ND/USC Aftermath: Vengeance Falls Short

Make that eight straight rubies that have been adorned on the Jeweled Shillelagh.

The seven year famine of ND victories continued this past Saturday in South Bend.  The game was much like many of the games we’ve seen all season from the Fighting Irish: fall behind, have a comeback, and have the game decided on the last play.  This time however, Clausen and company fell just short of upsetting USC — literally.  Kamara slipped on his quick out route and Clausen’s pass was right where it should’ve been; however, Kamara was not and USC stormed the field in victory…for the second time.

And that’s probably the most painful thing about this game.  It had all the makings of perfect and appropriate revenge for the 2005 “Bush Push” game.  USC storms the field in victory, the clock reads 0:00 and the Trojans have the lead, until further review that is.  Carroll stood at midfield (as he pretty much did the entire game…) and stared down the Pac 10 official awaiting the final ruling from the Big East replay officials — the very same officials he requested to not use in 2005.  And the final verdict was announced, answering the crowd’s chant of “one”.

Our greatest wish had seemingly come true. Despite being down by 20 just a quarter prior, we now had a chance to let USC feel our pain from 2005, and watch as they posted pictures of a scoreboard showing them as the victors for years to come.  We could literally take a victory they thought they had.

Weis called the perfect play, Clausen made the perfect pre-snap read, and Kamara made the perfect cut to ensure his defender had no chance to make any play…it was just coming out of that break when issues began.  As Jimmy’s ball fell to the grass that ate up Kamara, USC escaped a possible monumental upset (or if you want to listen to Carroll they “beat ND twice”…like I needed another reason to hate you…), and ND Nation doubled over in agony of yet another gut-punch delivered by our rivals from Southern Cal.

No one wanted to claim a moral victory: not the fans, not the players, and not Weis, who now is 0-5 against the Trojans.  The Irish did indeed avoid yet another embarrassing blowout, an outcome that looked all but certain at the start of the fourth quarter.  They fought valiantly.  Clausen proved that his Heisman hype was indeed legit.  Even the woeful defense stepped up and got a turnover.  However, in the end it was all still the same as the last seven years had been — USC wins, ND loses.

And now, some Irish fans are lighting the torches and grabbing their pitchforks to echo a familiar chorus from last season: “Fire Weis.”

However, much like last season, I highly disagree with that opinion at this point.  Sure, no one is happy with an Irish loss, no matter how close or how respectable the game might have been and I don’t even want to suggest that.  To be back where all of ND Nation wants to see the Irish again, these are the kind of games we have to end up winning.  There is simply no doubt about that.

However, here are the facts: Weis has taken a team, comprised now completely from his recruits, out of the ashes of a horrendous 3-9 season and a mediocre 7-6 season, and is now staring at a very strong possibility of ending this season 10-2 and going to the third BCS bowl of his tenure.  He has shown yet again, that he does know what he is doing with the offense.  What was an utter joke in 2007, and inconsistent in 2008, is now one of the most feared offensive attacks in the whole nation — one that even USC’s top ranked defense could not stop.  And let’s also not forget, Clausen has gone from potential bust to potential Heisman candidate.

This doesn’t happen by accident folks.  Credit has to be given to Weis for this, there is simply no way around it.

Now while that is all in Weis’ defense, here are the facts that still loom over his head, and could potentially spell his doom (yes, even in this season): our defense is ranked in the bottom of the nation and seems to have no direction.  We’ve gone from 4-3 to 3-4 and now to come hybrid of the two from the looks of things this season.  We’ve changed defensive coordinators/philosophies a total of three times in Weis five years.  Minter was fired and Corwin Brown was brought in to implement a 3-4 scheme.  Then later, Tenuta was hired to bring in his blitz happy package and this year was named co-defensive coordinator (however, he does indeed call the plays).  Despite all this change though, the defense is getting worse and what we are doing now clearly is not working.

We can just take a look at the USC game for the most recent examples.  We were unable to rattle the second true freshmen QB we faced, and not only that, we had our blitzes backfire in big ways three times.  Twice we were burned on the same play: a third and one play action pass to a USC TE, and both times those huge gains set up easy USC TDs.  Then we gave up a TD on a corner blitz…which completely backfired as the corner that blitzed was then able to turn around and watch his receiver running all the way to the endzone on a screen play.

