For every Knute Rockne disciple, there's someone who wants to toss
that leprechaun in front of the Four Horsemen.

--Schutz, Lansing (Michigan) State-Journal

Ah Michigan.

After last week's romp into Royko-land, we've swung the other way, toward Beckett. The dress rehearsal is over. Now we're waiting for Carlyle.
 

Last Week

ND nailed the Cougars, but it took a while. It took three quarters in fact just to get started.

Question: Was the whole team inept, or did we see instead an inordinate number of correctible individual mistakes? To check, I went to the videotape for the first few series. Here's what I found:

First offensive series:

• Holiday sacked. Derting knocks Molinaro flat and runs right past him.
• Grant, four yards. RPN whiffs his block.
• Holiday incomplete to covered Stovall. McKnight is open underneath.
• Punt.

Second defensive series:

• Green, eight yards. Collins & others miss tackles in the backfield.
• Green, three yards, first down. Hoyte misses tackle.
• Offensive penalty. Laws back in coverage, looks out of position.
• Smith, nine yards. Collins runs wide of the play.
• Kegel incomplete. Good D; Beckstrom misses interception.
• Kegel to Lunde, seven yards, first down. Good 0, good D.
• Kegel swing pass to Smith, six yards. Good O.
• Smith, outside run, 14 yards, first down. Momentum takes Bible too far inside; Collins taken inside by lead blocker.
• Smith, seven yard run against the flow. Hoyte caught going wrong way.
• Kegel to Moore, TD. Good D, great pass. Ellick prime defender.
• Missed extra point.

Second offensive series:

• Grant, one yard. Unblocked LB makes play. Obvious before snap -- Holiday should have audibled, or McKnight should have crossed over to block him.
• Holiday to Clark, no gain. SS unblocked.
• Holiday sacked; fumble; ball returned to ND 11. Uncovered SS blitzes, runs past TE and RT who block the same man. Holiday should have dumped to McKnight, open on left side.

Third defensive series:

• Kegel to Jordan, eight yards. Bible misses the underneath crossing route.
• Green, one yard loss. Earl great tackle, play.
• Kegel incomplete. Collins rushes well, hurries pass; Bible out of position, completion would have been TD.
• Field goal.

Third offensive series:

• Jones, eight yards, outside sweep. Palmer, RPN block well.
• Holiday to Jenkins, eight yards, first down. No blitz.
• Jones, good run, then fumble. Clark blocks well; Jones has ball in wrong hand.

Fourth defensive series:

• Kegel to Darling incomplete. Almost TD; everyone beat, especially Duff.
• Smith, four yards. Hoyte misses tackle at line.
• Kegel to TE Boyd, 27 yards, first down. TE beats Bible, but decent coverage.
• Smith, no gain. Good D, especially line, Hoyte.
• Smith, one yard loss. Good D, especially Hoyte, Jackson, Budinscak.
• Kegel sacked by Budinscak. Both DE's penetrate, Budinscak is unblocked, Kegel unwisely rolls toward him.
• Field goal.

Fourth offensive series:

• Grant, five yards. Good O.
• Grant, six yards, first down. Good play by FB Schmidt.
• Holiday to Schmidt, seven yards. No blitz; good block by Grant.
• Holiday to Stovall, seven yards, first down. No blitz, good O.
• Grant, no gain. Line holds blocks; good D.
• Holiday to Jenkins, five yards. Good WR screen, but tackled b/c RPN misses block.
• Holiday, four yards. Three receivers right, Holiday runs too soon.
• Grant, no gain. Two TE, I formation, RB gets stuffed.

Note the many blown individual plays, both offensive and defensive. This is not a list of team failures, but a group of plays where one or two players make mistakes, get out of position, take bad angles, whiff blocks -- a big group of plays.

Note too how well the offense plays when there's no blitz.

