Instant Reaction | Notre Dame 44 UNLV 21
Notre Dame won by 23. There were numerous people who didn’t think the Irish would score 23 points in this game.
With the way the offense played at times, putting up 44 points on the day was a surprising number to end up with. The continued frustration with offense will linger over the win, but nine three-and-outs, two blocked punts, and making UNLV go 0 for 12 on 3rd down played a huge role in Notre Dame dominating the field position battle. So even when the Irish didn’t come through with touchdowns, they managed to be in control for pretty much the entire game.
There is no doubt that they benefited from UNLV missing their starting quarterback, starting running back, and best defensive lineman. Not having those three should have made this a game where the Irish won by over 40.
They aren’t a good team. They do some good things, though, and they did enough of those to win comfortably today.
- It’s incredible the impact Brian Mason has had on the special teams. That’s four blocked punts in seven games. That tied with the number the program had in the last five seasons.
Of course the blocks were great individual plays from Isaiah Foskey, but those plays can happen because of Mason’s approach.
- UNLV knew Notre Dame wanted to run the ball a lot, especially late in the game. It was again an encouraging thing to see Notre Dame close out a game running the football with Logan Diggs leading the way.
It’s hard to argue with the decision to make him the lead back in this game, even if we don’t know if that’s how it’s going to be for the rest of the season. He ran with authority and proved how good he can be an inside runner.
I don’t know if Audric Estime is going to be in the doghouse for awhile, but the fact that he didn’t touch the ball the rest of the game after his fumble and that Diggs showed he can be a closer might mean Estime fits in as the third option in the backfield.
- Marcus Freeman mentioned after the game that UNLV didn’t show the center pulling before on that big run that they hit early, but even with that, DJ Brown has to make a tackle and then it’s a first down rather than an eventual touchdown on that drive. That and some missed sacks in the red zone are why UNLV ended up with 21 points in what was mostly a dominating performance.
A 19.7% Havoc rate was the best Notre Dame has had this season. It was 27.6% in the first half.
The main thing to take away from this game is that several players made plays who desperately needed to make them. JD Bertrand had 1.5 tackles for loss. Marist Liufau had a pair as well. Foskey had three sacks and those two punt blocks.
The defense needed a bit of a confidence boost and hopefully they got enough of it because they will have to play lights out to have a shot at winning the next two weeks.
- ISD’s Greg Flammang had called for it and we finally saw the Irish line up tight end/former high school quarterback Mitchell Evans behind center to take the snap on short yardage plays. It worked really well.
Using Evans on sneaks, the job the backs did, and the performance of the offensive line led to Notre Dame running the ball eight times on 3rd down and they converted on all eight.
- That one catch by Michael Mayer…I’m going to miss those when he’s gone. What a player.
- I guess it’s time to talk about Drew Pyne. It’s difficult to know what to even write at this point.
He’s a trick-or-treat quarterback. For two out of five starts, it was a treat. For the other three, the tricks haven’t worked. out
He finished with a 50% completion percentage, but take out the pop passes and it’s even worse. He did have that one great ball to Lorenzo Styles that was dropped on 3rd down, but the overall numbers don’t lie: he was 2 of 9 on 3rd downs and they only converted once on 3rd down when throwing the football.
It’s the misses that are hard to get over because there were times where receivers were open for big plays and he just missed the throw. And not just miss. He didn’t even give his receivers a chance to make a catch.
He had a clean pocket for most of the day too. It’s not going to get easier against two better defenses like Syracuse and Clemson.
This team wasn’t going to be a playoff team, but the team is good enough to win 10 games if the quarterback play is above average. It wasn’t in this game and wasn’t last week either.
The UNC/BYU version of Pyne has to show up for Syracuse because the defense, special teams, and the running game will have a tough time winning if they have to carry the majority of the weight at the Carrier Dome.
I think if Steve Angeli was a realistic option, we would have seen at least a little bit of him by now. The next two games aren’t spots where anyone would want a freshman quarterback to make their debut either.
It’s going to be on Pyne to better. The plays were there to be made today. He needs to make them or else they might have to block a couple of more punts next week.
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