he had to bring those players down a peg by instilling a much stricter sense of discipline and by emphasizing the concept of "team" over the individual. We're seeing from Coach Kelly a lot of talk about the sense of entitlement he perceived when he walked into the Gug and the need to find the Right Kind of Guys (RKGs) who come to Notre Dame because they want to be part of the tradition of the Fighting Irish, not because it will enhance their chances of being drafted by the NFL. The final similarity I see is the primacy of the "system." Under Lou the Irish ran the option offense. It was who they were. Everyone knew the plays they were going to run, and the game plan was simply to execute the system better than the other team could defend it. Under Coach Kelly the system is his version of the spread offense. His goal is to develop his team to a level of unconscious competence in the spread and then execute it at a high level on game day, regardless of who the opponent is. So, at the outset, the Brian Kelly Era feels an awful lot like the beginning of the Lou Holtz Era. I think these two coaches have very similar ideas about how a head football coach should go about his business. I hope Coach Kelly can have results that compare favorably to Lou's as well.

Tempo. We've had some glimpses of the team's spring practices, although we haven't really been able to see anything meaningful. But we've certainly heard and read a lot about tempo. Those who have observed the practices have said that they are remarkable for the high tempo. Coach Kelly himself has on numerous occasions stated that one of the biggest challenges for the players and the team in the spring has been adjusting to the high tempo at which he expects them to play. But does all the talk about tempo mean anything? Or is it just so much more "new coach" rhetoric? I think all the emphasis on tempo is very significant. Even Charlie Weis noted that one of the problems that really vexed the team in 2007 was "tempo." I have written quite a bit about tempo, or the lack thereof, here on this blog. For example, after the loss to Georgia Tech to open 2007 (sorry to bring that up):

In talking about the loss, Coach Weis had a different take. It wasn't that our guys didn't know what to do, it was a "tempo" problem.

“It isn’t just the players playing each other, it’s handing the speed of the game. You can simulate it in practice the best you can, but obviously they did a much better job than we did of handling the speed of the game. They controlled the tempo with their defense versus our offense.”

And again -

“I thought the speed of the game, especially the offensive front against their defensive front, we were playing at two different tempos.”

What does that mean? Is that like "Well, Mr. and Mrs. Domer, it's not that little Johnny can't read. He actually reads very well. It's just that he reads at a slower tempo than the other children."

Oh, is that all?

And, more importantly, can you fix a "tempo" problem? Because if we don't fix our "tempo" problem I have a very strong feeling that this could be an issue down the road. Like this week in Happy Valley. Or in Pasadena. Or when the Trojans come calling.

This "tempo" issue has been discussed before here at OC Domer. Following the fan appreciation day practice in August I posted my thoughts on what we learned (or didn't learn) from that public practice. Included in my ramblings was the following:

It seemed to me that the line play was only going about 80% speed. Very little real smash-mouth going on. That, and the poor overall quality of the video posted at UND.com (too small, too grainy) makes it very difficult to evaluate line play. So I won't try.

Much has been made of the coaches requiring the defense to "run" a lap around the field when they lined up with only ten men on one play, as though the coaches were really cracking the whip. I was disappointed in how most of the guys dogged it on the lap. They pace was very slow, and many of the guys cut the corners in the end zones. I know the guys are fatigued after a week of camp, but maybe the reason USC and LSU run laps around us on game day is that we don't really "run" our laps at practice. Practice slow and play slow. Maybe I'm being unfair and too harsh, but that "lap" bothered me.

So maybe we've had a tempo problem for a while. If so, I am really disappointed. Living in Southern California, I am subjected to a rather steady stream of USC coverage. I've built up some immunity to it and no longer break out in hives. One common, recurring theme from those who visit Trojans' practices is that they are impressed by the high tempo of USC practices. If I know that one of the distinguishing characteristics of the current top program in the country is their high-tempo practices, surely that word has gotten out to the coaching community. Why wouldn't we (Notre Dame) be trying to emulate that? And if we are trying, why isn't it translating to Saturdays? Is it because we're coaching it wrong? Or is it because our guys are just too slow to play at that higher tempo? I sure hope it's the former, because coaching techniques can be fixed. If it's the latter, we're in serious trouble, because you can't teach speed.

It certainly seems that "tempo" is central to Coach Kelly's ideas about how he wants his teams to play the game, and it appears that he puts his money where his mouth is on that point by forcing the team to work at a very high tempo 100% of the time in practice. Hopefully in will translate into a team that plays faster and with more urgency than we have seen at Notre Dame in many years.

Defense. With all the focus on Dayne Crist and the new offensive system, the defense is getting overlooked. In listening to the coaches, it is clear that the new defensive system will be a significant departure from the Jon Tenuta experiment. Rather than a "Tora! Tora! Tora!" attack mentality, this year's defense will be a more disciplined unit with greater attention to gap control and playing one's assignment. Nobody wants to say it, but it is going to be a "bend-but-don't break" scheme that will focus on slowing down the opponent and avoiding the big offensive play. Once Coach Kelly's spread offense is hitting on all cylinders, a solid though perhaps unspectacular defense should be more than sufficient to enable the Irish to win what I expect will be a lot of shoot-outs. But the offense will surely sputter for a while as Dayne and the receivers grow in it, and the defense is going to have to be more than just "solid" if this team is going to win games in 2010. The defense is going to have to generate turnovers and it will have to be very stout when faced with tough situations following stalled drives and turnovers by the inexperienced offense. I have no idea what to expect from this unit, but I have no doubt that it needs to be a lot better than it was in 2009. Hopefully the new 3-4 scheme will be a better fit for our personnel, and hopefully the new defensive coaches can teach basic tackling techniques better than the previous staff did. There is plenty of talent on this side of the ball, and if they can learn the new schemes sufficiently well to "play fast" without making too many mistakes they could be very good. Coach Kelly's public comments on the defensive talent on this team have been very positive. I don't have a lot of insight to offer on what the defense will do. My only insight is that I think folks are underestimating how important it is that the defense be very good right out of the box since it has to be expected that there will be growing pains on the offensive side of the ball.