Now go back through the list and take out the mistakes. It's now easy to see how the defense in the second quarter, and later the offense in the fourth quarter, pulled it together. Eliminate mistakes and these plays actually work.

There's a lot more to be said about the above examples (for example, most of the WSU runs went away from Tuck, who pursued well across the field) -- and indeed, about the whole game -- but there are only so many electrons in the world, and I don't want to overuse my share.
 

The Theater of the Mind

Vladimir and Estragon, loveable bums, sit in a non-descript landscape, patiently waiting for a man who may never come. Does he exist? Does it matter? Or is it the waiting that counts? Who knows? The audience waits with them, even pays for the privilege.

Diedrick and Willingham, equally loved, inhabit a non-descript emotional landscape, patiently waiting for a player who may never evolve. Will he emerge? Who knows? The audience waits with them, even pays for the privilege.

Carlyle is not Godot, but in some ways he might as well be -- the waiting feels almost as existential. So let's look at this closely.

First, like Godot, Carlyle may indeed show up, play with the skill we wish for him. If so, the waiting makes sense.

Second, Willingham, unlike Estragon, has no choice but to wait. Neither Quinn nor Dillingham is a better player -- at present. When Quinn is ready, the better man, whoever that is, will win the starting job.

It's important to remember this in those dark existential moments, when it feels like the wrong man is playing and we're trapped on stage with Vladimir. We're not.
 

Entrances and Exits

Two comments on Chris Olsen, the quarterback who left before the season started.

For Olsen to have worried about Quinn doesn't make sense. The backup job was his and his to lose, by all accounts including Olsen's. And quarterbacks expect to compete; they just want a level playing field.

So what if Chris wasn't frustrated by the view to the south (Quinn), but the view to the north (Holiday)? What if Olsen was upset because he thought he was winning the starting job, but not getting it?

Idle speculation; surely the devil at work. No one outside the program will ever know for sure, but conflict over starting, and not the battle of the backups, seems to this Sherlockian a better fit to the facts, what few we have.

If so, and if Holiday goes down this year, how ironic.
 

The Devil We Know and the Devil We Don't

The devil we know is Michigan. The devil we don't is ourselves. Can our best team effort beat theirs? Certainly. Will we get their best effort? Most likely, including their best mistakes. (Navarre is not yet Carson Palmer.)

Will we get our own best effort? I'm not sure. The guys will be ready, whatever that means, but ready may not be ready enough. Which brings us back to the start of this column, the list of errors and successes in the Washington State game. If the fourth-quarter Irish run onto the field in Ann Arbor, Michigan is in for a long day.

I won't predict, but I will believe. It certainly can be done, with these guys, this year, despite what The Real Deal says. (See last week's column for his comments.)
 

How will ND win? Passes to open up the field; then strong running. (This will be the formula all year.) On defense, stuffing Perry and forcing Navarre to the air -- and then containing his receivers.

The holes in the plan? On offense, Carlyle in the headlights. If he can't respond real-time, we may see Quinn again. On defense, pass coverage. Remember, Sapp's brain, at least with respect to the team, has not been replaced. Some of these backfield guys, including Duff, have been horribly out of position, and Michigan receivers aren't slouches.

ND has the edge in special teams, but not by much. Steve Breaston is a star in waiting.

It's trivial to say the game will be close, but my reason isn't historical. ND seems to lack the attacking defense it had last year. (Sapp's brain again?) Watson will add plenty of spark, but without points scored on defense or special teams, it's up to the offense this time, and the offense may give up almost as many as it scores.
 

So let's speculate. If Holiday & Co throw away 10 points and score 20, it's up to Watson & Co to hold Michigan to seven. Every point they give up after that, they have to make up themselves. Anything from special teams is a plus; I'll give them three.

Kanutski's scoreboard:

Irish 23
Michigan 17

And if you feel like praying for a miracle, pray for Carlyle -- he needs to know that ball is not a lunch box.
 

Yours,

The Rock