CFB: Notre Dame Fighting Irish Week 15 Review
By Stiofán Mac Fhilib
Notre Dame ended their regular season on a high note, beating long-time rivals USC to secure a spot in the College Football Playoffs. It means we can look forward to more Irish columns from Stiofán Mac Fhilib! Here’s his view on the final game and a look at how the race to the playoffs concluded.
Looking Back at Last Week
On rivalry weekend after Thanksgiving, Notre Dame left the LA Coliseum, after what was effectively their tenth win-or-you’re-out game in a row, with a vital 49-35 victory to formally seal their spot in the inaugural 12-team playoff.
After a long series of lopsided wins and performances, where the defense in particular excelled and recorded some remarkable statistics, this was exactly the kind of game the Irish needed to refocus minds, reset expectations and remind players, staff and fans of the weaknesses as well as the strengths of Marcus Freeman’s team in his third season.
For all his faults as a head coach and program-builder, Lincoln Riley remains one of the sharpest offensive minds in football, and he saved some of his best work this season for their last regular season game. And this was despite losing their star RB, Woody Marks, to injury after just six carries.
Often using a Wake Forest-esque slow mesh for the first time this year, his QB, Jayden Maiava, threw for 360 yards and 3 TDs, and made some remarkable throws that gave the Notre Dame DBs no chance of breaking up. Irish CB, Christian Gray, who had an impressive opening drive, was then picked on constantly. The ND front seven, missing DT, Howard Cross, and LB, Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa, had an unusually ineffective day, and their lack of pressure didn’t help the secondary.
USC were also able to rush for almost 200 yards at 7 yards per carry, which will also give Irish DC, Al Golden, much to ponder as he begins to prepare for the playoffs. Certainly, opponents will likely try to replicate at least some elements of Riley’s gameplan and it will be interesting to see if Golden reverts to more man coverage, after using zone much more often than usual in the Coliseum.
When all was finally said and done, however, it was Freemen’s team who eventually came out on top. Gray redeemed himself with a hugely athletic play to take an interception back 99 yards to make the game 42-28 in the final few minutes, then Xavier Watts went one better on the next SC drive, going over 100 yards for his pick-six.
And for all the debate around just how good the Irish defense is, and the extent to which they may have padded their stats against weaker offenses, the Notre Dame offense continued its journey of improving week by week. The run game was outstanding as the OL had their best day of the season, with 258 yards at 6.8 ypc. And when Jeremiyah Love exited the game with a lower leg injury one yard shy of 100 yards, Jadarian Price took over and finished with 111 yards at 9.3 ypc.
Leonard threw a pair of TD passes to his TEs, and this may be a good indication of the personality of the 2024 Notre Dame offense, in the absence of a true WR1. As the playoffs dawn, it’s no secret where the strength of the Irish offense lies, and teams with better defenses than most of ND’s regular season opponents will surely load the box and try to make Leonard beat them with his arm. His TEs, and his RBs out of the backfield, may be key to that.
Playoff Picture
Well, here we are. After 14 tumultuous weeks, a roller coaster of a journey that took in College Station, TX, New York City and Los Angeles, and an ignominious home defeat to MAC team, Northern Illinois, that no one, especially opposing fans, ever seems to mention anymore…the playoffs are finally upon us and Notre Dame have secured the #7 seed and home game that that brings.
For a while it looked like the Irish would host Alabama, and the thought of a southern team coming to freezing South Bend in mid-December was certainly intriguing. However, a last-second Clemson FG in the ACC title game saw the committee forced to decide between an 11-2 SMU, with just one regular season loss, and a 9-3 Alabama team with three losses in conference play, including two to a pair of 6-6 opponents.
To the surprise of some, and the disappointment of others at ESPN, the playoff selection committee made up for unfairly shafting Florida State and the ACC a year ago in favour of the Crimson Tide, by omitting Kalen DeBoer’s team this time and including the ACC one. Not much consolation for FSU fans, but for once, footballing justice was done.
So, when all the rejigging was complete, the narrow losses for Texas and Penn State ultimately kept them ahead of Notre Dame and sent the Irish to a #7 seed which will give them a home game, but not to opposition who will be unused to the weather conditions. Instead, it will be an in-state battle against the fairytale story of college football in 2024, the 11-1 Indiana Hoosiers.
I’ll save the detailed preview for the days leading up to the game, but it certainly won’t be an easy match up for Marcus Freeman and his team. Curt Cignetti has done an exceptional job in his first season since arriving from James Madison (and bringing quite a few of his players from there with him).
They’re a very well-coached and disciplined team who give up few turnovers and who have beaten most of the teams on a relatively weak P4 schedule comfortably. Their defense is stingy, especially against the run, and their QB, Ohio transfer, Kurtis Rourke, has thrown for over 2,800 yards with a 27-4 TD-INT ratio.
Notre Dame will start as around a TD favourite, but the USC game will likely be a comparable indicator for how the game might go. With just under four minutes remaining in the LA Coliseum, ND was losing 0-2 in turnovers and USC were down 28-35 with the ball just outside the Notre Dame red zone trying to tie the game. A couple of minutes and two pick-sixes later, the turnover margin was 2-2, and the Irish had a three-touchdown lead.
If the Irish can avoid losing the turnover battle and costly penalties in key moments, then they ought to have the talent to prevail over the Hoosiers in a hugely anticipated game that has already sold out.
STIOFÁN MAC FHILIB
COLLEGE FOOTBALL ANALYST
A VERY LONG-DISTANCE SUBWAY ALUMNUS OF NOTRE DAME, COUNTY ANTRIM-BASED STIOFÁN HAS BEEN A FAN OF THE FIGHTING IRISH SINCE 2000. FOLLOW HIM ON TWITTER @SMACFHILIB.