Will "Notre Dame" Be Unranked by Mid-October? "Notre Dame" Football Floundered Against Unranked Opponent for Second Week in a Row Against Toledo; Embarrassment Included Poor Administrative Planning by University and ACC
In the latest installment of "Notre Dame's" seemingingly perpetual Road to Plausibility, overrated "Notre Dame" Football has stumbled into its 2021 rebuilding year with a hyperinflated ranking and back-to-back close games against unranked opponents.
The latest was a 32-29 win over Toledo of the MAC, requiring "Notre Dame" to come from behind twice in the fourth quarter, including after trailing in the final two minutes. Indeed, they trailed for much of the second half.
Prior to that, "Notre Dame" allowed themselves to be taken into overtime by a Florida State team coming off three losing seasons, who then went on to lose to Jacksonville State of Div. I-AA/FBS, who, in turn, had just been blown out by Alabama-Birmingham (UAB). The "Notre Dame"-Florida State contest was misleadingly dramatic, and, at times, the two clubs were in danger of looking like the Laurel and Hardy of college football. For their part, "Notre Dame" allowed themselves to be limited to less than 2 yards per carry. They also were outgained by Florida State overall, helped along by the "Notre Dame" defense giving up multiple long touchdowns, looking at times like a junior high team in an informal scrimmage with their lack of consistent attentiveness or intensity.
Against Toledo, "Notre Dame" had to use a quarterback tandem featuring an 18-year-old freshman along with graduate transfer Jack Coan, who apparently had not been competitive enough to start at Wisconsin, who came to Notre Dame to get more playing time.
Coan did throw for 21 of 33 for 239 yards on the day, with 2 touchdowns and 1 interception, and freshman quarterback Tyler Buchner was 3 of 3 passing for 78 yards and 1 touchdown. However, Coan also throw a "pick-six" interception that was returned for a Toledo touchdown, and he fumbled at mid-field, on one of five sacks, that itself went on to get converted into Toledo points.
In more recent eras, there has been a recurring theme for "Notre Dame" football of having something seem dramatic, that actually was a bit embarrassing, despite some specific individual doing something courageous at a particular moment. For example, "Notre Dame" has had a number of games when they played down to the level of a weaker opponent, then tried to praise themselves for "battling to the end" if they managed to survive it, when it never should never have been that close in the first place.
In this case, in a shocking move, to bring in a close win against an unranked opponent "Notre Dame" apparently had to have a quarterback play hurt.
A newswire later reported that the graduate transfer quarterback dislocated a finger, that a trainer popped the finger back into place, and that the player then went out a played hurt.
So, in other words, "Notre Dame" is so weak in its quarterback depth chart that, just to sneak out with a win, at home, against an unranked opponent from a second-tier conference, "Notre Dame" had to use two quarterbacks, one an 18-year-old, and the other a transfer student who had to play hurt.
While the quarterback playing hurt demonstrated some courage and dedication amidst such foolhardiness, for Notre Dame to resort to such a thing is especially embarrasing, exposing their lack of quality depth, and a certain lack of ethics.
Even though it was a finger injury and not a brain injury, to have any player go out and play hurt seems especially bizarre amidst the current climate surrounding brain injuries and rules changes.
As we "speak," "Notre Dame" is even being sued by a former national championship "Notre Dame" football player accusing them, and the NCAA, of negligent bad practices relating to concussions and brain injuries. Meanwhile, while some commentators or on-air announcers might whine a bit about the application or enforcement of newer rules. Yet, similar to when Teddy Roosevelt talked about banning football over deaths, the question is whether football should exist at all, not quibbling about incremental rules changes, incremental changes that come too little, too little late, for world class football players like Dave Duerson.
As "Notre Dame" also trudges along in football mediocrity, this year's "Notre Dame" squad also is among the worst teams in the country for rushing, pass protection and rushing defense, even after just two games against unranked opponents.
"Notre Dame" is ranked a mediocre 47th out of 130 teams for total offense, heading into the Purdue game. Yet their rushing offense, by itself, is much worse, tied with East Carolina at 110th, four spots behind Rice, averaging 98.5 yards per game, and an anemic 2.66 yards per carry.
Additionally embarrasing, tied in with their apparent failure to rebuild their offensive line, they are tied for 125th in the country, i.e, five spots from the bottom, for sacks given up, averaging 5 sacks surrendered per game, just behind UNLV and East Carolina.
The offensive line has been undergoing a crazy quilt of reshuffling, such as due to losses to the NFL and graduation, transfers out and in, and injuries. With regard to overall, bottom line statistics, it sounds like one of the worst offensive lines in big-time college football, after two games against unranked opponents.
The defense is similarly stunted statistically, especially on the ground.
The "Notre Dame" defense is ranked only 89th in total defense. After two games against unranked opponents, they are 104th in rushing defense, giving up 194 per game, 4.91 yards per carry.
As can be seen, they also are giving up significantly more yards on the ground than the "Notre Dame" offense is gaining on the ground.
Part of the weak result against Toledo might be attibutable to poor administrative planning by "Notre Dame" and the ACC. Both were "boneheaded" enough to schedule "Notre Dame" and Florida State on a Sunday night, all but guaranteed to be made a televised night game, followed just six days later by another Notre Dame game.
