Davie won 10 straight? I didn't know that. Well since I'm going to be there, I hope I'm part of the streak!! BTW I see that rain is starting to creep into the forecast, Friday is scattered thunderstorms and Sat is cloudy with high of 67 and 10% chance of rain.
I just looked at the Sagarin ratings. It says that Alabama has the #1 most difficult schedule up to this point. Hunh?
Well so far you guys have only played Va.Tech and A&M both legit programs and have Colorado State a Mountain West team coming this weekend. Most everybody else has played at least 1 team that is considered an annual patsy.
Sounds like Sheldon Day may not play or if he does he will be limited by his ankle sprain. Kelly said they had him in a boot. Loss of Springman really hurts even more with Day hobbled.
ND <t>Well hopefully ND will get their act together on both sides of the ball and start playing up to their potential. We definitely haven't seen it thus far.</t>
:roll: 1. Another crummy win where the team's performance raised more questions than it answered. Both teams were limited on offense by their QBs. 2. The broadcasters were sickening. They were so bad they made me miss Pat Haden... 3. ALL of those pass interference penalties were legit. If anything, there should have been another half-dozen PI penalties called. The Spartan Dbacks had been coached to defend that way and it's NOT legal, which is why the penalties were called. A defender can't hold down the arms of the receiver then turn his head as he pretends to look for the ball. The referees weren't fooled... 4. The right (younger) side of the Irish Oline got taken to school today. Stanley and Elmer looked their age...... 19 and 18. This was definitely a learning experience for both of them... 5. McDaniel is a tough kid. He gets the ball when the going gets tough. 6. Corey Robinson and Will Fuller are emerging as wide-outs. They won't beat out DaVaris or TJ, but they are pushing their way into the WR rotation. 7. Farley looked motivated after a little bench time, but Collinsworth still needs more help back there. 8. This team is winning, but it must perform better against the teams coming up starting right now...
1. Agree 100%. Rees' worst game ever. This is the kind of game you win and can dip in the polls. 2 No comment. Game was so bad I kept flipping to UF/TN which was only slightly better 3 Diasgree. I saw two PI penalties that I thought were bogus including the one in the end zone that led to our winning TD. It got ridiculous at times. I despise the play calling. Empty backfields on 3rd and 1 all day long. No run attempts on 1st and goal from the two. The scheme is one of total improvisation
I am going to take a glass half-full approach, or at least as much of one as I can muster. In the past, when Rees plays terribly, we get smoked. We still found a way to win this game despite the fact that Rees is just awful. I actually agree with both JOCO and George, if that's possible, about the PI. Going back to the mid to late 80s, there have been teams (most notably, Florida State and Miami) who took the defensive rules of the game and just threw them away. They would gamble that the refs would not continue to make those calls, and they were right. That's sort of become the norm in college football over the years since then. Were they penalties? Technically, yes. Are those also the calls that the refs put the whistle away on in time? Technically, yes. The best example of the announcer sucking was when we pulled a FG attempt to the left and the announcer shouted 'INCOMPLETE!' I still like Mayock. He doesn't pick sides. His job is to provide color and player analysis. I think he does a great job with that. For as bad as the announcer was, I'll still take him every day over Hammond. The empty backfield on 3rd and short is precisely what I was bitching about, in re Rees, before the start of the season. We have an offensive design. We have a QB who is NOT a fit for the offense. I know Kelly had mentioned before the year started that he felt Rees would do well this year because he has learned to pull the ball down to take what the defense gives him. I HAVE SEEN ABSOLUTELY ZERO EVIDENCE OF THIS WHATSOEVER!! There are countless times he could tuck and take 3 to 4. He won't. Even worse, as pointed out by Mayock at least once, he is now holding onto the ball longer trying to make the bigger play happen rather than taking the easy check down for the 1st down pass to a WR that is WIDE OPEN. The only thing Mayock said that I disagreed with was, on one play, Jaylon Smith got knocked off the coverage and they completed a pass to his WR. It should be mentioned that this is the only time I can remember it happened this season. That's not bad for a true freshman at all, or even a senior. He's given up one pass to the field side all year. He's shutting it down. What I disagreed with was that Mayock said he got 'caught up in the wash', which means that he got caught up by WRs or inside slants before losing his assignment on the out route. What happened was he had his man covered and Jarret Grace (covering no one) backed into him in drop coverage (why he was in drop, I don't know, his man was headed inside) thus knocking him down. I would like to give Carlo an 'atta boy' for not punching that Michigan State player in the mouth. Carlo yelled so loud I heard it on the TV and he shucked someone fairly violently, but the Michigan State player punched our guy in the face and got away with it. He deserved to be punched, Carlo was right there and did not. We still got penalized (the bench jumped on the field yelling), but I see this as maturation by Carlo who would have murdered him as a younger player. Those officials (ACC I believe) were pretty horse ****. They had long whistles and let piles move on way too long. We gave up a 1st down once on a play Carlo shut down and moved the pile back. Officials who 'let em play' like that get people seriously injured.
