By the Numbers: A Freshman Record and a Season-High Scoring Day for Notre Dame Football

Notre Dame is 6-0 after a 58-7 win over Stanford, and Jonaz Walton’s name is now in the program record book. The freshman gained 181 yards on 13 carries, more than any Notre Dame true freshman has ever gained in one game. Josh Adams had held the mark since 2015, when he went for 168 at Stanford. Walton is also the first Irish true freshman since Adams to string together two straight 100-yard games.

He had plenty of company. Notre Dame finished with 361 rushing yards on 47 attempts, 7.7 a carry, and five rushing touchdowns shared by Walton, Nolan James Jr. and Javian Osborne. The rushing total and the 58 points are both highs for the Irish this season. So is the 598 yards of total offense, which came at 8.1 per snap.

Stanford had no answers on the other side of the ball either. The Cardinal managed 202 yards, 58 of them rushing, which makes seven straight opponents that have failed to reach 100 on the ground. Notre Dame forced three turnovers and didn’t commit one, and the 16th consecutive double-digit win pulled the Irish even with Georgia and Texas for third on the all-time list.

Here’s how the numbers tell the story of Notre Dame’s sixth win of 2026.

Key Stats

181 – Walton’s rushing yards, at 13.9 per carry. Two runs produced 137 of them: a 97-yard touchdown from the Irish 3 on the first snap of the second quarter and a 40-yard score on second-and-20 early in the fourth. He caught two passes for 28 more yards and finished with 209 all-purpose yards.

409 – Walton’s rushing total for the season, on 52 carries. Nobody on the roster has more. Before the North Carolina game he had 108 career yards.

361 – Notre Dame’s rushing yards, breaking the season high of 241 the Irish set in Chapel Hill a week earlier. Over the last two games the Irish have run for 602 yards.

58 – Points, the most Notre Dame has scored this season. The previous high was 52 against Rice. It’s also the fourth meeting in a row with Stanford in which the Irish put up at least 49 (56 in 2023, 49 in 2024 and 2025, 58 on Saturday). Notre Dame had never done that four straight times against any opponent.

37-0 – Notre Dame’s lead at halftime. The Irish gained 320 yards on 33 first-half plays, or 9.7 a snap, and scored on six of their seven full possessions before the break. Stanford ran 27 plays for 86 yards, went 0-for-7 on third down and punted six times.

23 points in 4:56 – Notre Dame’s second quarter. The Irish had the ball for less than five minutes of it and gained 230 yards on 13 snaps. Stanford held the ball for 10:04 of the quarter and came away with nothing.

10 – Points off turnovers. Boubacar Traore’s strip sack on the game’s first snap was recovered by Jaiden Ausberry at the Stanford 18, and James scored four plays later. Traore’s second-quarter interception set up a Spencer Porath field goal. Mark Zackery IV’s late pick ended Stanford’s final possession.

70 – The length of Aneyas Williams’ touchdown catch, a career long. No Irish running back had a longer touchdown reception since Chris Tyree’s 76-yarder against Central Michigan in 2023. Paired with Walton’s 97, it gave Notre Dame touchdowns of 70-plus yards both on the ground and through the air in the same game for only the third time, and the first since a 1993 game against Navy.

3 – Touchdown passes for CJ Carr, who went 14-of-20 for 181 yards and was done before the third quarter ended. He has thrown three or more in three straight games and four times this season, and he’s at 16 touchdowns against one interception.

8-of-13 – Notre Dame on third down. Stanford was 2-of-11.

58 – Stanford’s rushing yards on 21 carries, an average of 2.8. Micah Ford led the Cardinal with 48 on 13 attempts.

8 – Stanford punts, out of 12 possessions. Aidan Flintoft averaged 47.5 yards on them.

Milestones, Firsts, and Career Highs

The double-digit win streak is at 16, and nobody in the FBS has an active run that long. It’s the longest in Notre Dame history and now sits in a tie with Georgia (1945-46) and Texas (1968-69) for third all-time. Miami’s 17 straight in 2000-01 is next, and Army holds the record with 21 from 1944 to 1946.

Carr’s winning streak as a starter is up to 16 games, which ties Ian Book for the second-longest winning run by a Notre Dame starting quarterback, behind the 23 in a row Tony Rice put together in 1988 and 1989.

Carr’s three scoring throws gave him 40 for his career, the same number Rick Mirer finished with, and the two now share eighth place on the program list.

Walton joined a short list of Irish true freshmen to rush for 100 or more in consecutive games. Since 1972 the others are Jerome Heavens (1975), Allen Pinkett (1982), Autry Denson (1995) and Adams (2015).

Irish running backs have broken five touchdown runs of 90-plus yards in their home stadium since 2015, and the 97-yarder was the latest. Adams (98, 2015), Tyree (94, 2020), Kyren Williams (91, 2021) and Jeremiyah Love (98, 2024 CFP) had the other four. No Irish true freshman had a longer scoring run since Adams’ 98-yarder against Wake Forest.