Our blitzes seem to surprise no one and the counter-punches are delivered far too easily.  While Weis has kept his focus on the offense, he is still responsible for both sides of the ball.  Continuing to allow such disasters to continue is not acceptable by any means.

Then we have another big issue that Weis has faced the last two seasons: falling flat against teams we should beat continuously at season’s end.  I’m going to be brutally honest here, if we have a repeat of last season’s end in the next few games, Weis should indeed be fired.  From this team, I expect nothing less than a 9-3 season at worst with a very respectable bowl bid.  Falling short of that is absolutely unacceptable with the talent we have on the field and the schedule we have remaining.

Weis has far from failed this season, and winning out, plus winning a bowl game would go a long way in securing his job and such an end to this season would be a great success.

The fact of the mater is that ND’s season is far from over and Weis has not done enough this season to merit losing his job.  Yes, it flat out sucks that we’ve lost to those Southern Cal bastards eight times in a row and Weis is responsible for 5 of them.  I understand the frustration, but frustration doesn’t merit knee-jerk reactions.  Ask Auburn how their coaching change has treated them right now: they have a higher scoring, yet still inconsistent offense and now their defense, their strong backbone for years is now is a shell of its former self.

Weis had two years of awful Willingham recruiting to recover from and he has done that.  He is still managing to bring in said recruits, and hopefully this recruiting class will see the defensive studs that we badly need.  The cupboard is stocked and soon could have a surplus at this rate.  You flat out don’t fire someone that is able to recruit like that and put together what could very well be a 10-2 season on top of that.

Now if we come out completely flat against BC next week, I may be singing a different tune; however, we don’t need to jump off that bridge until we arrive there.

Preparing for the Fall of Troy

I’ll be honest, I have seriously attempted to sit down and write a breakdown of the Washington game, but I couldn’t.  The only thing on my mind as soon as the Irish walked off the field in victory was: “Beat SC.”  I attempted to try to write a usual entry of statistical analysis and a logical preview of the game this Saturday, but I failed miserably.  Any time I have sat down and tried to write this post, I have been blinded by pure utter hatred and contempt for the institution that is the University of Southern California.

It is a different hate than I have for Michigan for sure.  While a loss to Michigan infuriates me like none other, a win against them honestly doesn’t mean as much as taking down our rivals from the West Coast.  There is nothing sweeter for me as a ND fan to take out the Trojans — however, I have never had that feeling since I set foot on campus and became one of the millions that pledge their undying loyalty to the Golden Dome.

It’s been seven years, seven long years, since Troy has fallen at the hands of the Irish (and to Bob Davie no less), and I’ve never been able to enjoy such a victory as a true ND fan.  The annual game against USC has been like falling to the Dark Side of the Force: frustration leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering.

Yes, I can squeeze a Stars Wars reference into anything.

So to hell with the usual post and logical thinking.  I’ll give what I see as keys to the game at the end of this post, but the majority of this will be me speaking as a fan, a fan that can’t stand USC and is sick of losing to them.  The blue and gold colored glasses are on for this post folks.  If you are going to the game, I want you to read this, get riled up, get pissed, and get loud from 3:30pm EST until Troy falls.  If you aren’t going to the game, I want to read this, get riled up, pass this around to folks that are going to the game, and where ever you will be watching this I hope you are loud as all hell too — in fact, I hope it is within the vicinity of a Trojan fan.

Let’s take a stroll through a primer of why I (and you) should hate USC:

Tommy Trojan

My hate for USC will need no assistance, but Tommy Trojan will ensure that I will have the urge to punch anyone saying “Fight On” in my vicinity square in the mouth once he stabs the 50 yard line with his sword.  Seriously, I cannot think of a more worthless mascot in all of college sports.  His sole purpose is to come out with the band with leftover props from Gladiator, stab the field, ride a horse around, and face the band and USC fans with his sword in one hand and the “Fight On”/peace sign being wielded by the other.

For me, seeing him stab the field is even worse than the Michigan State flag planting.  It screams arrogance of “we own you” before the freakin’ coin toss even happens.  It’s our field, jackass, come take it from us first.