Chuck & Duck The Spread Offense. In order get some idea what to expect from Coach Kelly's offense, I have been watching this Tony Pike 2009 highlight video:




Obviously the quarterback drives the bus in this offense, and Dayne Crist will have to be very good from week one or we are in trouble. There is no place for the QB to hide in this scheme. There really is no way to protect the QB or slowly bring him along. It is pedal-to-the-metal from the coin flip. But the receivers are equally important. They have to run their routes correctly to get open, and they have to be able to catch the ball, even if the throw isn't perfect. It is clear from watching the above video that Tony Pike had a tremendous degree of trust in his receivers. He frequently threw the ball to receivers who weren't really open and trusted that they would be aggressive enough to come down with the ball or at least prevent an interception. In this system the QB is frequently going to be throwing the ball under duress, and he won't be able to deliver it to his wide-outs on a silver platter. This offense appears to assume that the QB will simply get the ball out of his hand and into the general vicinity of the receiver, who is expected to attack the ball and come down with it. That's the "bad news" for the receivers, so to speak. The good news is that the wide receivers will have many, many opportunities to make big plays. The ball is in the air all the time. When the offense is working, the receivers frequently catch the ball in space with plenty of room to make big gains. There will be plenty of wealth to spread around to those players who are able to grasp the scheme and step up their game. Michael Floyd is obviously the #1 WR right now. But this offense needs at least four WRs on the field at a time, and Golden Tate is playing for Pete Carroll now. It's time for the young guys to show us what they can do.

BGS RIP. The best college football blog on the 'net has decided to go out on top. The Blue-Gray Sky was the best college football blog when I started OC Domer in March of 2007, and they were still the best when they retired their jerseys on March 25, 2010. Week in and week out, season in and season out, the Blue-Gray Sky was the gold standard against which Notre Dame football blogs were measured. While the rest of us made do with our own modestly informed opinions based upon watching the game once, live, while drinking beer and eating nachos, the crew at BGS watched film, broke it down, and gave us actual analysis (accompanied by video clips, diagrams, and screen-caps) of what the team was doing and why it was or wasn't working. That's a lot of hard work and it was without peer in the Irish blogosphere. And it was greatly appreciated by me and thousands of other loyal BGS readers. It was a proud milestone for the OC Domer blog when BGS added us to their blogroll. Thanks for the traffic guys. Here's a portion of my comments at BGS upon hearing the news that they were shutting it down:

Running my own one-man blog, I completely understand how much work goes into a quality post. And as a dad with a job, I understand how hard it is to find the time to blog well. Thanks for all the blood, sweat & tears you guys have poured into your site the past six years. And good luck to all of you as you move on to the next chapters of your lives. But you and BGS will be missed.

NFL. Congratulations to Jimmy Clausen on being drafted by the Carolina Panthers! It looks like a great fit for Jimmy. The offense is the same one he ran at ND, and it is a fundamentally sound team that just needs a good QB to get to the next level. Jimmy will have a great chance to compete for the starting job right away, and if he wins it he will be in a much better situation to stay healthy and win games than Brady Quinn was in with the Browns. Good luck to Jimmy, and I'm glad he wasn't in New York where the cameras could document his pain as he slid down the board. And congratulations also to Golden Tate, who will be in Seattle playing for his old nemesis Pete Carroll. Great pick by Pete, and good fit for Golden as Seattle sorely needs a playmaker like him. How long has it been since Notre Dame had a player drafted (Clausen at pick 48) before the first USC player was drafted (Taylor Mays at pick 49)? Weird that Tebow was drafted ahead of Clausen and will be competing with Brady Quinn in Denver. I hope BQ wins that job and keeps Tebow on the sideline for a long time.

Conclusion. It's been exciting to watch Coach Kelly take over the Fighting Irish and begin to mold it in his image. But up until now its been like fingering the presents under the tree before Christmas, trying to figure out what's inside the wrapping. Tomorrow the wrapping begins to come off and we get to see what Santa brought us. I hope Santa got my letter.

Go Irish!

3rd Annual OC Domer Player of the Year Award

The ballots are in. Actually, they've been in for a while, collecting dust as I've been too busy/distracted to count them. But the results have finally been tabulated. It's time to announce recipient of the 2009 "OC Domer Player of the Year Award." The OC Domer Player of the Year Award is intended to recognize the Notre Dame football player or players who played the best when it mattered the most. The award is based on a horrendously complex and intricate scoring system that would take too long to explain and that you wouldn't understand anyway. Suffice it to say that the primary criterion was a consistently high level of play, with significant bonus points awarded for exceeding expectations.

Past winners of this prestigious award are David Bruton (2007) and Michael Floyd (2008). Bruton is now playing on Sundays for the Denver Broncos, while Floyd had another amazing year for Notre Dame, finishing second on the team in both receptions (44) and receiving yards (795) despite missing (only) five games with a broken collar bone. Hopefully Michael will get himself squared away after his recent off-field embarrassment and will have a truly monster 2010 season in Brian Kelly's high-revving spread offense.

The OC Domer Player of the Year for the 2009 football season is: Golden Tate.



Expectations for Golden Tate coming into the 2009 season could hardly have been higher. He was expected to team up with mates Michael Floyd, Kyle Rudolph, and Jimmy Clausen as part of a prodigious offense that would lead the Fighting Irish to a 10-win (or better) season, a BCS Bowl berth, and maybe if everything fell right a chance at playing for a National Championship. Given the importance of "exceeding expectations" in the the judging for OC Domer Player of the Year, Tate had to be considered a long shot for this honor, since he was expected to be an All-American. But he didn't just play great. He amazed us. And when Michael Floyd was out with a broken collar bone and quarterback Jimmy Clausen was hobbled by "turf toe" that turns out to have really been "torn-ligaments-toe", Golden Tate carried his football team on his back. He played wide receiver, running back, quarterback, and more while willing his team to nail-biting wins with highlight-reel catches and runs to rival any in the history of Notre Dame football. Speaking of highlight reels, here is the Golden reel from 2009:

How amazing was 2009 for Golden Tate? Here's an excerpt from a recent Notre Dame press release recognizing his selection as an All-American:

The 2009 Biletnikoff Award winner, Tate recently capped off the best receiving season in Notre Dame football history. He finished with 93 receptions for 1,496 yards and 15 receiving touchdowns in 2009. Tate added two rushing touchdowns, one punt return for a score and totaled 1,915 all-purpose yards, second most in Irish single-season history.

