Mitchell Evans Ready To Handle The Playoff Pressure
Thirteen months ago, Mitchell Evans laid on the turf clutching his leg during an October matchup against Pitt — his season ended due to a torn ACL. Now just three days out from Notre Dame returning to the College Football Playoff, Evans feels better, and more confident than ever.
“I feel great,” Evans said. “It’s been a long season obviously coming back from the ACL injury. Playing football at nine and a half months wasn’t easy, especially down at (Texas) A&M. I’ve gotten better each week, and gained more confidence every day.”
The senior tight end has slowly but surely come along as the season progressed, becoming a safety valve for quarterback Riley Leonard. Evans is coming off his best performance of the season, racking in five catches for 59 yards and a touchdown against USC.
Coming off the injury, Evans has been paying extra close attention to his body as the season has progressed.
"Obviously I've had to lock in more in that aspect than I've been,” Evans said. “I feel like I've been taking care of my body, in the weight room and in the training room. But also nutritionally, I've never been more focused on that aspect, being more lean, putting the right things into your body to fuel it right.”
With a new quarterback and with both coming off an injury from the previous year, the Leonard and Evans relationship on the field may have taken longer to develop than normal. But Evans isn’t worried as much about his production as he is about the team winning — a common theme with the Irish.
"If the ball finds me, the ball finds me,” Evans said. “That's kind of how football goes. You can have designed routes for certain people, but you don't know until the ball is snapped how they're going to play it. You can have an idea, but you never truly know. So, we'll see how it goes come game time."
Just as soon as Evans returned in Week 2 — he suited up in Week 1 but didn’t see any action — the Irish’s season appeared to many to be over. Even after the loss, his confidence never wavered. After all, he went through too much to get back on the field just for the season to be over before it started.
"I personally never once doubted that we wouldn't make it this far,” Evans said. “We couldn't lose. That's how we kind of thought about it. We weren't worried about Week 9, 10, 11. We were just worried about the next opponent we were playing. I think in the back of our head, we all kind of knew, we still play our best football today, and the rest will take care of itself."
The rest did take care of itself as Evans and the Irish rattled off 10-straight wins en route to securing the seventh seed in the CFP. With three weeks off in between games, Evans took advantage of some much needed time off.
"An important thing that Coach Freeman tries to push for us when we do get time off, get away, seriously, clear mind,” Evans said. “Don't really think about football. You can watch football on Saturday and stuff. But get your mind away from Notre Dame football for a little bit.”
“I watched championship games a little bit, but nothing crazy. I'm a big video game guy. I love video games, so that's what I like to do.”
Since getting locked back in on Indiana, the Irish aren’t changing up what’s gotten them to this point, but they may be raising the intensity level to match a playoff feel in practice.
“I don’t think we’re changing how we do things around here, we’re sticking with what’s worked,” Evans said. “I guess you could say (offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock) has raised his intensity a little bit, but our routine and how we do things has stayed the same.”
Evans also knows he’ll have his hands full going up against an elite Hoosier defense that ranks second in the country in defense yards allowed, averaging 244.8 per game.
"This week, we're going against a good team, obviously, IU, they bring a lot of different stuff at you,” Evans said. “So I feel like in our prep so far, we've kind of expanded how we're kind of attacking things, doing different, new concepts, new routes, but also just fine-tuning what we do best. Kind of sharpening that tool of how we just run the ball pretty good.”
While there will be a lot of noise surrounding the Irish and their performance Friday, Evans believes they’re ready to handle the pressure in what should be a special environment in South Bend.
"We've had a really good, good week of prep so far,” Evans said. “Big week ahead of us. But yeah, I think we're just ready for the excitement that this game brings, this atmosphere, this whole experience of the playoffs, I think it's not pressure, it's more excitement."