Instant Reaction | Notre Dame 56 Tennessee State 3
Notre Dame beat an overmatched opponent 56-3. They dominated the game in every aspect like they should have. 8.8 yards per play to 2.7 for Tennessee State sums up the kind of day it was.
It’s not often that this kind of win against an FCS program can make someone think about a great coaching job, but Marcus Freeman was fantastic on game day with a few decisions that showed he knew exactly how to handle this match up.
It could have been easy to be content with a stop on defense before halftime and go into the locker room with a 28-3 lead, but he called two timeouts to stop the clock and give Sam Hartman a chance to get more points before halftime.
TSU missed a field goal. Hartman led an 80-yard scoring drive in only 38 seconds without having to use Notre Dame’s last timeout. Notre Dame was up 35-3 at half.
Freeman then came out with the starting defense for one drive in the third quarter. They got a stop and backup quarterback Steve Angeli came into the game, but he had a chance to work with the first team offense rather than surround him with other second team players. He got more comfortable the longer he was in the game and led Notre Dame to touchdowns on two of his three drives.
Those decisions by Freeman helped make this a comfortable win, even though there were a couple of uncomfortable moments in the first half.
Notre Dame got what they needed out of this game and had one more confidence builder before their first real test next week.
- The first drive for the defense wasn’t ideal. 15 plays and giving up a field goal is not the kind of start anyone would have expected.
The response after the Devyn Ford “fumble” was exactly what was expected after that first drive. They forced a field goal attempt that was blocked by Jason Onye and TSU didn’t have much success at all after that point.
Only one sack doesn’t reflect the pressure they put on, specifically with the blitz, against TSU’s quarterbacks. 3.0 yards per attempt, two interceptions, and 36% completions is a much better reflection of it.
They only gave up one play of 20+ yards, had three red zone trips end up with only three points, and the starting defense had a Havoc rate of 24.3% before the staff went with twos and threes the rest of the way.
That’ll do.
Even throughout the entire game, the Havoc rate was 20.7%.
- Howard Cross was pressuring from the interior and getting penetration into the backfield all game. I know the opponent wasn’t top notch, but six tackles in basically a half of football is impressive.
That one pressure caused the duck from the TSU quarterback that produced the highlight reel worthy diving interception by Ramon Henderson as well.
- Josh Burnham really shows up whenever he is out there. Whether it’s pressure or him chasing down the back for a tackle for loss from the backside, he’s consistently noticeable in a good way.
- It was an up and down game for Jaylen Sneed, but I won’t focus on the downs here. That one pass rush off the edge in the second quarter shows exactly why everyone is so excited about his talent. To call it explosive wouldn’t be doing it justice.
- So, about those two other red zone trips, those clearly would not have happened without two special teams plays and the targeting call and non-call.
I guess I don’t understand what targeting is if a guy gets hit helmet to helmet and gets knocked out, but that doesn’t produce a targeting call. Even though the only reason Ford fumbled was because of that hit, it didn’t get a call.
The long kick return helped TSU on the other drive and then it was aided by the targeting call on Antonio Carter. Even the ref NBC employs to tell everyone about the rules said that it shouldn’t be targeting, but that along with Carter’s helmet hitting the runner’s shoulder pad first didn’t seem to matter either.
I guess someone could argue that those didn’t matter all that much with this game because Notre Dame’s defense got stops on those drives and even if they didn’t, the game would have still been a blowout. That is besides the point.
Ford is now going to be out for who knows how long with a concussion. This is the kind of game where he would have had more opportunities to prove himself and he never got that chance. Now he’s going to miss time in his final college season.
Carter is trying to earn his way into more playing time. He would have had a lot more in this game and that forced fumble might have earned him even more after that, but he gets kicked out for a hit that shouldn’t have been called.
It’s all just mind-boggling and incredibly dumb.
- Six explosive plays for the offense in the first half is great, but spreading the ball around as much as they did is even better. Just about everyone got a chance to eat. All four running backs had an explosive play as a runner (Audric Estime, Jeremiyah Love) or receiver (JD Price, Gi’Bran Payne). 13 different players had at least one catch.
Jayden Thomas made a couple of big plays after the catch, Chris Tyree scored a touchdown, and the tight ends were critical in the two minute drill to end the half. It turns out Hartman does not hate Mitchell Evans and Holden Staes so that random message board query can be put to rest.
On 15 drives this season (minus the two drives that finished both games), the offense has scored touchdowns on 12 of them. That’s a pretty good ratio.
- Are there some things that could be nitpicked about this game? There always are, even when Notre Dame wins as convincingly as they did today.
I’ll save that for the rewatch notes.
2-0 and winning by a combined score of 98-6 is exactly how it’s supposed to look when a good team beats opponents who aren’t on the same level as them. All Notre Dame could do was play to the standard they set for themselves. I think they did a pretty darn good job of meeting that standard to start this season.
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