Tate equaled or surpassed eight school records this year, including most catches and receiving yards in a season, tied for most touchdown catches in a season, most receiving yards in a career, most 100-yard receiving games in a season and career, most receiving yards per game in a season and tied for most consecutive games with a touchdown reception.

Tate ranks in the top eight nationally in nine different statistical categories and no wide receiver had more games with at least 100 receiving yards this year than Tate's nine. He also scored at least one touchdown in each of the final 11 contests for Notre Dame.

Tate, who recently declared his intention to enter the 2010 NFL draft, departs as the most prolific receiver in Notre Dame history. He recorded 2,707 receiving yards on 157 receptions with 26 touchdowns. Tate ranks second in career touchdown receptions and is tied for third in career receptions.

Congratulations to OC Domer 2009 Player of the Year Golden Tate! And thank you Golden for giving everything you had for Notre Dame over the past three seasons. Good luck in the NFL!

OC Domer Player of the Year Runner-up is: Jimmy Clausen. Jimmy just completed his best season at Notre Dame, completing 68 percent of his passes for 3,722 yards with 28 TDs and only four interceptions in 2009. He set a school record by passing for at least 300 yards in seven games and his four fourth-quarter comebacks for victories are the most in a season by an Irish quarterback. Clausen is ranked first or second in 32 passing categories at Notre Dame, including tops in career completion percentage, completions per game for a career and tied for first in lowest interception percentage over a career. He completed 695 of 1,110 pass attempts for 8,148 yards with 60 touchdowns and 27 interceptions while starting 34 of 35 games played for the Irish. Jimmy is expected to be a first round pick in the upcoming NFL Draft, although his ranking by various draft pundits is quite variable. However it plays out, I hope JC's surgically repaired toe heals well and quickly, and I hope he represents Notre Dame with distinction in "The League."

OC Domer Player of Year Honorable Mention goes to: Manti Te'o. Although he arrived a little too late to save Charlie's job, Manti was easily the most highly decorated defensive player to come to Notre Dame in the Charlie Weis era (Named 2008 High School Athlete of the Year by Sporting News. Defensive player of the year by USA Today. Inaugural high school recipient of the Butkus Award, given to the best linebacker in the country. Two-time recipient of Hawaii Gatorade Player-of-the-Year award in 2007 and 2008. Sporting News rated him the top defensive player in the nation and second-best player in the country. Rated second-best overall prospect in the ESPNU150 and best linebacker according to ESPN. Et cetera, et cetera). Expectations were high for Manti, but I was surprised by how much impact he had as a true freshman. He ranked fourth on the team with 63 tackles including 5.5 tackles for loss, one sack and added one pass breakup. He played in all 12 games and started nine contests. His 63 tackles were the most by a Notre Dame freshman since 1975 and the third most all time by an Irish freshman. Te'o became a full-time starter for Notre Dame in the fifth game of the season against Washington and he ranked second on the Irish with 57 tackles over the final eight games. Te'o is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and he recently announced that he will be delaying his traditional mission trip for at least one year and possibly until later in his life, which means he will continue at Notre Dame during his sophomore year and will be a member of the Irish football team in 2010. And there was much joy throughout the land.

Who are your Notre Dame Players of the Year? I'd love to hear from you.

Quick Hits, Pearl Harbor Edition

Things have been busy at OC Domer HQ and I just haven't been able to write all the posts I have wanted to write lately. So here are my thoughts on recent developments in condensed Readers Digest format:

1. Coaching Search. Well, what do you know? Brian Kelly will be meeting with Jack Swarbrick on Tuesday to discuss ... well, you know. All as foretold by OC Domer.

2. Pete Carroll's Girlfriend. Do I really care if Pete "Always Compete" Carroll is (or was) living with a USC grad student in Malibu? Hell yes I care. I'm not particularly proud of it, but I do care. I'm sure the Los Angeles media is all over this story and we'll get all the juicy details real soon. With pictures. (Won't they?) I want to see if Pete is hitting a higher class of "mistress" than Tiger Woods is. But you will note that in his profuse apologies about allowing an off-the-record comment to get into print that Charlie never quite says that the underlying facts about Pete and the grad student aren't true. Hmmm. Seems very unlike Charlie to let something like that slip without any basis.

3. Tiger Woods' Mistresses. Latest count is up to nine. At what point do we get real and stop calling all these tramps "mistresses"? And don't you love how all these "hostesses" are shocked and hurt by Tiger's infidelity? "I thought I was the only hooker gold digger in his life." Hilarious. What's not hilarious is that Tiger has hurt his wife Elin, who deserved better from him. I hope a few hundred million dollars will ease her pain.

4. Jimmy & Golden. Going pro. Not a surprise. I would love to see them play at Notre Dame for another year, but they'd be crazy to. Good luck to both guys as they move the show to Sundays. I hope they each make a big pile of cash and have long, glorious NFL careers. Thanks to both of them for giving all of us everything they had for three years. I hope they find the time somewhere down the road to complete their degrees and graduate from ND.

5. Charlie to Da Bears? Rumors have the Chicago Bears as a potential landing spot for Coach Weis next season, likely as offensive coordinator. Makes great sense. I would expect that CW will try to find a position as close to South Bend as possible to remain close to the Hannah & Friends facility that means so much to him.

6. Still Recruiting. Thanks to Coach Weis and all his assistants for being completely classy and professional and working to keep all the 2010 verbal commits in the fold.

7. Bowling. I agree with the decision not to accept any bowl invitations this year. Notre Dame has a long history of declining bowl invitations. During decades when we were THE elite program in the country we won National Championships without bowl games. We have frequently declined to go bowling when the team had a sub-par season or when the invitation wasn't from a prestigious bowl. There is no reason to humiliate ourselves by playing a bowl game in Detroit against some MAC opponent. In the current context there is no real upside. More weeks practicing the system of the just-fired coach? And who is calling the plays? And how motivated are our soon-to-be millionaire offensive leaders? And what would a win get us? Have some pride and play in a bowl again when you've actually earned it and when the game would mean something.

8. OC Domer Owns Subway Domer's 2009 Pick 'em Contest. Subway Domer once again hosted a weekly Pick 'em contest for this season. Players had to pick winners for about a dozen college games each week, straight up. Bonus points for correctly picking upsets. More bonus points for picking upsets in Top 25 games. After a very slow start to the season I went on a very nice run and finished 2009 as co-champion. Final results are here. My team is "Holy Cross." Thanks to Subway for putting on the contest again this season. I really do enjoy putting my picks together each week. It makes Saturdays more interesting without costing me a wad of cash.

