Boykin will have his degree and with some of the freshmen like Lenzy and Keys who have that speed to stretch a defense that Boykin doesn't have he might have lost playing time to the younger faster WR's. He made some great plays for the Irish this past year and I hope he's able to make an NFL roster.
Irish Womens Basketball are back at #1 and Louisville is #2 setting up our 2nd #1 vs #2 match of the season.
I wish Boykin all the best. That catch he made to win the Citrus Bowl made 3 hrs. of sitting in a misty cold stadium worth it.
A lot of conversation on ND boards about what last nights game meant for the Irish. We were all pretty far down with that 30-3 loss to Clemson, but some are feeling a little better that Clemson scored even more on Alabama than they did on us. I'm not really so sure it means anything though. Comparative scores is a losing game, we were really pretty bad on offense, while Alabama was good but kept shooting themselves in the foot with Tua's picks and with some questionable play calling in those 4th down situations where Clemson stoned them. Our weaknesses were exposed by Clemson, we don't have speed on the outside at WR something Clemson has a ton of and so does Alabama. Our OL is a good OL and played well most of the year but they weren't up to the Clemson DL and likely wouldn't have been up to the Alabama DL either. Ian Book is a good game manager at QB against most teams and a playmaker. Right now he doesn't have a good deep ball arm. Even against Clemson he had a couple of opportunities and didn't even come close. We saw some of that during the season, but most teams we beat couldn't make us pay so it was not apparent I do think we had a very good defense though, but like all good defenses you do need some help from the offense, against Clemson they got none. I think we'll be a good team again next year. Against this schedule...there should be about 7 automatic wins, Louisville, New Mexico, Virginia, Bowling Green, Duke, Navy, Boston College.. Va Tech is a probable that's 8, and USC a maybe since it's in South Bend so Maybe 9 wins. Georgia, Michigan and Stanford all on the road. Wining 2 out of 3 would be fantastic that'd get us to 11-1 and on the edge of the playoffs. If our only loss is to Georgia and we don't get blown out then we have a good chance at 11-1, lose 2 out of 3 or all 3 and well it's a nice season but not a great season. OL should be improved or Quinn should be finding a new job. We'll have 4 of 5 starters back and they were all highly rated coming out of HS. Book could be improved, but it's not a guarantee. Our RB's will be a question mark till they play the games. Our WR's should be good, and if Michael Young, Kevin Austin and Braden Lenzy all can develop, they all have speed. Claypool will be a great possession WR. and our TE's should be good. I'll be interested to watch how Phil Jurkovec performs in the Spring and Fall, while he wasn't rated as highly as Trevor Lawrence he was and outstanding HS QB and has the size and arm strength that Book does not have. Defense should be solid, need some guys who were backups to step up but there is talent to have another good defense. 09/02 TBA Louisville Louisville, KY — 09/14 TBA New Mexico Notre Dame, IN — 09/21 TBA Georgia Athens, GA — 09/28 TBA Virginia Notre Dame, IN — 10/05 TBA Bowling Green Notre Dame, IN — 10/12 TBA Southern California Notre Dame, IN — 10/26 TBA Michigan Ann Arbor, MI — 11/02 TBA Virginia Tech Notre Dame, IN — 11/09 TBA Duke Durham, NC — 11/16 TBA Navy Notre Dame, IN — 11/23 TBA Boston College Notre Dame, IN — 11/30 TBA Stanford Stanford, CA — Key: – Night Game
I see that ESPN Way too early Top 25 has ND at #5. I'd say that is too high considering the question marks that we have. I'm thinking somewhere in the top 15 for sure, #10 at best.
The last Ga-ND game was played the night before that bitch Irma blew through the state of Florida. We were under mandatory evac where I live so we were sequestered at my son's second floor apartment in a concrete building away from trees.... and watching football in between weather reports was not so relaxing.
hopefully you'll be able to enjoy a Notre Dame win on the road in more relaxing surroundings come Sept, Dave.
Apparently Donte Vaughn has been playing with a bum shoulder all year and will have shoulder surgery this offseason will not be full go for Spring but will for Summer/August.
Was not able to watch last night's 1 vs 2 game. Louisville and Notre Dame. I'm sure Sid watched it. I did see highlights and it was a good win for the Irish Women's team, solidified their #1 ranking. Plus it sort of avenged their losses to Louisville last year, the Louisville coach Jeff Walz is not very popular amongst ND womens basketball fans to say the least. From what I can tell it was a very good game, closer than the final score indicates. Arike Ogunbowale had another great game, passing and shooting. Irish Men get back into ACC action this Sat vs Boston College. Next up for the Irish Women is Wake Forrest on Sunday. Irish Hockey faces off v Minnesota at Compton Family Ice Center tonight and Sat.
Hockey lost to Minn last night, and we're down 2 high minutes players (Durham and Gibbs) for BC which is not a good thing. Word now is that Wimbush is visiting UCF this weekend and they are potential place for him. It has been posted that he was likely to go to PSU, but that seems to be up in the air right now.
Irish get bailed out by the refs and escape with the win over BC . Truth is that neither of those teams are very good. Irish Hockey loses again to Minnesota. Things are going south right now for the Hockey team.
Irish women's basketball had an excellent win vs Wake Forrest on Sunday. It was odd to look at the Box Score and see Arike with only 4 points and a 1-11 shooting line. Next up is a trip to Blacksburg to face Va.Tech a squad that was 13-0 in non-conference but is now 0-3 in ACC play. Men's basketball starts a brutal Jan schedule with a road trip to Chapel Hill to face a talented UNC team that just got their heads handed to them by Louisville, so I imagine Roy Williams will have their full attention in practice this week and they will be looking to take it out on the outmanned Irish. We should have T.J. Gibbs back I don't know about Durham.
Well Brandon Wimbush will be playing for UCF next year, McKenzie Milton will not be back and his competition will be the kid who started the Fiesta Bowl. Good luck to him, he's shown a lot of class in how he's handled things since being demoted.