Instant Reaction | Notre Dame 38 Duke 7

I guess the Michigan hangover is officially gone. 

Notre Dame could have sleep-walked into a game against a team who has lost three of their last four, but they didn’t. They could have fell back into bad habits when they had some things go against them at the end of the first half, but they didn’t.

They jumped out to a 21-0 lead and would have ended this game by halftime if not for a holding call bringing back a 78-yard gain to Chris Finke. A poor punt by Jay Bramblett after that gave Duke a short field. They took advantage with a deep ball for a score when Donte Vaughn stumbled in coverage.

But anyone who thought Duke had a chance to win the game wasn’t paying attention to the Irish defense.

The Blue Devils had nothing going against the Irish running or throwing aside from that one play. Quarterback Quentin Harris averaged 3.6 yards per attempt. A dangerous dual-threat option, he ran for 10 yards on seven carries.

Running back Deon Jackson had one run that went for 19 yards. His 13 other carries went for 33.

Duke was 3 of 16 on 3rd down. Eight of their drives went for three plays or less. They came in as one of the coldest offenses in the country and Notre Dame kept them freezing aside from one play.

The game finished 38-7 and it wasn’t even as close as that would indicate. It’s nice for a team to play 60 minutes and not have to worry more than a few of them and that’s what happened tonight. A comfortable win was what Notre Dame needed and they got it.

- Notre Dame had over 3.11 yards per play more than Duke in this game. That’s domination.

I wasn’t shocked at the way the Irish defense performed against a struggling offense. I was definitely surprised with the way Notre Dame’s offense controlled this game. Duke’s defense was really good and I was impressed with their personnel before this game. The Irish made them look below average in this game, even with the two turnovers.

The only team that averaged more YPP against Duke this season was Alabama (6.56 to Notre Dame’s 6.34). No team has rushed better against Duke than Notre Dame. 288 yards and 6.9 per carry is not too shabby. The next highest YPC against Duke was 4.76.

They did it by executing better than they had, but the big difference was utilizing Ian Book as a runner. They finally used designed runs and the read to counter Duke keying on the back heavily.

It worked wonderfully.

I didn’t even think the backs read their blocks all that well in this game and Notre Dame still almost put up 300 on the ground.

- Even outside of his running, I thought Book looked closer to the 2018 version of Book again this week. That has to be a good sign that he’s put together back to back encouraging performances (speaking specifically of the final drive against Virginia Tech).

The ball placement was off on that first 3rd down of the game to Chris Finke, but after that he was stepping into throws when he had to fit it through tight windows. And the route combinations, were much better in this game than I’ve seen from Notre Dame this season.

That first Finke touchdown was beautifully set up.

- The line played well tonight, especially in protection considering what Duke’s pass rush had done in previous games. I thought Trevor Ruhland struggled to anchor at times and I worry about that going forward, but overall the line had their best performance in weeks.

- It looked like Notre Dame might be in for a long night when they missed a couple of tackles on the perimeter to start the game. I knew Duke wasn’t going to push the ball down the field much and if the Irish didn’t tackle well in space, they were going to give up some yards.

My worries didn’t last very long and pretty much ended when Jeremiah Owusu-Koromoah came off a block to blow up a bubble screen for a tackle for loss.

The whole defense played pretty well, but the linebackers in particular stood out.

Drew White had that big stick in the hole to stuff Duke on 3rd and short, Asmar Bilal ran step for step with a back down the sideline, and JOK was back to making splash plays.

- Guys, I think the ACC refs might be really bad. Don’t know if you noticed, but they blew more than a few calls again tonight.

- This team looked more like the one we saw at times earlier this season. It would be great if they sustain it because they become a much more fun team to watch when they are playing like they did tonight.

They came into this game favored by a touchdown. They won by 31.

If that doesn’t help them build up some confidence, then I don’t know what will.