Sorry. A little late this week.
There were a lot of the obligatory, “Dump Navy” posts this week. I may be one of the very few, but I love the Navy series, on a couple of different levels. First, if you love ND you should really should love Navy because they are the reason this place still exists. No need to rehash the history, but if you don’t know it here it is (https://www.irishcentral.com/sports...he-teams-shared-histories-168127246-237526071).
Second, I Iove seeing the young men who are going to be defending this great country, not to mention some of our future leaders, playing against ND. They’ve earned it. It’s special, believe me, and it’s a tradition most other teams would love to have.
The only lament that I have is that it wasn’t Army that saved ND and there isn’t an active Army series. @alperry is sure to agree.
I was in Annapolis in July for a work conference. One of the other attendees was a local and he took me and some of my co-workers out to the Fleet Reserve Club of Maryland a few times. Members only and you have to be Navy. Most Academy graduates are members. Anyway, I’m wearing my ND hat and these members are telling me how much they enjoy the series and giving me a good ribbing about last year’s loss. Many of those members told me that their rivalry game is ND, not Army/Air Force. This is the game that drives them and they said they bring everything to their game against ND. My point is that this series is historic, and it should continue as long as ND plays football.
Ara Parseghian- He was a Navy vet, so there’s also that. He left college and joined the Navy after Pearl Harbor.
Post-Game Post of the Game-
Senior Day- Another thing I love. It’s just great to send these guys off with these memories. I was scared to see Martini do whatever type of move it was that he did. Usually things like that don’t end up well. Martini came to play, however, and had a hell of a game. I was really happy for him to go out that way. I also really liked the pictures of the players as kids. McGlinchey’s childhood picture looked like a future serial killer. Still does. All business.
McGlinchey/Nelson Pre-Game Interview- I thought that was just awesome TV! I really enjoyed listening to these two talk about their last home game at ND. Great players and great representatives of the University.
Playcalling- Long/Kelly sure made some adjustments as the game went on, but the playcalling to open the game was atrocious. To call 3 straight passes on a three and out in that weather against Navy with our rushing attack is odd (the 3rd play, Wimbush ran out of the pocket on a designed pass play) . Listen, I understand they’re trying to get Wimbush some confidence, but in those conditions, it probably wasn’t the best scenario to do that. Geek Stat- Navy controlled time of possession 42:42 to 17:18 or nearly two and a half to one ratio. When you play a team like that, you have to score on every possession, because you’re not going to get the ball back anytime soon. The first possession of the game was wasted, in my opinion.
Wimbush- Jekyll and Hyde. He had some receivers drop passes right in their hands, and that’s tough, but he continues to sail the ball high on many throws and, if caught, that’s going to get his receivers hurt. There was one play in the first quarter where he was rolling to his right with receiver 5 yards to his front wide open and he overthrew him. That was maddening. He did, however make some great passes during the game, particularly the 2 TDs to Stepherson. He also made a couple of great throws to Boykin and Claypool as well. Of course his running ability is a game changer, so we’re fortunate to have him. A relatively new poster @sorin91 had a great thread on the upside of Wimbush. Too long to quote but his stats put me to same. Have a look (https://notredame.forums.rivals.com/threads/wimbush-upside.117586/#post-2201351)
Stepherson- He’s just a dynamic player and he was the missing ingredient through the first 4 games this year. If he played against Georgia it would have been a different outcome.
J. Adams- He had a good game but he looks a bit slower lately. I know he’s banged up, but he one long run that stood out to me and he got caught from behind. Usually he breaks those runs for TDs.
Finke- He has great hands for catching punts, but he lacks the instincts on when to fair catch and when to run. I’ve said before, he makes me nervous when he tries to make a catch and run rather than make a fair catch. He made a costly error on Saturday by not signaling for a fair catch. It wasn’t so much that Navy went on to score a TD, it’s the loss of possession to a team that believes in controlling time of possession that hurts. When you’re not scoring on Navy, you’re losing. Great exchange on this:
Defense- @Bryan Driskell had a lengthy thread on the D (https://notredame.forums.rivals.com...erent-game-than-a-lot-of-other-people.117468/). I’m basically in agreement with BD on this one, but there were a lot of posters smarter than me that took another view. My initial thoughts were, “This D looks a lot more prepared than past year’s D.” The most important statistic to come out of Saturday was the most important one, we won the game and moved to 9-2. I’m not saying that this D was a world-beater, but they did a good job against a tough opponent who always comes to play (see my comments above). By almost every statistical measure, this D slowed/stopped a powerful Navy offense. Geek Stats- Here’s a few examples: Prior to ND, Navy was averaging nearly 34 points per game. In fact, ND was the only team to hold Navy to less than 20 points this year. Navy had and 318 total yards, the lowest amount all year. Over the past 4 games in this series, Navy has scored an average of 31 points per game against ND. Navy had 277 yards rushing, their 4th lowest total all year. I had some issues with the defense, however, particularly the TD pass to Scott in the 3rd quarter and the DL seemed a little weak up the middle. Negative Geek Stats: Navy was 8 of 18 on 3rd downs and 4 of 8 on 4th downs. The 4th down conversions are hat really kill you against a ball control team like Navy, but the reality is that despite the conversions, the ND D kept them from scoring points. Mission accomplished. Read and discuss. There’s plenty of room for dissenting opinions and I want to hear yours. Yeah, I'm talking to you, @dhighducheck.
