Notre Dame Focused on Avoiding Letdown in Rivalry Game
Notre Dame was dominant on Saturday night as Marcus Freeman’s team took the soul of Clemson and didn’t look back.
It was a win that sent a message across the country, but Notre Dame has to move on as a road trip to Baltimore to face rival Navy is staring them in the face.
Yes, Navy is 3-6, but the Midshipmen boast the nation’s No. 7 rush defense, which is more than enough to capture the attention of the Irish offense.
“Everyone is still flying around,” stated running back Audric Estime. “It feels like we kind of lost. Back to our first loss, that practice was a little different. Everyone was flying around and hungrier.
“Today and on Sunday, I was like, ‘Dang, did we win or lose?’ I couldn’t really tell because people were still playing with an edge. I feel like that’s something we need to keep for the rest of the season.”
The mindset looks good on paper, but Freeman isn’t stopping there as he’s making sure his team knows Clemson is in the past.
“Last week’s over,” safety DJ Brown said. “We have to move on to Navy this week. It’s also cool to enjoy your wins, but Coach Freeman always says you get a 24-hour period to enjoy your wins and then it’s on to the next week. Since Monday we’ve been preparing for Navy. We’re excited. Discipline will be (important) for the defense, assignment-based. It’s going to be a challenge for us.”
Freeman doesn’t lack experience against the triple-option and the first-year head coach likely lost sleep for an entire year at Cincinnati following the 2017 Navy game.
And yes, Freeman knows exactly how many rushing yards Navy tallied that day.
"To be exact, we gave up 569 yards rushing vs. Navy in 2017 when I was at Cincinnati,” stated Freeman. “That will be a number I'll never forget. It was a long day. What I didn't have that day was answers. That's a helpless feeling. It's something that personally I wanted to make sure I continued to find different answers to really try to figure out how they think offensively - not just how they think, but how the triple-option really works and the different things they're looking for.”
Freeman found those answers as the Bearcats shut Navy out the next year and he led a dominant effort against the Midshipmen at Notre Dame. Navy ran for just 166 yards (3.0 ypc) in the 34-6 loss, but Freeman isn’t relying on the past to stop the triple-option this week.
“That's how I've grown from 2017 to now,” Freeman explained. “The great thing for me was last year being able to come here and really collaborate with a group of guys with Mike Elston and those guys that were here that have played Navy for many years, so we enhanced our package last year. This year to add Al Golden's expertise in what he did at Temple and Miami (Fla.) - to add that to what we did last year, hopefully, it will enhance our package and, in turn, help us with our execution on Saturdaying.
"Continuing to grow. That's something you hear me say often. It's growth and it's enhancement. If we do the same thing we did last year or the same thing I did in 2018 when we played Navy really well, then at some point, they'll pass you by because these coaches every year find ways to enhance their offensive scheme. That's what we have to do defensively."
As Freeman mentioned, defensive coordinator Al Golden is no stranger to the triple-option, but he at the same time, he hasn’t seen it for eight years. A lot has changed and Golden is grateful to have experienced players on his side of the ball that have previously faced Navy.
“Experience is important here,” Golden said. “Anything, where they have a built-up blueprint of what they need to do versus certain blocks, versus certain schemes, is definitely paramount going against these guys. The biggest thing for our guys is assignment football when you play a team like this, just to be disciplined. The more guys that you can have that have experience and play with poise and can communicate, the better off you'll be.”
Drew Pyne also knows it’s his job as the quarterback to lead his team this week in hopes of avoiding a letdown.
“Conor McGregor says, ‘If you sleep on a win, you wake up with a loss,’” said Pyne. “That’s what our whole entire thing of coming in on Sunday and practicing, flushing the game and learning from it. Something Coach Freeman and Coach Rees have instilled in the whole team is we can’t let winning mask the true outcome of plays of the game. You have to learn and get better no matter what the outcome was of the game.
“We all understand that was a great game, but we have to move on and we’re on to Navy. That’s just what we’ve done every single week of this entire year. We have to keep on getting better.”
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