If that isn’t enough, this is all accompanied by that damned band…speaking of…

This Is the Only Song We Know…It’s the Only Song We Know….

Holy dear friggin’ Christ-on-a-crutch does the “Spirit of Troy” make me want to take Tommy Trojan’s sword and slice both my ears off.  If getting beat by USC isn’t bad enough, their damned band will never shut up, and if that wasn’t enough they do nothing but play the same damned two songs over and over and over again.  And of course, you have all their fans just acting like mindless zombies following in-beat with the “Fight On”/peace sign symbol (see Tommy Trojan in the picture above) in rhythmic loyalty.

I really wonder what the requirement sheet for the band says if you show up to try out.  I have a feeling it is something like this:

Try Out for the Spirit of Troy!

Requirements:

  • Must enjoy wearing ridiculous head gear
  • Must have the ability to learn two songs
  • Must also be able to play these songs non-stop without having your our ears bleed or be reduced to vomiting all season long

I’m pretty sure I got it dead on.

I’m not even joking about the two song thing.  While on defense they will play the same song after just about every single play (sing along with the “This is the only song we know” line) and then on offense, you will hear their God-awful fight song.  This will repeat until halftime, in which the only highlight will really be the Song Girls coming out front and center, and then they will go back to the cycle of horrible until the game ends.

Every note that comes out of a USC instrument just makes my blood boil.

The Fans

You know, I never really had an issue with USC fans until I decided to go watch and game in their house my senior year.  Now before I go on, I will say, I can’t really make this an indictment of the student body because I learned one thing rather quickly: the majority of the fans appeared to pissed off former Los Angeles Rams fans that want a pro football team, don’t want to be Raider or 49er fans, so they cheer for USC.

Now I know we got our fair share of non-Domer fans, aka Subway Alumni, but our fans have, well class more often than not.  I mean you know you are doing something wrong when Pat Forde actually calls you out.

I kid you not, at this game, I had the following situation happen: ND fans were behind me and said a certain call was (and excuse the French) bullshit.  A USC fan, father with a small boy around 8 or so, turned around and chastised the fan, and me and my family did the same, saying ND has more class than to use such language around a child.  They apologized and the game went on as normal…until USC scored, and then Mr. Watch-Your-Mouth-In-Front-Of-My-Boy, stood up and violently screamed at two female Irish fans with a slew of F-bombs and other four-letter delights: “YEAH! THAT’S FUCKIN’ RIGHT! GET YOUR SHIT TEAM OUTTA OUR HOUSE! WE ARE ABOUT TO KICK YOUR FUCKIN’ ASSES ALL NIGHT LONG!”

The funny part, that is the abridged version, dude seriously went on a 3-minute tirade on these poor women.

I think my sister said it best at halftime: “you know, this is just a stadium full of annoying ‘whoop-de-wooing’ jerks that are wearing colors that resemble Ronald McDonald vomit.”

Also if that isn’t enough to show how classy they are, how about this what this one fan decided to do to Weis:

Charlie Weis keeps a hat in his office that is emblazoned with the words, “USC owns Notre Dame.”

A Trojans fan mailed him the hat a few years ago, along with a letter containing disparaging remarks about his daughter, Hannah, who is developmentally disabled. Weis won’t divulge what the letter writer said, but he keeps the hat as a reminder.

“When we’ve won a game (against USC), that cap won’t be around anymore,” Weis said.

Bravo, jackass.


2005 – The “Bush Push” Game

Yes, it is that game.  The one game that you will likely ever see me not viciously strike down arguments that ND was completely screwed by the refs.  Yes, ND did have a chance to stop a 4th and 9, a pass that somehow managed to fit into the smallest window ever as Ambrose Wooden had perfect position on the pass; however, the defense stepped up after said play once again, but those efforts feel short due to some…uh beyond questionable reffing.