Golden Tate #2 on my Heisman Ballot

I received an e-mail from Shotgun Spratling at Blueworkhorse.com inviting me to cast my ballot for this year's Sports Blog Heisman Trophy. Voters are not limited to just the five players invited to New York for the presentation of that other Heisman trophy. Here is the full text of my e-mailed "ballot" as submitted:

Dear Shotgun,

Here is the OC Domer Heisman Ballot.

1. Toby Gerhart. He is most dominant player at his position, and his dominance doesn't depend on anyone else to make him look good. One-on-one, mano-a-mano he beats you down at the point of attack. Puts his team on his back and carries them to victory.

2. Golden Tate. You can't keep him from getting the ball, you can't tackle him, and you can't catch him. Once Michael Floyd broke his collar bone, everyone in the stadium knew Notre Dame and Jimmy Clausen were going to get the ball to Tate, and still nobody could stop him. Despite being double or triple covered every play, Golden still came up with huge plays time and again. Golden kept the Irish in games single-handedly for seven weeks. Without Golden Tate to throw to, Jimmy Clausen would not be in a position to make big money as a top draft choice in April.

3. Colt McCoy. My choice at the beginning of the season, he played his way down to third place during the season and especially against Nebraska.

Honorable Mention: Jimmy Clausen. He has become one heck of a quarterback. Will make Charlie Weis look like a really good coach once he starts playing and winning on Sundays.

My website is http://ocdomer.blogspot.com

I'm in the Far West.

Look forward to seeing your results!


OC Domer

What would your ballot look like?

You Are What Your Record Says You Are, Charlie.

After the Fighting Irish suffered their humiliating loss to Syracuse last November, I wrote that I was done defending Charlie Weis. My conclusion to that post was:

If it was my call, I'd give him another year, provided he could present a serious plan for addressing the team's glaring deficiencies (i.e., at the very least getting a new offensive line coach). After all, as ugly as it is, this team really is close to being 9-2 right now.

If Swarbrick decides to keep Weis I'll support him, if Charlie is let go I'd be okay with that too. However it goes, the Irish are my team, Notre Dame is my University, and I'll be sending in my Sorin Society donation at Christmas time.

But I'm done defending Charlie Weis. How can you defend the indefensible?

The Irish are my team. Notre Dame is my University. And I'll always support and cheer for my alma mater. But a year after the Syracuse disaster and one day after the second consecutive home loss to the Midshipmen of the U.S. Naval Aademy, I have to say that if it was my call I'd give another coach a chance to lead Notre Dame's football program.

That was not easy for me to type, because unlike a lot of folks, I really like Charlie Weis. I find him a sympathetic figure on a personal level, and I think he is largely misunderstood. Charlie is a real Notre Dame guy who understands the importance of bringing in athletes of real character who are committed to getting their Notre Dame degrees. He is an excellent recruiter. I hope that the next Head Football Coach at Notre Dame does as well as Coach Weis in these important areas.

Charlie is fond of quoting his coaching mentor, Bill Parcells. One of Coach Parcells' most well known maxims is that "you are what your record says you are." With three regular season games to play in the 2009 season, Charlie Weis is a mediocre head coach. Through 59 games Charlie has 35 wins against 24 losses, for a 0.593 winning percentage. Just under 60% after almost five years.

He is 0-5 against USC.
He is 2-3 against Michigan
He is 1-2 against Boston College
He is 2-3 against Michigan State
He is 3-2 against Navy

But he has owned Stanford (4-0) and Purdue (4-1).

Under Charlie the Irish have played ranked opponents 15 times, and have gone 4-11 in those games. The last win over a ranked opponent was a 41-17 home win over #17 Penn State on September 9, 2006, when ND was ranked #4. Since then the Irish have lost NINE straight games to ranked teams. Even against unranked teams, Charlie is only winning at a 70% clip (31-13).

Navy is not a bad football team. They very nearly beat Ohio State in Columbus earlier this season. Navy is a good football team.

But Notre Dame does not aspire to be competitive against good football teams. Notre Dame aspires, ultimately, to be great. Being a great football team means comfortably and consistently beating good football teams. It means being competitive with and winning your share of games against elite teams. Under Coach Weis the Irish have never beaten an elite football team. Never. In 2009 his team has struggled mightily to win games against teams that would have to be considered "average". Last minute wins over Washington, Purdue, and Michigan State are exciting and show some character, but they are not enough. Games against teams of that caliber should be boring workman-like wins, not nail-biters. They should be mere tune-ups to get the team ready to beat USC or win a BCS bowl game. This season Notre Dame has only beaten two teams convincingly (Nevada and Washington State), and those teams are truly among the weakest in the nation.

Is it fair that a decision to fire a coach should come down to a missed field goal that should have been an automatic 3 points? Or two missed field goals? Or a fumble at midfield on the opening drive? Or a fumble at the 1-yard line as the team is about to score? Or a freak pass that bounces off the back of a receiver and is intercepted?

Is it fair that Coach Weis should lose his job when, arguably, it was really the defense that cost Notre Dame the game?

One could flip the questions around. Suppose the freshman kicker makes a couple of kicks and the Irish beat Navy by a point or by a touchdown. Does Notre Dame really want to be led by a head coach that is barely able to eke out close wins against Navy at home?

Not any more. It is clear to me that Charlie is an excellent quarterback coach and offensive coordinator. But it is equally clear that his teams too frequently show up on game day unprepared to play. Usually it's a question of emotions and intensity. Sometimes (like Saturday) it is a matter of game plan and schematics. Against Navy our defensive coaches got worked by the Navy coaches. They absolutely schooled us. Ultimately, the head coach has to take responsibility for failures on both sides of the ball. Charlie has had five years to put a credible defensive staff together. To his credit he has been willing to replace the weak links on his staff when it was obvious that it needed to be done. But waiting until the need for a new direction is obvious to a fan watching from Orange County is a failure to recognize problems quickly enough. The defensive staff belongs to him, and the five years of mediocrity on defense belongs to him too. Being an offensive genius is not enough for a head coach. A head coach has to be accountable for what happens on both sides of the ball.

