NC State hasn’t played one team this year to the caliber of ND and not anyone as physical.
ND wins by 17+ not sold on NC State
Sep 2 @
South Carolina L 35 - 28
Sep 9 vs
Marshall W 37 - 20
Sep 16 vs
Furman W 49 - 16
Sep 23 @
Florida St. W 27 - 21
Sep 30 vs
Syracuse W 33 - 25
Oct 5 vs
Louisville W 39 - 25
Oct 14 @
Pittsburgh W 35 - 17
Ummmmmmmmm where are the UGA’s, MSU and USC?
ND gashed USC, but USC is ranked outside the top-100 in stuff rate and opportunity rate allowed. We have a much better rush defense than USC.
They did have 5 rushes of over 10 yards against Michigan State, the longest being 32 yards. That's not terrible. But, well, whatever. I could probably live with that. The difference in that game was TOs and the fact that Wimbush was crazy efficient. And Mich state twice committed personal fouls at the end of 30+ yard plays.
I don't think there's a top-10 team out there who we have a more favorable match-up with.
Everyone agrees Clemson has a great rush defense, and if Clemson were playing ND, all the pundits would wonder if ND could still run the ball against Dexter Lawrence and co. We've done better than Clemson against two common opponents.
UL vs Clemson
22 rushes, 139 yards, long of 30,
UL RBs had 10 carries for 52 yards, 5.2 ypc average
Excluded 5 sacks for 23 yards
UL vs. NCSU
25 carries 140 yards
RBs had 10 carries, 43 yards
Excluded 4 sacks for 24 yards
Syracuse vs. Clemson
44 carries, 192 yards
Syr RBs had 101 yards on 22 carries, 4.59ypc average
Excluded 6 sacks, 30 yards
Syracuse vs NCSU
27 carries, 83 yards
RBs had 12 carries for 20 yards
Excluded 3 sacks, 24 yards
Crunched some numbers from play logs. Decided to see how our defense fared against non-QB rushes.
Non-QBs are averaging a paltry 3.79ypc against us.
Fun stat: in our last 3 games, the other team's leading rusher in net yards has been the QB: Dungey, Jackson, and Pickett (with a whopping 18 yards) led their respective teams in rushing against us.
Apparently UGA held ND to 0 rushing plays of 10+ yards, but ND has 61 such plays in all other games. We have given up 13 total 10+ yard plays to non-QBs, and only 7 such plays over our four ACC games. The longest rushing play we've allowed in ACC play is 22 yards, when Eric Dungey scrambled on 4th and 4 with the score 33-17. That's it. No other player has netted a 20+ yard rushing play against us.
This is particularly important when you realize that ND's rushing offense is 23rd in success rate, which is good, but 2nd in explosiveness, meaning that their real dominance comes from big rushing plays. If we are able to stuff ND often enough and can otherwise limit big running plays, we will be in great shape.
Michigan St. -
Garbage time stats involving the 4th string RB don't convince me of much.
ND had a 21 point lead at half-time thanks to a pick-6 and a Mich State fumble that gave them a 24 yard TD drive, though. On ND's 80 yard TD drive, Mich State gave them 15 yards on a silly personal foul. Mich State was -3 in TO margin, including two fumbles lost, and had 9 penalties for 97 yards compared to 6 for 65 yards for ND.
Our worst penalty day was 8 penalties for 65 yards against South Carolina. We are generally a well-disciplined team that commits very few penalties.
Our DL stats are better than Mich state, who rank 17th in power success rate and opportunity rate, and 44th in stuff rate.
The stuff rate is, IMO, the key stat. Stopping ND for 0 yards or negative yardage, especially on first down, changes the dynamic of the drive drastically.
I think we are a better run defense than Michigan State. Our rushing S&P numbers took a hit because Lamar Jackson, who had an obscene 73% success rate rushing against us, mostly on scrambles. And I don't even care, because we contained him and prevented any of his explosive runs, holding him to a long of 17 and 3.8 ypc. He's been held under 4ypc only two other times since the start of last year: by Clemson this year and by Houston in that blowout last year. I realize that number includes sacks, which should count as passing yardage, however, many of his gains come on passing plays, too.
Offensive S&P of Michigan State's opponents:
Bowling Green 100th (47th in rushing S&P)
Michigan 85th (41st in rushing S&P)
Western Michigan 58th (47th in rushing S&P)
Iowa 91st (61st in rushing S&P)
Minnesota 107th (68th in rushing S&P)
Indiana 106th (85th in rushing S&P)
Notre Dame 12th, 1st in rushing S&P
Our opponents
South Carolina 82nd, 100th in rushing S&P
Marshall 102nd, 109 in rushing S&P
Florida State 64th, 31th in rushing S&P
Syracuse 74th, 90th in rushing S&P
Louisville 8th, 10th in rushing S&P
Pitt 80th, 34th in rushing S&P
We've played three top-35 rushing attacks compared to Mich State having only played one, and our stats are better, and Lamar Jackson destroys your stats over a small sample size.
If we hold ND to <200 rushing yards and 5ypc, I think we will actually win, PROVIDED their passing game performs as expected and we don't lose the TO margin by 3 or something crazy like that. We are the second-best rush defense ND has faced and we have the best offense they have seen.
Looking at offenses, for a minute, we won't bother with Temple, BC, Mich State, Miami-Ohio, or UNC, as they are all crap, or at least in the case of BC, were crap when ND played them.
But looking at UGA and USC, we present ND with a challenge they have not yet seen: a truly efficient passing attack that also doesn't turn the ball over.
Our passing success rate of 49.8 is 8th nationally. That means we produce a "successful" play to stay ahead of the chains nearly 50% of the time we throw the ball. Oklahoma State is one spot ahead of us at 50.2%. That's better than Alabama, at 49.6. Ohio State is 51%. This is some ELITE company. This means that even if we can't run the ball, we can move the ball down the field, efficiently, with a passing game. We hadn't been a big-play passing offense early in the year, but that's definitely change since the Louisville game.
By comparison, UGA, who has a good passing offense, ranks 66th in success rate at 40.7%.
USC is close to us, with a 48.6% success rate. But, Sam Darnold has 10 INTs in 8 games and Ryan Finley has thrown 8 interceptions in his last 20 games and has had 15 no interception games at NC State. Finley beats Darnold handily in completion %, INTs, yards/attempt, and sacks taken.