we beat those teams last year by keeping THEIR defense on the field. I'm not sure we can do that this year and I know our defense isn't deep enough (due to injuries) to play in a shootout.
Carlo played big yesterday. Eight tackles, two for loss. And he blanketed that TE coming across the back of the end zone from side to side at a key moment late in the game. He looked like the leader of the defense yesterday. My man is hitting someone every single play.
I can't add much to what has been said about the game. Like everybody else I didn't really understand why Kelly threw so many down field passes, esp on 3 and 3 and less. Even with the running game stuffed by MSU surely there were some pass plays open that would get 3 or 4 yards. The OL was giving Tommy pretty good protection all game, I wonder why not a delay to a back out of the backfield over the middle or the same to the TE. I also am befuddled by our constant inability to get to the line and run a play quickly, it's like Kelly can't make up his mind what to do, then Tommy takes for ever to run through his checks and counter checks. I'm pretty frustrated with the offense right now and not really sure where to put the blame. Is it play calling, is it the OL, is it the RB's, is it Tommy, I don't think it's the WR's unless they aren't running good routes they all seem to catch the ball very well. I do think the defense showed improvement, I thought they handled the MSU run game pretty well, MSU seemed to be consistent in getting some yards on first down, but overall they only ran for 119 yds and 3.4 average. Not exactly shutdown run defense but pretty good. It was great to see Tuitt get a sack and in general play better, Kelly said he's finally getting healthy, that is good news. Also I like that we saw less of Carlo and more of Jarrett Grace, I noticed that Grace and Jaylon Smith seemed to be communicating a lot on defense those guys are our core going forward. I think Carlo being relieved of playing on downs where he's a liability is why he had a good game. Our DB's still have a ways to go though. The best part was in the 4th qtr when we were hanging on to our lead and the offense wasn't helping, the defense held Michigan State and forced Dantonio to switch QB's and that's what won the game for us, solid defense when we needed it. As far as the PI"s I don't know what to say, I'm kind of with JO'Co in that the MSU db's seemed to be all over our WR's on every play, very physical with them. So I have no doubt that while maybe every PI that was called was not warranted I think the refs missed a number of other PI calls that were warranted. The weekend in general. It was a great weekend, I think I found a place where the old Prodigy crowd enjoy themselves. Called Franks Place, old bar in the neighborhood that our rental house was located. Pub food was good, beer selection was good, older crowd that seemed to all be regulars and know each other. Our house was a restored old house that is on the historical registry. It's owned by a young couple with 4 kids and a cat. They got 2 grand for the weekend and they are full for the football season. Not bad...12K extra income. It was a very nice older home, the restoration was excellent and I really loved the location just a few miles south of campus (723 Park Ave). The streets in the neighborhood are brick to give you an idea. Clearly it was a neighborhood that was once a professional neighborhood that went down hill, we looked up our house and the guy bought it for 37K and it's now listed on the tax rolls at 150k. Some properties are still in disrepair but clearly it's on the upswing. We had nephew Sean and his fiance with us and they had a great time, Jenny is a real sports fan so she fit right in and held her own at the tailgate and the game. I think for the future we'll be sticking with the home rentals as long as we can get a group large enough to make the split a good deal, the split was 333$ each on the house which is cheaper than 2 nights even in Benton Harbor and you're not faced with that long drive. Weather held for the weekend, we won the game, we had a great tailgate spot and made new friends with our tailgate neighbors. Jenny is Irish Catholic and had never been to Notre Dame, she was impressed! Not with the team, but the experience. Next up OU.