Photo by Bob DeChiara-USA TODAY Sports
Notre Dame Football
Instant Reaction: Notre Dame 49 - Boston College 20
September 16, 2017
7,558
If I had told you before the game that Notre Dame would beat Boston College by 29 points, I’m sure you’d gladly take it.
If I told you they would have over 400 yards rushing, you’d take that too.
I know you’d take 49 points against just about anybody.
49-20 looks great on paper and ultimately it feels pretty good for the Irish. But it also felt really ugly for a long stretch of the game and it was a roller coaster on both sides of the ball for probably too long.
Through it all Notre Dame pulled away in impressive fashion to end the football game while simultaneously revealing major concerns about their passing game and their ability to shut down an average offense.
Might as well start with the most important position on the field.
- I knew Brandon Wimbush was a talented runner, but I didn’t know he had that in him. That was straight up ridiculous.
Brian Griese compared him to being a notch under Lamar Jackson and it was legitimately a fair comparison. He was that dynamic today. The numbers (207 and 4 touchdowns) were gaudy, but it was the improvised run on what was supposed to be a shovel pass that was one of the best runs I’ve seen from a quarterback.
He got the edge on BC All-American defensive end Harold Landry and then ran away from him. Then he cut back across the grain and took it the house for 65 yards. That was crazy and he had a few runs that were almost as good as that one.
The running was simply masking how bad he was throwing the ball today, though. Early in the game receivers weren’t getting open. That wasn’t the case all game. He had plenty of wide open targets he missed on play-action shots down the field. His interception on a throw to Equanimeous St. Brown was extra frustrating at the end of the first half.
He was way off and it was amazing that EQ could even get a hand on it. EQ finished with one catch on the day and it was all because Wimbush couldn’t deliver the football to him.
Outside of the pocket he really struggled. His mechanics were bad. He rarely had his feet set. At times it looked like he was regressing throughout the game. His day running the ball was phenomenal, but there should be legitimate concerns about him as a passer unless he starts to show some improvement as early as next week.
- It’s impossible to evaluate the receivers today based on how Wimbush threw the ball. That’s my opinion on it directly after the game. Maybe that changes after watching it again, but they weren’t given enough chances to make plays by Wimbush.
As of right now, the jury is still out on the wide receiver play.
- Josh Adams absolutely deserves to be the number one back.
I don’t want to hear any talk about that not being the case after this performance. He is showing really great feet and running stronger than he ever has before. If the play-calling was different, he could have had an ever bigger day. I think that Chip Long went away from him at times when they needed to keep feeding him.
In general, the play-calling early in the game was a bit head scratching. I think we know what Notre Dame does really well now and what they don’t do well. I know they need to get better at what they don’t do well, but that kind of thinking can get you in trouble if you stick with things too long.
That was part of the reason the game was tight into the 3rd quarter when the Irish could have distanced themselves earlier in the game.
- The offensive line deserves a ton of credit for a bounce back performance. Not only the job they did run blocking, which was exceptional, but the job they did protecting Wimbush.
He had plenty of time to make throws and Landry was not a large factor in the game. They got the heat last week. They earned it. This week they deserve the credit for doing a heck of a job.
Boston College had not given up over 600 yards of total offense at any time in the last three seasons. They did today and the offensive line is a massive reason why.
- Although the defense had plenty of frustrating moments, it’s tough to argue that they responded in a terrific way in the 3rd quarter. BC could have taken over the game, but Mike Elko’s group wouldn’t let them.
Aside from the one touchdown drive in 4th quarter by BC, the defense held them to 91 yards on 8 drives. They also forced four turnovers if you count the turnover on downs they had by stopping BC on 4th and short.
That was a massive play by Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa who bailed out his teammates who were not prepared at the snap. He blew up his man into the backfield and Te’Von Coney came up with the stuff.
- Speaking of Coney, he missed a tackle early that wasn’t his best play. He rebounded nicely and ended up with 13 total tackles. BC challenged Notre Dame physically and the linebackers got better as the game went along.
- It was really nice to see a couple of young guys step up with big plays today.
Shaun Crawford had two interceptions and really flashed in coverage today. It definitely was the most confident he has looked since his injury last season.
Julian Okwara had his best game rushing the passer. That part will get lost in the fact that he made a great play early on a jet sweep for a tackle for loss and that he stripped the football late to put the nail in the coffin (recovered by Crawford).
Notre Dame needs some guys to emerge and it looks like these two are in the process of doing it.
- The Irish got killed on play-action today. They were undisciplined too often against boot and there were guys running open quite a bit. I’ll go back and watch before I say more, but look for Michigan State to run a ton of it with the way the Irish struggled with it.
- BC got lucky by recovering two forced fumbles early in the game. One on defense and another on a punt with Dexter Williams stripping the ball. Those end up in the hands of Notre Dame and it’s probably a blow out at halftime.
In the end, putting up just under 50 against a BC defense that has been really good the last couple of years and pretty good in the earlier two games is nothing to sneeze at. Those points count even if everything wasn’t ideal for the Irish offense.
I feel like this Irish team has shown enough positives that people should feel good about this squad, but they need to grow in many areas to be anywhere close to elite.