Jordan Faison caught a pass for the 27th consecutive game. Only TJ Jones has a longer streak in program history, with 40 from 2010 to 2013, and Faison now shares second place with Chris Brown, who also caught a pass in 27 straight games from 2013 to 2015. Faison is up to 1,705 career receiving yards and 126 receptions.

Traore forced a fumble on a sack and picked off a pass in the same afternoon, a combination no Irish player had managed in one game since at least 1998. The sack was his 3.5th of the year, the forced fumble was his second, and the pick was the second of his career. Stanford had turned it over twice all season before Saturday.

Notre Dame has forced 14 turnovers in six games. The Irish came into the week ranked third in the Power Four in takeaways, behind Alabama (13) and UCLA (12). On the other side, Notre Dame has given the ball away once all season.

No opponent has gotten to 100 rushing yards in seven straight games, matching the 1973 team for the second-longest such run in program history since 1930. The record is eight in a row, set in 1993.

Firsts on the day:

• Jayden Sanders – start
• Jonaz Walton – touchdown
• Elijah Burress – touchdown, a 30-yard catch from Carr in the third quarter
• Javian Osborne – touchdown
• Ian Premer – reception, a 14-yarder that moved the chains in the fourth quarter
• Micah Drescher – point, on the first of his three extra points
• Mark Zackery IV – interception

Career Highs

Jonaz Walton with 181 rushing yards and a 97-yard long. Aneyas Williams with 70 receiving yards and a 70-yard long.

Positive Trends

The running game has carried the offense for two straight games. The Irish set a new season high in each, totaling 602 yards, and the freshman at the front of it has 301 yards on 36 carries in that span. James added 73 yards and two scores on 10 carries, and the three backs who reached the end zone combined for 285 yards.

The backups closed it out properly. With Noah Grubbs at quarterback, Notre Dame went 90 yards in 16 plays and ate 8:46 of the fourth quarter. Osborne carried six times for 31 yards and the touchdown, Grubbs completed three of his four throws on the drive, and Jack Larsen converted a third-and-4 with a seven-yard catch.

Stanford’s passing game got nowhere for most of the day. Davis Warren finished 12-of-22 for 144 yards, and 52 of those came on one throw. Sanders broke up two passes in his first start, both on third down.

Special teams set up points again. Faison returned a punt 37 yards to the Stanford 39, and James scored three plays later on a 31-yard run. After allowing a kickoff return touchdown in Chapel Hill, the coverage unit gave up four returns for 81 yards with a long of 27, and six of Notre Dame’s 10 kickoffs went for touchbacks.

The Irish played a clean game. No turnovers and four penalties for 28 yards.

Negative Trends

The pass rush was quiet. Traore’s strip sack was the only sack of the day and the only tackle for loss Notre Dame recorded. Two weeks earlier at Purdue, the Irish had six sacks and nine tackles for loss. Warren was hurried three times.

Stanford’s only touchdown came on a quick drive. The Cardinal went 75 yards in five plays and 1:54 in the third quarter, with a 52-yard completion to Caden High and a roughing-the-passer penalty on Jaylen Sneed doing most of the work.

One takeaway was turned into three points instead of seven. After Traore’s interception put Notre Dame at the Stanford 19, the Irish netted four yards on three plays, including a four-yard loss on third-and-2, and settled for Porath’s 33-yard field goal.

Porath missed an extra point after Walton’s 97-yard run. It was the first miss of his career after 67 straight makes, and Drescher handled the three PATs in the second half.

Team Notes

Notre Dame sent Faison, Adon Shuler, Carr and Drayk Bowen out for the coin toss. The Irish won it, deferred, and kicked off with the north end zone at their backs.

The crowd of 77,622 marked the 23rd sellout in a row at Notre Dame Stadium. Of the 30 home games Freeman has coached, 28 have sold out.

Notre Dame and Stanford have now played 40 times, and the Irish hold a 26-14 edge. Freeman is 4-1 against the Cardinal.

The Legends Trophy goes to the winner. It pairs California redwood with Irish crystal and dates to 1989, when the Notre Dame Club of San Francisco first handed it out.

Freeman’s record against current ACC programs moved to 22-4.

It was an Irish Wear Green game. Notre Dame has gone 8-1 in those since 2018, including 4-1 in the ones where the players wore green jerseys. Dating to 2010, the Irish are 9-1 in green jerseys.

At Notre Dame Stadium, the Irish have now gone 537-133-13 all-time.

Final Word

Two weeks ago, Walton was listed behind Aneyas Williams and Nolan James Jr. on the depth chart and had 108 career rushing yards. He has run for 301 since, owns the program’s single-game freshman record, and leads the team for the season. The line has opened room for him and everyone else in consecutive weeks, and Notre Dame has averaged 6.5 yards per carry across those two games.

Stanford was never going to be the test of that. The Cardinal came in 2-3 and couldn’t sustain anything until the game was 44-0. The useful part of Saturday was how little Notre Dame needed to get there: 4:56 of possession in a 23-point second quarter, and a starting quarterback who sat out the last 17-plus minutes.

The only real nitpick was up front on defense. One sack and one tackle for loss against a team that couldn’t run the ball is a thin day for a group that has been living in opposing backfields. BYU is next, on the road in Provo on Oct. 17.