As for the offensive genius, what the heck is going on in the Red Zone? Against Navy the Irish scored just twice in six Red Zone chances, after moving up and down the field at will against the middies. Why is the offense stalling out inside the five yard line?

The bottom line is, despite some very impressive offensive production from Jimmy Clausen, Golden Tate, and Michael Floyd, this team continues to perform well below the level expected of the Fighting Irish.

I suppose Charlie might still save his job. There are two ranked opponents left on the schedule (Pitt and Stanford), and the team knows by now that the head coach's job is on the line. They might surprise us all and dominate those two teams and U-Conn, ending the regular season at 9-3. Despite everything, it'd be tough to fire a guy who has stocked the roster with talent and gone 9-3.

Assuming that doesn't happen, I would expect Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick to drop the hammer right after the Stanford game. Announce that a change will be made, ask Coach Weis to remain through the bowl game, and name the replacement coach quickly so that the new guy and his staff can begin working as quickly as possible to keep the committed recruits on board while finishing up a decent recruiting class. If Charlie goes, I fully expect that we'll lose Jimmy Clausen to the NFL. He'll likely be in New York for the Heisman Trophy ceremony and still might win the darn thing. He's rated very high by the scouts and would likely go very high in the NFL Draft. As fun as it would be to stick around and throw the ball to Golden Tate and Michael Floyd for another year, the fact is that the offensive line will have to be largely re-tooled for next season and everyone would have to learn a new offensive system - one that might not be as pass-happy as the Weis system.

As for Coach Weis' successor, I am sure Jack Swarbrick has some excellent candidates in mind. The new guy will have to be PROVEN head coach at the pro level or the Div-1A college level. Think Ara Parseghian, Frank Leahy, or Lou Holtz. Not Gerry Faust, Boob Davie, or Charlie Weis.

He must be a person who can be relied upon to uphold the high standards of the University of Notre Dame both on and off the field. He has to be a person of integrity who will be committed to bringing in players of character who are willing and able to perform in the classroom and earn their degrees. I don't think Urban Liar or Nick Satan meet fit description. I would rather that Notre Dame football become a Division II program with integrity than see it sell its soul by bringing in a coach of that ilk. Yes, I am dead serious. One of the things that makes me most proud to be a Domer is that I know that the kids we bring to South Bend are going to class and that they will leave Notre Dame after four years with a world class education and a meaningful degree.

I'll post later about who the next head coach should be. I haven't done my background research yet. But I'll admit that I've always like Jon Gruden.

I'll reiterate that I like Charlie Weis. He "gets" Notre Dame and has always acted with dignity and class in representing the University. I wish it had worked out better. But you are what your record says you are, and his record screams "mediocre."

Irish Blogger Gathering: The Quest for a Signature Win

Welcome to the USC-week edition of the Irish Blogger Gathering, hosted right here at OC Domer in a nod to the fact that I have to live my life surrounded by Trojan alumni & fans. Having grown up in California, and living in So Cal for the past 16 years, the USC game annually is the "Big One" at OC Domer HQ. Win this game, and you get a full year of smack-talk satisfaction out of it. Lose this game and you're in for a full year of crap at every cocktail party and other social function you attend for 12 long months. It's funny how many more USC fans you meet when they're winning than when they're losing.

Added to the usual stakes surrounding a USC-ND game this year is the Quest for the Signature Win. Charlie Weis is in his fifth season as Notre Dame's head football coach. He rolled up a lot of wins in 2005 and 2006, but lost the Bowl game following each season. 2007 & 2008 were unequivocal disasters with the exception of the Hawaii Bowl win last Christmas Eve. Can you name Coach Weis' biggest win to date? Neither could I, so I looked it up. The candidates for "signature win" are:

• Unranked ND beats #23 Pittsburgh, 42-21. (2005)
  
• #20 ND beats #3 Michigan, 17-10. (2005)
  
• #13 ND beats #22 Purdue, 49-28. (2005)
  
• #4 ND beats #19 Penn State, 41-17. (2006)
  

Those are Coach Weis' only wins over ranked opponents, and the last one was more than three full years ago (September 9, 2006 over the Nittany Lions). It's nice to win games over weaker teams (which itself has been pretty uncertain for the last three years), but WE ARE ND! We should be competing with and beating highly ranked opponents our fair share of the time. And it needs to start now.

This week's IBG Questions:

1. The weather forecast for Saturday's game (as of this writing) has the high temperature in the mid 40's with some chance of rain (or snow?). What weather would give Notre Dame the best chance to beat USC? Why?

Think snow. Better yet, think sleet and wind chill. Snow can be beautiful, and it might be novel enough that the Trojans find it amusing to play in. But cold, near-frozen rain in a driving wind would be ideal playing conditions. USC's players, as talented as they are, traditionally have not adapted well to poor weather in South Bend. Frankly, if it gets cold enough, you quickly get the sense that they'd just as soon be anywhere else but playing football in Notre Dame stadium. Our guys don't really like it either, but they're more used to it and can gut it out better. The worse the weather is on Saturday, the more I like our chances.


2. Irresistable Force or Immovable Object? Notre Dame's offense is ranked #10 in yards (470 per game) and #27 in points (32.6 per game). USC's defense is ranked #6 in yards allowed (238.6 per game) and #4 in scoring allowed (just 8.6 points per game). In 2008 Notre Dame had just 91 total yards against USC. Will the Notre Dame offense be able to move the ball on Saturday? If so, how?

To me, this is the key question in the game. USC graduated most of the players off their 2008 defense (you can watch them playing on Sundays now), but the guys they have plugged in this season are playing very well. Notre Dame returns most of the players who were completely bottled up in 2008. What has changed?

Without Michael Floyd in the lineup, Coach Weis has been much more creative this year with how he creates favorable match-ups and tries to get the ball in Golden Tate's hands. Thus, it will be more difficult for the Trojan defense to double Golden and take him out of the game. Also, in contrast to late 2008, Coach Weis has some more weapons in his arsenal. Kyle Rudolph is a real match-up problem, and Coach Weis has been creative in moving him around and in stretching the defense vertically with Rudolph. Mix in a little bit of Robby Parris and Shaq Evans and Jimmy should be able to find an open receiver. The offensive line has matured in both pass protection and run blocking, so I think we'll be able to move the ball some. Last year the Irish had some success running straight at the Trojan defense with James Aldridge, who will be back for this game. Rather than trying to get Armando Allen to the edge (a losing proposition), I'd like to see Robert Hughes and James Aldridge running inside the tackles, with some play action passes mixed in. I think the Irish will be able to move the ball, but I don't think we'll be able to sustain 80-yard drives. In order to score points, we'll need some big plays on defense and special teams to set up scoring opportunities.