I predicted it would be tight early and then they would pull away late. It happened that way. It just took a couple of different directions than I expected it would to get that result.
If I told you they would have over 400 yards rushing, you’d take that too.
I know you’d take 49 points against just about anybody.
49-20 looks great on paper and ultimately it feels pretty good for the Irish. But it also felt really ugly for a long stretch of the game and it was a roller coaster on both sides of the ball for probably too long.
Through it all Notre Dame pulled away in impressive fashion to end the football game while simultaneously revealing major concerns about their passing game and their ability to shut down an average offense.
Might as well start with the most important position on the field.
- I knew Brandon Wimbush was a talented runner, but I didn’t know he had that in him. That was straight up ridiculous.
Brian Griese compared him to being a notch under Lamar Jackson and it was legitimately a fair comparison. He was that dynamic today. The numbers (207 and 4 touchdowns) were gaudy, but it was the improvised run on what was supposed to be a shovel pass that was one of the best runs I’ve seen from a quarterback.
He got the edge on BC All-American defensive end Harold Landry and then ran away from him. Then he cut back across the grain and took it the house for 65 yards. That was crazy and he had a few runs that were almost as good as that one.
The running was simply masking how bad he was throwing the ball today, though. Early in the game receivers weren’t getting open. That wasn’t the case all game. He had plenty of wide open targets he missed on play-action shots down the field. His interception on a throw to Equanimeous St. Brown was extra frustrating at the end of the first half.
He was way off and it was amazing that EQ could even get a hand on it. EQ finished with one catch on the day and it was all because Wimbush couldn’t deliver the football to him.
Outside of the pocket he really struggled. His mechanics were bad. He rarely had his feet set. At times it looked like he was regressing throughout the game. His day running the ball was phenomenal, but there should be legitimate concerns about him as a passer unless he starts to show some improvement as early as next week.
- It’s impossible to evaluate the receivers today based on how Wimbush threw the ball. That’s my opinion on it directly after the game. Maybe that changes after watching it again, but they weren’t given enough chances to make plays by Wimbush.
As of right now, the jury is still out on the wide receiver play.
- Josh Adams absolutely deserves to be the number one back.
I don’t want to hear any talk about that not being the case after this performance. He is showing really great feet and running stronger than he ever has before. If the play-calling was different, he could have had an ever bigger day. I think that Chip Long went away from him at times when they needed to keep feeding him.
In general, the play-calling early in the game was a bit head scratching. I think we know what Notre Dame does really well now and what they don’t do well. I know they need to get better at what they don’t do well, but that kind of thinking can get you in trouble if you stick with things too long.
That was part of the reason the game was tight into the 3rd quarter when the Irish could have distanced themselves earlier in the game.
- The offensive line deserves a ton of credit for a bounce back performance. Not only the job they did run blocking, which was exceptional, but the job they did protecting Wimbush.
He had plenty of time to make throws and Landry was not a large factor in the game. They got the heat last week. They earned it. This week they deserve the credit for doing a heck of a job.
Boston College had not given up over 600 yards of total offense at any time in the last three seasons. They did today and the offensive line is a massive reason why.
- Although the defense had plenty of frustrating moments, it’s tough to argue that they responded in a terrific way in the 3rd quarter. BC could have taken over the game, but Mike Elko’s group wouldn’t let them.
Aside from the one touchdown drive in 4th quarter by BC, the defense held them to 91 yards on 8 drives. They also forced four turnovers if you count the turnover on downs they had by stopping BC on 4th and short.
That was a massive play by Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa who bailed out his teammates who were not prepared at the snap. He blew up his man into the backfield and Te’Von Coney came up with the stuff.
- Speaking of Coney, he missed a tackle early that wasn’t his best play. He rebounded nicely and ended up with 13 total tackles. BC challenged Notre Dame physically and the linebackers got better as the game went along.
- It was really nice to see a couple of young guys step up with big plays today.
Shaun Crawford had two interceptions and really flashed in coverage today. It definitely was the most confident he has looked since his injury last season.
Julian Okwara had his best game rushing the passer. That part will get lost in the fact that he made a great play early on a jet sweep for a tackle for loss and that he stripped the football late to put the nail in the coffin (recovered by Crawford).
Notre Dame needs some guys to emerge and it looks like these two are in the process of doing it.
- The Irish got killed on play-action today. They were undisciplined too often against boot and there were guys running open quite a bit. I’ll go back and watch before I say more, but look for Michigan State to run a ton of it with the way the Irish struggled with it.
- BC got lucky by recovering two forced fumbles early in the game. One on defense and another on a punt with Dexter Williams stripping the ball. Those end up in the hands of Notre Dame and it’s probably a blow out at halftime.
In the end, putting up just under 50 against a BC defense that has been really good the last couple of years and pretty good in the earlier two games is nothing to sneeze at. Those points count even if everything wasn’t ideal for the Irish offense.
I feel like this Irish team has shown enough positives that people should feel good about this squad, but they need to grow in many areas to be anywhere close to elite.
I predicted it would be tight early and then they would pull away late. It happened that way. It just took a couple of different directions than I expected it would to get that result.
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