Fast forward to the end of the video to play along folks, I had the best seat in the house for this debacle, on the USC sideline just a few yards away (in fact, if you can make out a guy wearing a blue shirt and kakhi shorts on the sideline, that would be me).  Once Leinart, fumbled the ball out of bounds, I immediately saw the refs blow the clock dead; however, their good calls stopped there.  As I saw (and you can see in the video), the immediate reaction on the sidelines was to attempt to call a timeout — one they didn’t have, that would be a penalty.  The refs also gave USC a more than beneficial spot on the ball.  They actually marked it where Leinart’s body went down on the field and not where the ball went out on the fumble.  USC should’ve been a couple yards back — an area where you can’t QB sneak/Bush Push it in.  And of course, the Bush Push play happened, which is again, a penalty (yet somehow made ESPN’s top college plays of all time at 23).  Now I can see how that wasn’t called as you never see a flag thrown on that, but the more and more I see the push, the more and more it just sticks out like a sore thumb — it was such an obvious violation.

And if that all isn’t enough, the reaction from USC fans was even better.  On my aforementioned road trip, I saw more than one person wearing the following shirt: “Flight to South Bend: $300, Tickets to the Game: $200, Watching Irish Fans Charge the Field When They Didn’t Win: Priceless.”

Yeah, eff off:

Pete Carroll

Programs always tend to take on the character of the man leading the charge.  If you ever wonder why USC seems to resemble a gigantic collection of cocky douchebags, look no further than head douche–I mean coach, Pete Carroll.

I mean this is same guy that sends this whopper to press boxes before the Trojans take the field:

O is for obsolete, which is what USC considers the moniker “Southern Cal” to be. In its weekly game notes each week, there is a friendly warning not to use that reference. Accepted names are: USC, Southern California, So. California, Troy and Trojans.

I mean really?!

This is also the same guy that decided to “prank” his team — I’m sure you’ve all seen in that wonderful “Lean on Me” video, has his O-linemen play a touch football game during Friday walkthroughs, allowed Will Ferrell to disrupt a practice, and also did a swimming exhibition against the famed USC alum.

That alone isn’t as annoying as the constant fellating that ESPN performs on his goofy antics.  “Man, he knows how to keep his team loose” — no he knows how to make them a bunch of cocky, arrogant douchebags that have consistently shown they have a case of overconfidence when some bottom-of-the-barrel Pac 10 team upsets them every year.

Speaking of, how is USC preparing for the Irish this week?  Well, they are slip and sliding down the sidelines.  You just can’t make this stuff up.

Perhaps the best example of Carroll’s arrogance came in the 2005 game.  After USC stole the game from the Irish, Carroll had the nerve to point to his national championship ring as he left the field.  Yes, Pete, we are fully aware bending the rules can bring about championships.

Now go die in a fire.

Keys to the Game

OK, that’s enough of the anti-USC tirade for now.  Here is what I see as the important keys to Saturday’s tilt against Southern Cal:

  • Clausen vs. USC Defense: Yeah, yeah ND hasn’t faced a “defense like USC”, well guess what, USC hasn’t faced an offense like ND or a QB like Clausen whom leads the nation in passing efficiency.  This is the marquee matchup for sure.  Clausen needs to stay efficient and ensure he doesn’t turn the ball over.  Of course, a Heisman-like performance will also do wonders in helping the Irish topple Troy.
  • ND Blitzing vs. Barkley: Hello true freshmen QB! Welcome to your first big rivalry game on the road and let me introduce you to Tenuta’s mad-professor blitzing packages.  Let’s be frank, ND’s defense has not been good save for Nevada.  USC doesn’t quite have the same offense they used to, but they are still dangerous.  Getting in Barkley’s face and rattling him early can force USC to be run dependent and allow us to completely sell out on it.  A Barkley turnover could very well be the difference maker in the game.
  • ND Rushing Defense vs. USC’s Backfield: Going along with the above, we have to make sure that we actually can stop USC’s rushing offense; otherwise, I’m sure USC will be happy to hand the ball off all day long.
  • The X-Factor: It is all on ND’s side.  Seven years of pain, constant taunting of players saying “should’ve picked SC”, a slew of the best recruits in the nation on hand, Clausen has something to prove, the weather will be freezing for the California boys, etc, etc.  There is a reason this blog entry was written the way it was: this is the most important factor going into the game.  On paper USC should beat us; in fact, it shouldn’t be close.  But that doesn’t matter, we should’ve been killed in 2005 and we should have won that game.  ND is out for revenge, out for blood, and out to prove to all the nay-sayers that ND is indeed coming back.