3. USC's offense is #22 in yards (430.6 per game) and #53 in scoring (28.8 points per game). Notre Dame's defense is #100 in total defense (403.2 yards per game) and #59 in scoring defense (allowing 23.8 points per game). Will the Notre Dame defense be able to slow down the USC offense? If so, how?

USC's offense is a very balanced attack, averaging just slightly more passing yards per game than rushing yards. I'm hanging my hat on two factors. One is the fact that USC quarterback Matt Barkley is a freshman. I am hoping that at some critical moment in the game a combination of environment, moment, confusing Jon Tenuta defense, and inexperience will coalesce into a major mistake or two by the young QB. I am also hoping that the defensive stat sheet for Notre Dame against Washington is the beginning of a trend. I have been lamenting for a very long time that the leading tacklers in ND's defense are the defensive backs. The safeties have almost always been the leading tacklers, way ahead of any linebacker, and the defensive linemen were statistical ghosts. There was a sharp turnaround in that pattern against UW. Kyle McCarthy was still the leading tackler. But linebacker Manti Te'o was second, and several other members of the front seven stepped up in a big way to dislodge the defensive backs from their normal spots atop the stat sheet. In other words, the defensive front seven finally started making plays against the Huskies. If that continues, it will allow the defensive backs to concentrate on down field coverage and hopefully eliminate big plays in the passing game.

I don't expect the Irish defense to stop USC. They haven't stopped anyone else. But I think they can slow them down enough, and make enough plays, to keep Notre Dame in the game.

4. In 2008, with Michael Floyd unable to play due to injury, Golden Tate had 2 catches against USC for a team-high 15 receiving yards. How do you expect Golden Tate to play against USC this year?

I expect Golden to play much better. As noted above, Charlie is working much harder to find creative ways to get the ball into Tate's hands. It reminds me of the way Lou Holtz made sure that Tim Brown got his touches, or even the way USC always found a way to get Reggie Bush the ball.

However, I don't expect Golden to put up the clown numbers he has for past few weeks. I think he'll have perhaps 120 total yards. But he won't be able to carry the team on his back. In order for the Irish to win, somebody else is going to have to break some big plays. Who will be the hero?

5. Jimmy Clausen has started to get some Heisman buzz. In your opinion, which Notre Dame player is the most deserving of Heisman attention, Jimmy or Golden Tate? Why?

Jimmy is playing well. But in Floyd's absence Golden Tate has been ridiculous. His highlight reel is absolutely sick. If he continues to play the rest of the season the way he has the past few weeks, I think Golden is more Heisman-worthy than Jimmy. But Jimmy could change my mind on Saturday. In fact, I hope he does.

6. Overrated or Underrated. Notre Dame cracked into the AP Poll at #25 this week. Are they overrated or underrated at #25? Where would you put them in your poll?

The Irish are underrated at #25. I'd put Notre Dame at about #20. As I look at the AP poll I see about 5 teams that in my view should be below the Irish.

7. USC Song Girls: Ambassadors of Collegiate Goodwill or Anachronism from a bygone era of oppressive sexist stereotypes?


I'm gonna have to come down pretty firmly on the side of "Ambassadors of Collegiate Goodwill."


8. Green Jerseys? There's a lot of "green" talk coming from campus this week, and it raises the question of whether the team will be wearing green on Saturday. Do you want to see the green jerseys or not? Why?

Unless the team is begging Coach Weis for the chance to wear the green because they think it will really fire them up, I don't want to see the green jerseys for a while. Lately the green jerseys have not been "lucky" and they certainly haven't been associated with big wins. To me, the wearing O' the green has been a bit of contrived emotion tried by coaches who have run out of ways to motivate the team.

That said, if we're winning at halftime (or even keeping it really close at half time), coming out in green for the second half might be just what the doctor ordered.


9. Name the next number in this sequence: -3, -20, -38, -35, _______. Explain.

The next number in the sequence is +3. There is no way this game doesn't get decided in the final moments. I see a tie game at the end of regulation. USC gets the ball first, but we hold them to a field goal. Notre Dame gets the ball and scores a touchdown, and doesn't need to kick the extra point. Irish win by 3.

Follow-up:

The Domer Law Blog IBG Contribution for this week is HERE.

The Brawling Hibernian's post is HERE.

OneFootDown checks in for this week HERE.

Subway Domer is in the house.

And Sarah at Bad Trade goes on the record.

Charlie's Nasties aren't feeling it. Yet.

Irish Learning How to Win

So how excited can you really be about a last minute win over the Purdue Boilermakers? Normally, I'd be writing a post full of disappointment about how the team under-performed and played down to the level of the competition.

But today I am actually very impressed with the guts and determination of the Fighting Irish. Lacking #1 wideout Michael Floyd, #1 running back Armando Allen, and working around a very limited and gimpy Jimmy Clausen, this team took a collective step up and, as a group, made the plays they needed to make to win an important road game in the face of serious adversity.

The final winning drive led by Clausen and finished in the end zone by TE Kyle Rudolph was very dramatic and should be remembered for a long time. But Notre Dame wouldn't have been in a position to win the game without key contributions from a bunch of guys who, until Saturday night, were not household names:

• Jonas Gray had 60 total yards rushing and receiving.
• Robert Hughes ran like a raging bull, flattening would-be tacklers on his way to 68 rushing yards and a touchdown.
• Golden Tate was Superman, rushing, receiving, wild-catting, punt-returning his way to 128 total yards, including a 14-yard touchdown run. (Okay, Golden's is a household name, but I couldn't leave him off this list!)
  