Game Chat- Some people need to stop embarrassing themselves. When you take shots at others for saying that ND would win the game and they actually do, you look like a jackass. Consistently the Game Chat Voice of Reason:
Tackling- It was spotty on Saturday. Some great tackles. Some complete whiffs. Some guys just getting bowled over during the tackle. That certainly needs to improve.
Triple Option- I really hate watching it. I can’t tell who has the ball half the time, and that’s watching it on TV. It must be even worse to watch in person.
Fun Facts- A nautical mile is longer than a standard mile (6,076 vs 5,280 feet). It’s used by in the air and on the water because it is 1/60th of a degree of latitude so if a naval vessel moves one nautical mile along a meridian of longitude, the longitude changes by 1/60th of a degree, aiding in navigation where terrain features are unavailable. When measured on a map, a standard mile may be quite a bit longer than 5,280 feet in reality due to the terrain
Post of the Game- The truth about Navy… they’re good.
Moving Forward- Nothing was perfect, but he puts it in perspective.
BK- The announcers mentioned at the end of the that if ND wins at Stanford next week BK should be in the conversation for Coach of the Year, yet some on this board think he’s coaching poorly. @irishnatty tries to make some sense of this.
Have a great week folks! Big win coming next week.
There were a lot of the obligatory, “Dump Navy” posts this week. I may be one of the very few, but I love the Navy series, on a couple of different levels. First, if you love ND you should really should love Navy because they are the reason this place still exists. No need to rehash the history, but if you don’t know it here it is (https://www.irishcentral.com/sports...he-teams-shared-histories-168127246-237526071).
Second, I Iove seeing the young men who are going to be defending this great country, not to mention some of our future leaders, playing against ND. They’ve earned it. It’s special, believe me, and it’s a tradition most other teams would love to have.
The only lament that I have is that it wasn’t Army that saved ND and there isn’t an active Army series. @alperry is sure to agree.
I was in Annapolis in July for a work conference. One of the other attendees was a local and he took me and some of my co-workers out to the Fleet Reserve Club of Maryland a few times. Members only and you have to be Navy. Most Academy graduates are members. Anyway, I’m wearing my ND hat and these members are telling me how much they enjoy the series and giving me a good ribbing about last year’s loss. Many of those members told me that their rivalry game is ND, not Army/Air Force. This is the game that drives them and they said they bring everything to their game against ND. My point is that this series is historic, and it should continue as long as ND plays football.
Ara Parseghian- He was a Navy vet, so there’s also that. He left college and joined the Navy after Pearl Harbor.
Post-Game Post of the Game-
Senior Day- Another thing I love. It’s just great to send these guys off with these memories. I was scared to see Martini do whatever type of move it was that he did. Usually things like that don’t end up well. Martini came to play, however, and had a hell of a game. I was really happy for him to go out that way. I also really liked the pictures of the players as kids. McGlinchey’s childhood picture looked like a future serial killer. Still does. All business.
McGlinchey/Nelson Pre-Game Interview- I thought that was just awesome TV! I really enjoyed listening to these two talk about their last home game at ND. Great players and great representatives of the University.
Playcalling- Long/Kelly sure made some adjustments as the game went on, but the playcalling to open the game was atrocious. To call 3 straight passes on a three and out in that weather against Navy with our rushing attack is odd (the 3rd play, Wimbush ran out of the pocket on a designed pass play) . Listen, I understand they’re trying to get Wimbush some confidence, but in those conditions, it probably wasn’t the best scenario to do that. Geek Stat- Navy controlled time of possession 42:42 to 17:18 or nearly two and a half to one ratio. When you play a team like that, you have to score on every possession, because you’re not going to get the ball back anytime soon. The first possession of the game was wasted, in my opinion.