    This team has a confidence and swagger that is different from the 2005 team, they showed me against Washington at the end of the 4th and in OT that they, as a collective unit, refused to lose that game.  What followed was multiple goal line stands, Clausen leading yet another clutch drive and then a game winner, Tate flew through the air, and the defense laid out a Washington receiver to end the game with a hit I have never seen ND deliver in recent memory.  They are playing with fire and resemble the “nasty” team that Weis promised us years ago.

Bring it on Southern Cal, we are ready.  It’s time to put another emerald on the Jeweled Shillelagh.

GO IRISH! BEAT TROJANS!

Important Info if You Attended the Stars Home Opener

First off, apologies I have been dark.  I am aware I have a ND game/heart attack to write about, as well as catch up on the Cowboys, but this last weekend was a whirlwind and to make things even better, I got stick at the tail end of it.

So yeah, blogging not at the top of the list of things to do right now…

Anyways, there is one piece of news I want to make sure is out there.  I’ll have a more in depth article about this later and as more information comes out, but the fact is, if you had a ticket to the Stars home opener, you have a free ticket coming your way.

Long story short, Razor guaranteed a Stars win and put his money where his mouth is.  If the Stars lost, everyone gets a free ticket on him.  Well, the Stars fell in a shootout and Razor will keep to his word.

This was originally announced on the Ticket and blogged about as well by Razor.  I’m not sure how well publicized this was beyond that, so here you go.  If you didn’t know, you are welcome, now go spread the word to anyone else that was at the game.

The Fat Lady Has Sung

The Rangers are now officially playing meaningless baseball — this season though, we got to stick along for the ride until the end of September.  While bittersweet, especially considering what was no less than a complete collapse a couple of weeks ago, it has been a very long time since I’ve been able to stay to involved and wrapped up in Rangers baseball for so long into the season.

We’ve gotten to see the debut of several young stars: Elvis Andrus, Derek Holland, Neftali Feliz, Julio Borbon, and Tommy Hunter, among others.  We got to see Scott Feldman pitch like a staff ace for most of the season, winning an impressive 17 games.  We even got to see a completely different Kevin Millwood for most of the season.

We were able to welcome back Pudge to Texas, and have the treat of watching Omar Visquel play in a Rangers uniform.

Kinsler had only the second 30/30 season by a second baseman in MLB history.  On that note, Washington, please put Kinsler in the middle of the lineup next season.

Michael Young was again a model of hitting consistency and Marlon Bryd had a breakout season.

Most importantly, we saw this team lead the AL West for the first time in years and we watched them do so over a span of months and not days.

It was definitely one hell of a ride:

Thanks for one hell of season boys, see you in 2010.

Initial ND/Purdue Post Game Reactions

I’m going to be straight with everyone right now, I’m extremely conflicted about this win.  Now I really don’t want to be one of those fans that does his damnedest to try to find every single little thing wrong with the team.  I’m not trying to be a downer on the whole situation in the least.  It is just that I see some glaring issues right now with what has been out on the field week after week.

I don’t want to take anything away from Jimmy, who made an incredible clutch drive of epic proportions, even if it was against a team we were favored to beat by a TD.  The team was crippled with injuries and had major weapons simply watching the game.  Yet we still won (albeit, with a little aid from an awful timeout call).

We even got a glimpse of some old-school, smashmouth football when Crist first came into the game.  We saw Weis throw the kitchen sink at Purdue as well in that stretch, running a spread option, wildcat, lining Tate up at RB, and simply running right at Purdue and they couldn’t handle it.

But there is still something bugging the ever-living hell out of me.  It isn’t so much the fact that ND is failing to put teams away, but yet, why we are failing to do so.  The fact of the matter is that in these past three weeks, we seem to put together a solid quarter or solid first half and all seems well.  Then, our opposition makes adjustments, and we seem to do nothing but stick to the gameplan.

For instance, Crist isn’t exactly some option QB.  He was one of the top passing QB prospects in the nation.  Yet for some reason, Weis refused to take the training wheels off of him and stuck to his “package” of running plays and short passes.  There was one pass Crist got to throw deep and he overthrew it — ok, it happens, let him do it again.  Purdue was selling out on the run and Tate easily burned his man downfield.

For some reason, Weis was set in having Clausen be the only QB that would be throwing any passes that involved any risks and it was irritating the hell out of me.  We had Purdue hooked for any play action pass we wanted to throw with Crist, yet we only did it once.  Everything else was a short dump route or drag pattern for him — or a screen.