"Notre Dame's" usual custom, or rather bad habit, has been to take red-eye flights after night games on the road, with one notable but rare exception coming in another year when they were coming back from San Diego. One gathers that they likely did the same thing this time, leaving Tallahassee after midnight and flying through the wee hours of the morning to arrive back at campus with no hope of a proper night's sleep.
In addition to disregarding the conventional wisdom of mothers, fathers, and sports coaches, that "an hour of sleep before midnight is worth two hours after," there have past studies, including by the military, that found bioindicators of sleep deprivation lingering for days after a subject supposedly "caught up" on their sleep. Back in the Charlie Weis era, there was one season that had been on a strong footing, before going completely downhill after they took a red-eye flight back from a long-distance neutral site game, played at night for the so-called Shamrock Series.
Given that practices usually taper off with intensity across the week, as a team gets closer to game-time, it seems likely that "Notre Dame" did not have one single practice at full intensity, at optimal levels of potential performance, during a short week coming off sleep deprivation during preparations for Toledo.
Will an overrated, rebuilding "Notre Dame" be unranked, or even have a losing record, by mid-October?
Whether Notre Dame is unranked, or even struggling to stay at .500, by mid-October will depend upon several factors. One factor is the extent to which their poor play thus far serves as a barometer of the state of the program during rebuilding, and a hint at worse results to come against stronger opponents. Another factor is the eccentricity of the schedule. Yet the prospects are ominous.
Already they dipped a bit in the rankings after the performance against Toledo, perhaps impacted also by Florida State getting exposed by Jacksonville State.
If "Notre Dame," itself, does pick up losses later, weak performances early on against unranked opponents might continue to have retroactive impact on subjective assessments.
Next up is Purdue, who also represents the worst of all worlds. They are unranked, and coming off of weak seasons like Florida State did, not adding much to "Notre Dame's" portfolio. Yet Purdue still is a solid program from a major conference, that could pose a threat. And, unlike Florida State, Purdue is coming off a good win over Oregon State and a blowout win over Connecticut.
Particularly concerning is that Purdue comes from a conference that tries to emphasize a strong line of scrimmage and solid ground performance, while "Notre Dame" is becoming weak on the ground on offense and a bit of a "sieve" on defense.
Back when Purdue played "Notre Dame" annually, in addition to sometimes beating "Notre Dame," Purdue also sometimes played "Notre Dame" like a rivaly game, perhaps as much or moreso than when they play Indiana. Judging from the games against Florida State and Toledo, "Notre Dame" might have their hands full.
After the triumvirate of unranked opponents, "Notre Dame" then faces a triumvirate of ranked opponents that all are capable of beating "Notre Dame."
They face powerhouse Wisconsin at a neutral site in Chicago (which itself brings to mind another bit of glaring administrative incompetence, the failure to move the game to a site that has not had record, and growing, numbers of freeway shootings across the past two years, including on freeways need to get to the stadium.)
Then "Notre Dame" has top-10 Cincinnati. It is embarrassing enough that Notre Dame Head Coach Brian Kelly's former employer is ranked higher than his current employer. Even worse would be if the Bearcats defeat Kelly in a home game at "Notre Dame." Also concerning is whether he has felt the need to give that game any kind of primacy for those reasons, impacting preparations for Wisconsin.
The fact that the old BIG EAST, now the American, no longer has an automatic major bowl bid, might complicate matters further, in terms of perception, if they are mistaken, beforehand, for an overperforming Conference USA-type team instead a bona fide top-10 powerhouse as good, or better, than powerhouse Wisconsin.
Then comes the ultimate fiasco, a resurgent Virginia Tech that already knocked off a then-top-10, still-ranked, North Carolina team, following up with a few warm-up games and a bye week. The Hokies will have two full weeks to get ready for "Notre Dame" at the dangerous venue in Blacksburg.
Given what has happened thus far, and considering all factors, it would not be unimaginable for "Notre Dame" to get bitten on the neck by Purdue with a loss, even if the game is, once again close against an unranked opponent.
Even if "Notre Dame" plays much better than they have going forward, even a solid "Notre Dame" team could have had trouble with Wisconsin, Cincinnati and, on the road especially, in Blacksburg. In other words, last year's team could have ended up in a battle royale against each of those three teams.
Even if this year's squad improves enough to battle well against the three, three losses seem likely unless there is dramatic improvement and perhaps even a lot of good luck.
If "Notre Dame" gets edged out by Purdue, then has three losses, they will be at 2-4. If they get edged by Purdue, then improve enough to pick up at least one quality win against the tougher trio, they still will be unranked at 3-3. If they survive Purdue, then pick up three losses, they will be unranked, of course. At 4-2, they might hang around with a low ranking, or sneak back in.
However, if, for example, they get edged out by Purdue and get blown out by Wisconsin, they would drop out of the records at 2-2. If then, they have some kind of crazy resurgence, such as with a freshman quarterback with cornerback footspeed compensating for the worst offensive line in big-time football, and the defense remembering that they are football players, and if they edge out Cincinnati and Virginia Tech, perhaps at 4-2 they start knocking at the door of the top-25 again.
The big question is, after a quarter-century of failing to even be competitive in a major bowl game, as time finally caught up with the watered down "Notre Dame" to expose what already has been unfolding, perhaps not unlike the British Empire sputtering at Suez or the Romans having barbarians at the gates.
Key Words: Notre Dame, Notre Dame Football
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