• Freshman Theo Riddick had just one offensive carry, but it went for 24 yards. He also had 96 kick-return yards (averaging 24 yards per return) for 120 total yards on the night.
• Freshman Nick Tausch was 1-for-1 on field goals, perfect on PATs, and had his best game yet on kick-offs booming the ball down near the goal line (and beyond).
• Quarterback Dayne Crist, while not allowed to open up the whole playbook, was very effective leading the offense when Clausen needed a break. Crist was 5-for-10 passing for 45 yards, and had four rushes for a net 16 yards, including a very nice 16-yard gain on his first play of the game that seemed to knock Purdue back on their heels a bit.
• Robby Parris had a huge 16-yard catch for a key first down on the final scoring drive.
• Robert Blanton had eight total tackles on the night.
• Darius Fleming went OFF for four solo tackles, including three tackles-for-loss and one QB sack.
• Kapron Lewis-Moore had for solo tackles, including one TFL.
• Manti Te'o had a big QB sack to put the game on ice on Purdue's last possession.

And that's not to forget the usual outstanding play of guys like Rudolph, McCarthy, Smith, Smith, Smith, Smith, and Brown; or the terrific play of the offensive line.

In 2008 this same team found a way to lose three games that it had well in hand and should have won. In 2009 this team let the Michigan game get away from them on the road, but held on to beat MSU last week. On Saturday the Fighting Irish finally had the feel of a team that collectively refused to lose. Despite losing most of its marquee offensive talent, the team scraped and clawed its way to a 10-point halftime lead. Despite losing that lead when the offense stalled and the defense stumbled, they regrouped and rallied around their injured quarterback and gave it everything they had until they got the ball across the goal line to take the lead for good. How freaking inspiring was Robert Hughes' 2-yard run on 2nd-and-goal at the Purdue four yard line with less than a minute to go? On the stat sheet it doesn't look like much, but seeing the determination as he dragged Purdue tacklers toward the goal line and refused to go down made me feel like he was carrying the hopes of his whole team on his shoulders and there was no way he was going to let his teammates down.

In 2005 and 2006 one often felt like the team was waiting for Brady Quinn to win the game for them. In 2008 it seemed like the team went as Clausen went. If he was hot the team did well, if Jimmy was off, the team had no chance. In this game against Purdue I felt that the whole team from Jimmy to Bobby Burger to Kerry Neal to Mike Anello took personal ownership of the fate of the team and as a group they said "You can take Floyd, you can take Armando, you can take Clausen, and we're still not going to let you beat us."

It was Purdue, but a night game on the road in the Big Ten with a lot of adversity to overcome was as good a time as any to begin to learn how to win games. That personal yet collective ownership of the fate of the team and the will to win no matter what will pay dividends down the road.

My Dad sent me an e-mail after the game criticizing Charlie Weis' play calling on their last possession of the 3rd quarter. With Notre Dame driving and with a first down at the Purdue 34, Notre Dame had a Hughes run for no gain, an incomplete pass attempt, another Hughes run for no gain, and a 4th-down sack of Crist for a 7-yard loss. Dad thought a pooch punt to bury Purdue in their own end was the smart play, feeling that there was no reason to give Purdue the emotional lift of a big 4th-down stop along with good field position. I replied that I thought the 3rd-down play was the worst of the series, in that it showed no confidence in Crist to run the offense. Plus, if you're going to let him throw it on 4th down anyway, let Dayne have a shot at making a play on 3rd down rather than just plowing into the line on 3rd-and-10.

But I also told my Dad that I thought he was being too negative on Charlie. I feel like he coached his ass off on Saturday night. He was without his #1 receiver, #1 running back, and his starting QB for much of the night, playing on the road against a jacked-up opponent. He went deep into the playbook and found a package of plays that managed to generate enough offense to win the game with the players he had on the field, including a game-winning TD drive at the end of the game led by a one-footed QB.

Coach Weis gets a lot of deserved criticism when he mismanages a game situation and/or gets too cute with his play calls. We should all be willing, however, to give him credit when it is due, and I think he deserves a lot of credit for writing a game plan (actually two or three game plans) that gave his team chance to win a tough game, and for managing the dynamics of the game as it unfolded in such a way as to bring home a "W".

Little Things: Notre Dame won the turnover battle (2-1), had fewer penalties and penalty yards (6 for 41) than Purdue (13 for 103), and won the field position battle (ASFP for Notre Dame its own 34; ASFP for Purdue its own 28).

IBG: Life After Michael Floyd

Wow. It's been way too long since my last post, I'm embarrassed to say. Part of the problem was a business trip to Pittsburgh last week that threw me off my normal rhythm. But part of the problem has been a certain degree of befuddlement about the Irish that left me unsure of where I stand on this team. I wrote a quick post right after the loss to Michigan which pretty well captured my thoughts at that moment, and despite winning last week in a game that had very much the same feel as the Michigan game, my feelings haven't really changed much.

I feel like I owe you all a decent analysis of both the Michigan and Michigan State games, but I don't have the time to do so in a lot of detail. Here's the nutshell:

• The offense is playing well enough to win a lot of games. Passing game is strong, run game is acceptable.

• The defense is not playing well enough to win a lot of games. The vaunted Jon Tenuta "pressure" is rarely getting home, and the result has been unacceptably large yardage and scoring totals for two teams led by inexperienced quarterbacks. Michigan gained 430 yards (6.1 yards per play) and scored 38 points. Sparty gained 459 yards (7.1 yards per play) and scored 30 points.
  

• In each of the last two games four of the top five tacklers for the Irish were defensive backs. What's up with that?
  

• It's still the little things that kill you. Notre Dame had nine penalties for 75 yards against Michigan, and had ELEVEN penalties for 99 yards against Sparty.
  

• Special Teams play hasn't been special, although they were significantly better against Sparty than they were against Michigan. Against UM the Irish lost the field position battle by 8 yards (Irish ASFP of their own 29, Michigan at their own 37). Against MSU the Irish barely won the battle of ASFP (own 29 versus own 26). Funny how often winning the field position battle correlates to winning the game.
  

Bottom Line: If the Fighting Irish expect to meet any of their goals this season, the defense has to get a whole lot more stingy than it's been to date.

With Michigan and Michigan State finally out of the way, we can now turn our attention to the Purdue Boilermakers. This week's Irish Blogger Gathering is hosted by Frank V. at the UHND Blog. After you finish up here, head over there to read all the IBG posts for this week. This week's questions:

1. The obvious question for the week, how does Notre Dame deal with the loss of Michael Floyd? What wide receiver steps up? How, if at all, does the offense change?

