Irish Must Recover
UHND.com - Frank Vitovitch
September 27, 2000
Notre Dame, Ind - Notre Dame has played four straighttough games, three of which all have come down to the final two minutes. With a weekoff before defending PAC 10 Champion Stanford comes to town, the Irish must recover bothphysically and mentally. Physically they must recuperate after four grueling gamesand mentally they must recover from realizing they are two plays away from being 4-0 and atop 5 ranked team.
Physically the Irish are missing two of their big guns. Grant Irons and Arnaz Battle have both been gone since the Nebraska game and willbe out for the season (Irons definitely and Battle is questionable). Notre Dame isalso physically drained after playing four straight top 25 teams. Playing Purdue,Michigan State, Nebraska, and Texas A&M has to have left Notre Dame's tank on emptyand with the soft part of the schedule up Notre Dame needs to rest up and get ready to runthe table.
The Michigan State loss does not mean this season isgoing to be another disaster. It means however that a BCS game is looking unlikely,but with the rest of Notre Dame's schedule, a healthy Irish team can easily go 8-3 andmake a trip to a lesser bowl.
For Notre Dame to make the 2000 season a success and nota repeat of 1999 however, they must not look back on the first four games with any regret. Any thinking about what could have been does the team no good at this point. For Notre Dame to run the table they have to look at it as if they were 0-0. If the team can put the heartbreaking losses behind them they can have a fineseason.
Quarterback is again questionable as Gary Godsey seems tohave lost his job to freshman Matt LoVecchio. LoVecchio is more mobile than Godseyand has the best grasp of the offense among the freshman. Stanford's defense can betough so Stanford will not be a walk in the park for Matt. He does however have twofull weeks to prepare for the game and should be ready to go when the Cardinals roll intotown.
The rest of the offense needs to step up however forNotre Dame to run the table. The offensive line needs to start giving itsquarterback time to pass and needs to start blowing the lesser defensive lines they willbe facing off the line. Notre Dame has three talented running backs, but hasn't beenvery successful running the ball. The Irish gained 149 yards on the ground Saturday,but other than that success has been minimal on the ground.
The defense has been excellent this year even though itis yielding over 20 points game. They have come up with big plays when the offensewasn't able to move the ball and has held high powered offenses in check. The Irishhave 14 sacks through 4 games after having only 18 all of last season.
This Irish team is better than its 2-2 record and canplay with anyone. As long as they continue to think that Notre Dame will be fine. A week off will Notre Dame wonders. I think we will see a refreshed NotreDame team come out and take care of business next Saturday against Stanford.
Lastly, all last season everyone criticized Davie for notbeing aggressive enough. This year he blitzes on a 4th and 10 and everyone is allover him for not sitting back and not taking any chances. The guy simply can't win. He is doing a good job this year and everyone needs to realize he is doing hisbest. Calling for his head does nothing at this point. If he finishes 9-2 thisyear he will be coach of the year.