Now, let me take a moment on the screen play.  I love the screen play.  It is the ultimate equalizer for biting an over-aggressive blitz square in the ass if you call it at the right time.  However, I am getting absolutely fed up with seeing Weis continue to call screens on third and long.  I know to look for it third and long and so does any other team.  We dig into that well far, far too often.

But again, there lies the problem of adjustment.  Weis has that pretty little play chart, and he will only call plays inside that pretty little play chart for certain situations and it comes back to haunt us week after week.

You want to know why the running attack worked so well?  It is because Purdue had no freaking clue what hit them.  Clausen goes out, and so does ND’s biggest offensive weapon — one that they practiced for again and again.  Then out of nowhere Crist is acting like Tim Tebow, Tate is lined up as a running back, we are making perfect wildcat reads and Purdue didn’t know which way was up.  Then Purdue got to the half, took a look at things, and settled down and were able to have success against the run.  Finally, they realized that Weis was refusing to open up the field with Crist so they started selling out for the run with no consequence.

A win is a win, but if we continue to fall into these predictable patterns week after week and refuse to adjust, we will be facing several losses to close this season.

One more thing, while I’m airing my issues with ND out.  If our defense does not pull their head out and learn how to tackle, I’m going to lose it completely.  That effort in the second half was absolutely inexcusable.  What made it even more infuriating was that it looked like our defense had finally gotten it together and was causing Purdue all kinds of havoc in the backfield.  Although that meant absolutely nothing after a while, as I sat and watched blown up plays in the backfield turn into 10+ yard gains.

This kind of effort will not win us football games with any consistency.  Washington is no slouch (ask USC), and then we have USC just around the bend.  If we want that three week stretch to be any kind of productive, what I have seen out there for the last three weeks needs to change or we will be in for more heart attacks like this one — except this time they might just turn into heartbreaks.

MSU Breakdown/Purdue Preview

I know, I know, I’m behind.  Hey, we got a night game tonight and it is going to be a long journey through crappy Big Ten games airing today until we finally get our very own crappy Big Ten opponent.  So let’s take a journey through the last week or so for the Irish before tonight’s game at West Lafayette and breakdown the ND/MSU game and preview tonight’s matchup.

Uh, Defense?

After a very impressive outing against Nevada, the defense has more or less just flat out fallen on their faces.  The Irish have given up a combined 68 points in their past two games.  Our passing defense has gotten worse too, against Nevada the Irish gave up 154 yards, against Michigan: 240 yards, and last week against Michigan State: 354 yards.  As a reference, last season we gave up 195.7 yards/game through the air.

Now, I do believe our secondary is far better than the numbers show; however, our problem starts up front with QB pressure.  As I said in the beginning of the season, when you decide to be blitz-happy like Tenuta, the key is having those blitzes hit home.  If you continue to place your corners on an island with single coverage, and the QB still has all day, you will have major issues no matter how good your secondary is.

So where are the hitting home results?  Against Nevada and Michigan: 2 sacks.  Against the Spartans: 0.  Now you might want to make an argument here saying “but hey, how many times did that rush Cousins and/or he was hit as he threw?”  Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter in this case.  Last week, the Spartans had a 65% completion percentage.  They weren’t rushed in the passing game at all.

Well, until that is, the last drive of the game.  As the Spartans were driving to deliver what looked to be an all to familiar comeback win in South Bend, a blitz finally hit home in a big way.  Cousins was flushed from the pocket, panicked, and threw off balance to avoid a sack.  The result was a lame duck floating into the arms of McCarthy to ice the game for the Irish and barely escaped with a win.

A weak defense caused us far more problems than it should have this past Saturday.

The Officiating Saga Continues

I’m far more prone to complain about the zebras after a win, and some of last week was comical.  Once again Big Ten refs came into a ND game and left with some fans wanting to tear them from limb from limb.  Once again, the Irish saw a TD inexplicably taken away from them, and this time, it wasn’t only the Big Ten to blame, but “our own” Big East refs in the both that we have every home game.

