IrishBeer, Saavy and 4-4-3 must be laying low and preparing the “wait until Clemson comes to town” rebuttal … and they didn’t even get a Brian Kelly win today.
Great job by coaching staff today and if you can’t see how much they have to coach around a disasterous QB situation left by the previous coach then you are in denial.
The team played better, NO QUESTION. And the coaching was GOOD ENOUGH.
But how good is Syracuse? I DON’T KNOW. They’re undersized on defense, played over their heads against Clemson in the first half and then got completely shut down in the second. They were also pretty banged up.
Also, the game was rated as a tossup. That ND won by 17 suggests that Syracuse may have been overrated. Other than Clemson, they hadn’t played tough competition prior to playing ND. But now, Syracuse must play Pitt, FSU and Wake. They could lose any or all of them and drop from the TOP 25.
STILL, ND pushed them all over the field and with the help of some poor Shrader QB play and numerous dropped passes, ND’s D basically contained them.
The other qualifier is that Babers has coached against ND 13 times, both as an assistant and head coach. In only one game at A&M has he been victorious. And if you heard his pregame news conference, he was already making excuses about how PHYSICAL ND is. And compared to HIS TEAM, he was right.
Clemson?
ND has a shot. But can it run the ball? And if not, can it pass? I can’t see how Clemson won’t PUT UP POINTS. Can ND trade PUNCHES? We’ll see.
If ND makes a game of it, I’ll consider that POTENTIAL PROGRESS, but if it gets blown out, nothing fundamental to the program’s UPSIDE will have changed.
And, of course, if it wins, it could signify ACTUAL PROGRESS. But it will then need to go out and play CONSISTENTLY in the rest of its games. Gerry Faust’s 1982 team beat #1 Pitt 31-16 at Pitt, climbing to 6-1-1 in the process. It then lost its last three games to lesser opponents.
For Freeman, too, consistency or the LACK OF IT will tell the story.