Notre Dame, Ind (UHND) - The Notre Dame offense is still a ways away from instilling fear into the hearts of its opponents, but is the West Coast Offense that Tyrone Willingham installed last spring finally turning the corner. Fresh off of a 447 yard performance against the Air Force Academy, the Irish offense is showing signs of life. For the first 5 weeks of the season the offense looked anemic at times, but despite the total yards and score from the Pitt game, the ND passing game started to look competent, but was missing the running game - that came the following week against Air Force.

Against the Falcons, the Irish totaled 335 yards on the ground with Ryan Grant leading the way with a career high 190. Grant also added an 18 yard touchdown run, his 6th of the season. It was the first time this year that the Irish offense looked competent and capable of beating a top 25 team. While they may have only scored 21 points, the offense still moved the ball when it wanted to and would have scored more points had they not lost three fumbles - 1 by Vontez Duff and 2 by Carlyle Holiday. Those are the kinds of mistakes that need to be eliminated if the Irish are to win this week.

There are many positives from the past two games however. Carlyle Holiday has completed 60% of his passes since returning from injury (24 out of 40) for 257 yards with 1 touchdown and 1 interception - not exactly amazing numbers, but completing 60% of his passes is key. He has also been hitting the shorter passes the last two games - something he didn't do early on in the season. He hasn't been hitting the deep balls as much, but he has been getting the ball in his receivers' hands and letting them make people miss. He will need to hit a couple deep balls against the Seminoles this weekend however.

The emergence of Arnaz Battle has also lead to the improved offensive play. Battle has now had 2 straight 100 yard receiving games gaining 213 yards on 18 receptions with a touchdown. He has become Holiday's main target and is getting in sync with his quarterback. The timing that wasn't quite there early in the season is getting there. Battle is a play maker through and through. He makes good things happen with the ball in his hands and has the ability to take a short pass and make it into a big play with his athleticism.

Holiday is definitely improving, but he now needs to start hitting his secondary receivers more. Battle has 18 of his 24 completions over the last two games. Holiday needs to start getting the ball into the hands of Omar Jenkins, Maurice Stovall, Rhema McKnight, Gary Godsey, Jared Clark, etc for this offense to really start making things happen. One thing Pat Dillingham did well was get the ball to Gary Godsey on the move. If Holiday can start hitting his tight ends and running backs, the offense will continue to evolve.

The offense still has a long way to go and it remains to be seen if Carlyle Holiday can put up the kind of numbers he needs to for this team to have a shot at a national title, but the potential is there. Holiday needs to put it all together, and a great time to do so would be next week against Florida State. If he can put the short passing game together with a deep threat to a receiver like Maurice Stovall, the Irish will have a potent offense.