Of course, I am referring to the catch that ended Floyd’s season.  The call on the field was an incomplete pass, and the call in the booth upheld it.  Later on in the broadcast, we were informed that the ruling from the booth was that Floyd did not “have full control of the catch all the way to the ground.”  Which really boggles my mind…that ruling is brought into play for passes in which the receiver is immediately shoved out of bounds, and barely gets a foot in.  Let’s do our own further review:

Now, as the commentary shows, in bounds isn’t an issue at all.  What we are focusing on here is having full control of the ball.  Watch the replay again and watch the MSU defender, as he is the one that “disrupts the catch”.  Floyd has full control of the ball as he puts both feet in bounds, the defender is even able to try to rip the ball out until after Floyd has taken the extra step that usually is more than enough evidence to signify the catch.  Once Floyd’s back hits the ground then the ball is finally ripped out by the MSU defender.  How this is not full possession is beyond me.

Thankfully, it did not affect the game in the end; however, the fact that Floyd went down on this play and didn’t even get credit for his catch is infuriating to say the least.

There were some other questionable calls throughout the game as well; however, one fact does remain and that is the Irish are getting penalized far too much.  You can place blame on the refs for throwing laundry around all you want, but somewhere along the line the Irish need to stop giving them any excuses to throw flags.

Golden Shower

Once Floyd went down, Tate needed to step up.  While he again gave Irish fans a heart attack by dropping some passes, he completely redeemed himself with the winning TD and best celebration ever.

How we got away with that I will never know, but I’ll be damned if it wasn’t the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. 

I know Tate claimed he thought it was ND’s band, but I have a feeling he is full of it.  Go back and find a highlight reel of him and watch him taunt nearly every receiver he burns by turning around and pointing the ball back at them.  He likes to taunt, he just happens to get away with it.

By the way Spartans, we are now even for the flag planting of 2005.

M*A*S*H Unit

Ok enough of the Spartans, time to turn our attention to the pressing issues facing tonight’s game.  The first of which are the injuries.

Clausen should be good to go, despite his turf toe.  It sure wasn’t all too much of an issue during the MSU game when it happened, and I would like to assume it got better and not worse.  However, it is something to keep an eye on.  If he starts hobbling and struggling, I would expect to see Crist in tonight.

Allen, at best is questionable with his ankle.  Weis hasn’t completely confirmed that he is out, but from all news that’s I’ve read out of South Bend, he will have a limited role at best.  Expect to see much more of Jonas Gray and Robert Hughes tonight.

Floyd, of course, is out for the season, and Aldridge is still slated to be out for this game as well.

Keys to the Game

For Weis, he simply wants to avoid a shootout.  He’s got good reason for that.  The Irish are 28-5 when holding opponents to 29 points or less.  They are also undefeated when they win the ground game and out-rush their opponents.

The Irish are facing a rather potent offense in Purdue that has racked up 440.3 yards/game, with 229.7 yards/game through the air and 210.6 yards/game on the ground.  As stated earlier, the Irish defense must step up in a big way.  If they aren’t able to disrupt Purdue in the backfield, we could have another heart attack of a game on our hands.

On the flipside of the ball, Purdue has given up 434.3 yards/game, with 253.3 yards/game coming through the air and 181.0 yards/game on the ground.  Those are some big holes the Irish should be able to punch through all game long, especially on the ground.  With Floyd out, that is going to be a major factor in this game.  Tate will likely get much more attention than usual, so airing it out may not be the best plan of attack this time around.

Look for the Irish to establish a strong ground game first and then try to throw over the top once Purdue crashes the box — which will be the complete opposite of last week when ND attempted to air the ball out early and often and allow that to open up huge holes for Allen.

I’m not really sure how to peg this Purdue team.  They’ve beaten lowly Toledo, lost to an Oregon team that isn’t what it was last season on the road, and lost to the powerhouse that is Northern Iowa at home.  While I’d love to have supreme confidence with that resume, I can’t help but forget MSU lost to Central Michigan before facing off against the Irish.  The only thing I do feel some what confident in saying though is that ND will have no problem moving the ball against Purdue. 

The key for a ND win is going to be the defense.  If the defense shows up, it’ll be game over for Purdue in a big way.  The Irish have some bouncing back to do of their own and I expect to see it happen for a solid win.

Final Prediction: ND over Purdue 34-24