Instant Reaction | Notre Dame 35 Virginia 14
It looked like it was going to be smooth sailing for Notre Dame all day when Chris Tyree muffed the opening kickoff. Five plays later and it was 7-0.
It was a lot more difficult than it needed to be after that on offense. Penalties killed several drives. A 78-yard touchdown to Jayden Harrison was taken off the board on one of them. A brilliant fake punt touchdown by Jordan Faison was taken off the board as well.
Even with some things out of their control, there is no way to excuse having five of the next six drives ending three-and-out for the offense. That’s the kind of thing that should have mattered in this game.
After that initial Tyree fumble, Virginia had a lot of things go their way. None of that mattered because Notre Dame’s defense never allowed it to matter.
They absolutely dominated the first half. They had a havoc rate of 28.9%. They only allowed one two conversions on 3rd/4th down out of 11 attempts.
They only ran plays in Notre Dame territory after returner Max Hurleman muffed a fair catch opportunity and that shouldn’t have even counted because the refs blew that call.
No matter. Rod Heard knocked the ball out and Xavier Watts recovered to ensure that no points would be scored by Virginia.
Al Golden’s defense flipped the game with interceptions on three straight Virginia drives. The Notre Dame offense was able to put up points off those turnovers and do what they do in the red zone.
It was game over from there.
- There’s too many standouts to highlight everyone on defense, but when guys like Xavier Watts (one interception, one pass breakup), Jack Kiser, (one sack, one pass breakup), and Rod Heard (one pass breakup, one forced fumble) make impact plays in what could be their final game in Notre Dame Stadium, they deserve to be mentioned.
Watts won the Bednarik Award as the top defensive player in college football last season and he’s been better than he was in 2023. When the coaches try to convince players to come back for another and how it can help them improve as a player, Watts will be the one they point as the primary example.
- The only non-garbage time touchdown the defense gave up was when the refs blew a call on what should have been a Christian Gray pass breakup. They missed an obvious call (they knew he lost it and called it a fumble) and the replay booth didn’t call in time to review it.
Malachi Fields was handed 38 free yards on what was a great play by Gray and it was completely unsurprising.
The officiating has been bad this season across college football. People make mistakes, but the amount of mistakes that are made from week to week is mind boggling. I think Notre Dame fans think it’s an ACC thing against Notre Dame, but it’s bad in every conference no matter who is playing.
This is a game that generates huge revenue and one play could cost a program significantly. It doesn’t need to be this bad. It shouldn’t be.
- When an offense scores 35 points, averages 6.3 yards per play, and runs for 235 yards, that doesn’t look like a bad day at the office.
It’s a perfect example of why no one should judge a game by the box score, though. Or at the very least, look a little deeper into the box score because finding that Notre Dame was 1 for 12 on 3rd downs explains so much about the type of day it was.
The average distance on 3rd down was 10.5 yards. No one is going to have a good day when that is happening and the seven penalties on offense were the biggest reason for that.
There were a lot more little things that added to it as well. I didn’t think Riley Leonard was good with his decision-making on RPOs. I don’t think Mike Denbrock ever found a rhythm as a play-caller and Notre Dame’s receivers weren’t set up for success. The offensive line had a rough game as well.
- It says a lot about the mentality of this team that they can have things go against them and still find a way to win big.
Notre Dame can have a dominant win that doesn’t look all that pretty. Virginia isn’t a good team, but they are the kind of team who has beaten decent teams who have not had their A game. On this eight game winning streak, we’ve seen enough to know that Notre Dame is far better than that.
Marcus Freeman has them at a much higher level than these above average ACC teams. They’ve proved throughout this season that Northern Illinois was the fluke result and Texas A&M was not.
They are a team who has the depth and talent that is deserving of an opportunity in the College Football Playoff. They have two more tests to pass against Army and USC. All Notre Dame has done is prove that they have a team who is capable of passing those tests.
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