It's rare that you dominate both sides of the ball up front and lose but we accomplished it. Moved the ball at will throughout and held McCaffrey in check all night. Doc's brief assessment above was the story. This team has shown an inability to finish off drives all year and we lost two games by a total of four points and red zone ineffectiveness was the direct cause of both losses. It makes you wonder why we do not have a fullback or H Back package in the red zone. Uncle Rico's defense was as as strong as they had been all year against the run and we got good pressure on Hogan most of the game. So what went wrong? As usual , pass coverage. And when Stanford really needed it, they went to the "promised land" in the Irish defense.... the middle of the zone from 10 yards and out. It's where dreams come true. I thought the team played as good as possible under the circumstances and with all the injuries.
Blame this loss on AJ, he called me after Kizer scored to congratulate me on the win.. Said you just have to hold on for 30 seconds. Jinxed us with the Neb late game loss curse. :roll:
ND <t>Heart breaker for sure. Big plays killed us again. Should have had this one. We are the better team I know. <br/> <br/> Doubtful if a win would have done us any good as far as the playoff is concerned as Oklahoma kicked the crap out of Okie St. and I think we needed them to lose. Probably down to the winner of MSU and Iowa for the #4 spot and I'm pretty sure MSU can beat Iowa. <br/> <br/> <br/> crazy season for sure. Two losses by a total of 4pts. <br/> <br/> <br/> Maybe Fiesta Bowl?</t>
And I thought 30 secs was only too long for us...look at the bright spot, at least it didnt happen at home like it did for us.....ok....that probably didnt help.
Something that stood out to me as the season wore on are two key elements which were missing last year: the marked improvement in our depth and strong leadership. I don't know if we had more, less, or the same amount of injuries compared to last year, but we saw in 2014 how the loss of key players and the absence of effective leadership combined to devastate our season. That didn't happen this year. We were in the hunt up until the last two games, when we almost went 2-0. Last night's game is where our depth and leadership almost enabled us to pull out the win despite all the problems in the red zone and despite a horrendous pass defense. Unfortunately, the clock ran out on our refuse-to-lose mentality with 30 seconds left in the regular season.
This season exceeded my expectations. But it sure was a hard way to end it. Maybe next year will have a happier ending. GO IRISH PJ in Jersey
Well 10-2 isn't an awful season, it is one that could have been even better but it wasn't. I think we had good leadership on this team, I can't point to a particular guy, the tendency is to say Joe Schmidt and maybe he's one of them but there were others and maybe one of them was Farley. Neither are great players but were passionate about the team. The best player was Jaylon but he didn't seem to want to be a leader vocally, let his playing do the talking. I think before the season I was thinking 10-2, I never think undefeated as that usually requires a bit of luck, but I saw Clemson, Ga.Tech, USC and Stanford all as tough games we'd have to play well to win and I expected to split those 4 games, and hoped we wouldn't lose to somebody we shouldn't like Pitt or BC both of which always play us tough. Kelly said we were 2 plays away from being undefeated, not sure exactly which 2 plays he was talking about, obviously 1 from Clemson and 1 from Stanford. But which one. He didn't however mention that we were an incredible end of game TD pass from Kizer at UVA from losing there, and also a Kizer to Will Fuller TD pass from losing to Temple. So we were 2 plays from being 8-4 as well. But that's college football. Not a lot of teams go through the season hammering each and every one of their opponents. The reason I didn't see us as being undefeated was our defense, we were so terrible late last year, sure we had a lot of injuries but still just awful. So I couldn't point to anything that I could say we've got a ton of talent coming back and should be great. At the end of last year we still though Joe Schmidt was good LB, but he was coming off a bad injury. We had Sheldon and Jaylon but other than that it was all a lot of guys who had to prove themselves. So defense was a huge question mark, now we played great vs a bad Texas team, but then against UVA started the habit of letting teams make big plays for us, trick us with regularity. So my fears for the defense were well founded. We had our moments, but the defense didn't get better as the year went on. Now I think most of us wonder if BVG's defense is too complicated for college football. But that's why I didn't see us as undefeated. I thought we'd be better on offense without Golson, we had our best OL and Folston was primed for a breakout year, with Prosise on the rise behind him. We had awesome returning talent at WR. I thought Zaire, esp after the Texas game was going to have a great year, that he truly was a leader and a passionate type that would force his will to win on the team. Combinatin of him and Folston and an excellent OL would lead to a solid and maybe dominant offense that wore teams down with a running attack and big plays from the WR. So 10-2 is about where I saw us, I thought if we got to 11-1 that would be awesome and 12-0 would be unexpected like it was in 2012 and the result of some close maybe even lucky wins. Now on to the Bowl game, I think this team will do well in the bowl game. The OL will be healthier than the have been in awhile with ankles being much better, CJ will be back and teaming with Josh Adams we should be potent on offense both running and throwing the ball. I don't know if we'll be better on defense, supposedly Jarron Jones will be back for the bowl game but it will be his first game since 2014. We'll still be weak at safety and our corners will still have to cover longer because we can't get much of a consistent pass rush without BVG's wild blitzing scheme..which seems to get there infrequently. Some are saying the Fiesta Bowl, maybe Iowa or Mich State or maybe the Group of 5 team. Houston probably. Anyway we should be a very good team next year on offense, Kizer will only be better, Wimbush and Zaire will be good/great backups. Folston and Adams and maybe Prosise will be a great group of RB's, Dexter Williams might get in there as well. OL even losing Martin and Stanley wiill still be very good, with the backups stepping right in for those guys. Maybe we'll rediscover the TE with Alize Jones being a soph and getting Smythe back plus more development from Lautua. It's the defense that will again be the problem. I can't see it being better next year.