Frank's right, as he usually is. This/these is/are the obvious question/questions. The answer has to be that the Irish handle the loss of Floyd in 2009 much better than they did in 2008. When Michael got hurt last season the Irish offense curled up into the fetal position and sucked it's thumb until he returned for the Hawaii Bowl. In his absence the Irish offense averaged 1.9 yards per play against USC, not even gaining a first down until the last play of the 3rd quarter. With Floyd watching from the sideline Notre Dame suffered a humiliating loss to Syracuse.

The primary problem the Irish have without Michael Floyd is that the offense goes from having two very dangerous deep threats to just one, Golden Tate. While ND has several quality receivers who can step into the mix, none of them have so far shown the ability to stretch the field vertically like Floyd and Tate can. It's an easy call for opposing defenses to double-cover Golden Tate and dare the other Irish receivers to beat them.

I expect to see more of Robby Parris and Duval Kamara, along with a heavy dose of tight end Kyle Rudolph. But the only other wide-out we have seen so far who has the ability to threaten the defense deep is freshman Shaquelle Evans. Physically he has the size and speed that reminds one of Floyd, although he hasn't yet shown the same play-making ability.

I hope that Coach Weis keeps the offense fundamentally the same as the first few weeks, stretching the field vertically with Tate and (probably) Evans. The difference will be that, in the absence of Floyd, Jimmy Clausen won't be able to just throw the ball up in the air and expect #3 to come down with it. He'll have to actually wait for a receiver to get open, and thus more throws will come over the middle of the field to Rudolph, Kamara, and Parris once Tate and Evans have lured the coverage deeper.

It would be a mistake to decide that this is Purdue, we should be able to handle them, so let's just work on our run game. That could well work for one game, but Coach Weis needs to let Clausen and the receivers run the entire offense so that they are ready to execute the full passing attack against Washington and USC without Floyd to lean on. This week will be a really good test of Jimmy Clausen's development. Can he work through his reads and deliver the ball to the open receiver without committing costly turnovers?

2. After seeing three games from Notre Dame in 2009 have your expectations increased, decreased, or remained the same?

At the conclusion of my season preview post I included the following thoughts on season expectations:

Depending upon where you look, I've seen over/under win totals for Notre Dame set between 8.5 and at 9.0 wins, which is right in line with my own estimations [...]. For me, 9 wins is what the Irish "should" achieve in 2009, all things being equal. If they earn less than nine wins, they have under achieved and only a very, very nice Bowl win would bring Coach Weis back in 2010. If they manage to win ten games, they will have beaten the odds in my view, and the extra win would have to be credited to Coach Weis who will have earned the chance to stay on as coach. If they win eleven or twelve, that would be a superior job of coaching and you'll need dynamite (or another year like 2007) to dislodge Charlie from the Gug.

I think my feelings remain about the same. Notre Dame "should" win at least nine games. Ten or more wins would be a very good season. Less than nine wins would be very, very disappointing. I guess what has changed for me is my level of optimism that they will actually exceed nine wins. I still think they will, but the poor overall play of the defense and the loss of MF has reduced the margin of error for this team to almost nil.

3. The last two years against Purdue, a Notre Dame player has had their breakout game. In 2007 it was Golden Tate and in 2008 it was Armando Allen. Who do you think could have their breakout game against the Boilermakers this year?

I really, really hope that Shaquelle Evans or another wideout has the breakout game. For the longer term prospects of the team, we need to find another deep threat ASAP. But I'm not counting on it. I think the more likely breakout player is Jonas Gray. Armando Allen is nicked up and may not play, and almost certainly will not play as much this week. In his place Jonas Gray will get consistent carries, he will get into a rhythm, and he will grind down the Boilermakers. A slightly more conservative game plan will also alter the pass/run mix and mean more carries for Gray. I see him having a 100-yard game.

Another two possibles: Tight end Mike Ragone and linebacker Manti Te'o. Coach Weis has always liked two-TE sets, and the loss of MF is the perfect time to get really creative with his formations and personnel. Purdue knows that Kyle Rudolph can be trouble and will give him a lot of attention, opening things up for Ragone. Catch the ball when it comes your way Mike!

Besides Brian Smith, the Notre Dame linebackers have under-performed so far this season. If the starters aren't going to make any tackles or get to the opposing QB, why not put #5 in there and turn him loose? Let's see what the young phenom can do.

4. How would you grade the three new coaches on this year’s staff based on the first three games?

Offensive Line coach Frank Verducci gets an "A-". Jimmy has stayed upright and very productive. The running game is more consistently productive than any other time in Weis' tenure. The "minus" is for too many stupid penalties.

New Running Backs coach Tony Alford gets a "B+". The Irish running backs seem to be running with an entirely new level of confidence and decisiveness this season. Armando Allen is no longer falling over on first contact, and Jonas Gray doesn't even look like the same guy.

Defensive Line coach Randy Hart gets a "C-". His guys have been largely invisible so far this season. It has been so bad that when Ian Williams actually made a tackle last week I was genuinely surprised to hear his name called.

5. Your thoughts on Golden Tate’s stage dive into the Michigan State band? Was he trying to avoid running into the band? Was the whole thing intentional? Little of column A, little of column B?

It was totally hilarious. When I saw it, all I could think was "Lambeau Leap." Love the exuberance. Glad nobody got hurt. I always worry about guys getting a sheet music stand in the eye when they go into the band.

6. How has your opinion of the Notre Dame schedule changed from how you felt about it in the pre-season?

It doesn't look such a cakewalk now, does it?

• Michigan is MUCH better than expected.
• Washington BEAT the Trojans.
• Navy almost beat Ohio State.
• U-Conn, Stanford, Pitt all look to be legit.

The only team that looks less formidable than expected is USC who, despite losing to UW, has gone into the horseshoe and beaten Ohio State.

7. Should Jimmy Clausen be getting more hype for the Heisman?

Not yet. Jimmy has played well so far. But, seriously, throwing the ball up in the air knowing that Floyd and Tate are going to come down with it for a touchdown looks too easy. This week can be the start of Clausen's Heisman campaign if, without Michael Floyd to lean on, he can carve up Purdue for 300+ yards and three or four TDs. If Jimmy can make Robby Parris and Duval Kamara look like All-Americans, then any Heisman talk will be deserved.

Go Irish! Beat the Boilermakers!

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