Wimbush- Jekyll and Hyde. He had some receivers drop passes right in their hands, and that’s tough, but he continues to sail the ball high on many throws and, if caught, that’s going to get his receivers hurt. There was one play in the first quarter where he was rolling to his right with receiver 5 yards to his front wide open and he overthrew him. That was maddening. He did, however make some great passes during the game, particularly the 2 TDs to Stepherson. He also made a couple of great throws to Boykin and Claypool as well. Of course his running ability is a game changer, so we’re fortunate to have him. A relatively new poster @sorin91 had a great thread on the upside of Wimbush. Too long to quote but his stats put me to same. Have a look (https://notredame.forums.rivals.com/threads/wimbush-upside.117586/#post-2201351)
Stepherson- He’s just a dynamic player and he was the missing ingredient through the first 4 games this year. If he played against Georgia it would have been a different outcome.
J. Adams- He had a good game but he looks a bit slower lately. I know he’s banged up, but he one long run that stood out to me and he got caught from behind. Usually he breaks those runs for TDs.
Finke- He has great hands for catching punts, but he lacks the instincts on when to fair catch and when to run. I’ve said before, he makes me nervous when he tries to make a catch and run rather than make a fair catch. He made a costly error on Saturday by not signaling for a fair catch. It wasn’t so much that Navy went on to score a TD, it’s the loss of possession to a team that believes in controlling time of possession that hurts. When you’re not scoring on Navy, you’re losing. Great exchange on this:
Defense- @Bryan Driskell had a lengthy thread on the D (https://notredame.forums.rivals.com...erent-game-than-a-lot-of-other-people.117468/). I’m basically in agreement with BD on this one, but there were a lot of posters smarter than me that took another view. My initial thoughts were, “This D looks a lot more prepared than past year’s D.” The most important statistic to come out of Saturday was the most important one, we won the game and moved to 9-2. I’m not saying that this D was a world-beater, but they did a good job against a tough opponent who always comes to play (see my comments above). By almost every statistical measure, this D slowed/stopped a powerful Navy offense. Geek Stats- Here’s a few examples: Prior to ND, Navy was averaging nearly 34 points per game. In fact, ND was the only team to hold Navy to less than 20 points this year. Navy had and 318 total yards, the lowest amount all year. Over the past 4 games in this series, Navy has scored an average of 31 points per game against ND. Navy had 277 yards rushing, their 4th lowest total all year. I had some issues with the defense, however, particularly the TD pass to Scott in the 3rd quarter and the DL seemed a little weak up the middle. Negative Geek Stats: Navy was 8 of 18 on 3rd downs and 4 of 8 on 4th downs. The 4th down conversions are hat really kill you against a ball control team like Navy, but the reality is that despite the conversions, the ND D kept them from scoring points. Mission accomplished. Read and discuss. There’s plenty of room for dissenting opinions and I want to hear yours. Yeah, I'm talking to you, @dhighducheck.
Game Chat- Some people need to stop embarrassing themselves. When you take shots at others for saying that ND would win the game and they actually do, you look like a jackass. Consistently the Game Chat Voice of Reason:
Tackling- It was spotty on Saturday. Some great tackles. Some complete whiffs. Some guys just getting bowled over during the tackle. That certainly needs to improve.
Triple Option- I really hate watching it. I can’t tell who has the ball half the time, and that’s watching it on TV. It must be even worse to watch in person.
Fun Facts- A nautical mile is longer than a standard mile (6,076 vs 5,280 feet). It’s used by in the air and on the water because it is 1/60th of a degree of latitude so if a naval vessel moves one nautical mile along a meridian of longitude, the longitude changes by 1/60th of a degree, aiding in navigation where terrain features are unavailable. When measured on a map, a standard mile may be quite a bit longer than 5,280 feet in reality due to the terrain
Post of the Game- The truth about Navy… they’re good.
Moving Forward- Nothing was perfect, but he puts it in perspective.
BK- The announcers mentioned at the end of the that if ND wins at Stanford next week BK should be in the conversation for Coach of the Year, yet some on this board think he’s coaching poorly. @irishnatty tries to make some sense of this.
BK is a good coach and he knows what he’s doing. Not perfect, but he’s a 9-2 coach moving on to a big game followed by a bigger bowl game.
Have a great week folks! Big win coming next week.