P.S. to my post above: I am impreseed by the significant contributions of freshmen on both sides of the ball.
:idea: :!: Why did Kelly leave Stanford with 30 seconds on the clock? With one minute left the Irish were knocking on the door. I relaxed as I thought, "Now force Stanford to use their time-outs!" Kelly had them in a position where they had to use their time-outs or bet the farm on a goal-line stand. I screamed "NO!" when Kelly called the first time out. I couldn't believe it. I still can't. He could have waited until 30 seconds were left, then he would have still had two timeouts left to run two plays at the goal-line... He really does need to learn time management. He's simply not good at it.
Agreed all the way around here. It sucks, but look at it this way: 1. Take any team in the top 10 and take away their starting QB for the rest of the year in game 2, now replace him with the 3rd string guy who received almost no work in Spring because Golson is a bitch and make that 3rd string guy your starter for the rest of the year..... what are the odds they even finish in the top 25? 2. Now, same drill, same team, but take away their top RB... and then their next best RB about 6 weeks later.... is that team even above 500? 3. Now mix in the myriad of season ending injuries to key defensive players to that team... are they still in the running, or are they that team referred to on ESPN as 'those poor guys who had their season ruined?' 4. We suffered all that to go along with what some call the most injury plagued season in the history of the program (I haven't fact checked that), and we were still playing for the big dance until a last second FG by a team filled with 5th year seniors sailed through the uprights. It stings now, but in the big picture, this has been a great season. I really hope some of those younger kids were paying attention to the leadership Sid talked about. It's what drove and saved this team. Players like Sheldon Day taking Jerry Tillery under his wing (I had never seen 300lbs shot out of a cannon until Sat night btw. I bet McAfree hopes to never see it again). Nick Martin along the OL. I thought it a brilliant move to have a role player captain in Farley. Regardless of who stays or goes to the NFL, we're gonna be pretty good next year. I am all in on Kelly's 'recruiting guys that fit, instead of recruiting stars' certainly can't be anything but applauded. You figure we lose our LT and C, that sucks. At the same time, we've done a good job with young talent stepping into tough roles. We know we have 2 of the best QBs for our system in the nation. Strike that, we have 3 of the best QBs. We have a stable of RBs that are explosive and tough. Defense is going to have some holes to fill, but there's talent. Morgan once again showed his bonehead decision making, but he's got a ton of talent. If Smith came back next year, I would be very confident about our chances. It wasn't the ride we started off wanting, but it was one hell of a fun ride. To the bowls! Where do we invade this holiday season?
http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2015/11/notre-dame-stanford-ratings-fox-highest-overnight-beats-abc-college-football/ While it's always nice to be reminded that ND sells well on networks, I'd have rather had lower ratings and the win!!
ND <r>Love us or hate us, ND puts butts in the seats and eyes on the TV. <B><s></s>It's what we do!<e></e></B><I><s></s><e></e></I></r>
All the talk is that it's either the Peach or the Fiesta Bowl for the Irish. The opponent if it's the Peach seems to be FSU. The Fiesta Bowl has a few more twists. The Rose Bowl gets the first pick of B1G teams and could choose either the loser of the Championship game or Ohio State. Ohio State is very likely to be much higher ranked than the loser of the Championship game so they seem like the logical choice, sending either Iowa or MSU possibly to the Fiesta bowl. I have also seen Houston as a option and maybe even Baylor. Somebody said that the Rose Bowl likes to invite B1G teams that haven't been in awhile, so that would seem to favor Iowa if they lose to MSU. So do they go with the highest ranked team or the team that has had the longest hiatus from the Rose Bowl. Both Iowa and Ohio State are likely to travel very well to Pasadena so the Chamber of Commerce doesn't have to worry about poor fan support from either of those teams.
ND <t>I'm betting that if MSU beats Iowa the Rose takes OSU. Personally, I'd like to play Iowa in the Fiesta but that's just because it's within driving distance for me😃</t>