By the Numbers: Notre Dame Football Takes Over After Halftime Against Navy

Notre Dame is 7-1 after a 35-13 win over Navy at Gillette Stadium, but the score covers up a first half the Irish spent mostly watching. Navy ran 41 plays and held the ball for 23:33 before halftime. Notre Dame got three possessions, and the Midshipmen were ahead 13-7 with less than two minutes left in the second quarter.

The second half belonged to the Irish. Notre Dame scored touchdowns on its first three possessions after the break and finished with 28 straight points, starting with Nolan James Jr.’s 52-yard run with 55 seconds left in the half. Navy ran 16 plays after halftime, gained 56 yards and picked up one first down.

The rushing numbers cut both ways. Notre Dame bounced back from a 115-yard day at BYU with 204 yards on 29 carries, 7.0 a pop. The defense gave up 212 on the ground, the most by any opponent this season and the second game in a row over 100, although 163 of those yards came before halftime.

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

Key Stats

23:33 – Navy’s first-half time of possession. Notre Dame had the ball for 6:27. In the second quarter alone, the Midshipmen kept it for 13:29 to Notre Dame’s 1:31.

22:38 – Game clock used by Navy’s three first-half scoring drives. They went 14 plays for a field goal, 16 plays for another field goal and 11 plays for a touchdown, and they produced 13 points.

28 – Consecutive points for Notre Dame to finish the game, after Navy went up 13-7 with 1:52 left in the first half.

1 – Navy first downs after halftime. Three punts and a turnover on downs ended the Midshipmen’s four second-half possessions, and the Irish held them to 49 rushing yards on 13 carries over the final two quarters.

107 – James’ rushing yards on nine carries, an average of 11.9. He scored on runs of 52 and 23 yards, with the 52-yarder going down as the longest of his career, and went over 100 on the second one. It’s his second 100-yard game of the season, along with Michigan State.

50 seconds – How long Notre Dame needed to go 72 yards at the end of the first half. Carr hit Micah Gilbert and Jordan Faison for 10 yards apiece, and James went the final 52 on the next snap to put the Irish back in front, 14-13.

7-of-7 – Carr’s passing in the third quarter. He finished 19-of-29 for 210 yards and two touchdowns and has not been intercepted since Purdue.

6 for 78 – Jerome Bettis Jr.’s catches and receiving yards, both career highs. His 31-yard catch on the opening play of the fourth quarter was his first career touchdown and made it 35-13.

0 – Yards Navy gained on its fourth-and-2 at its own 43 late in the third quarter. Luke Talich and Adon Shuler stopped Jackson Gutierrez at the line, and Notre Dame scored two plays later.

212 – Navy’s rushing yards on 48 carries. Gutierrez carried 28 times for 110 yards. BYU’s 121 two weeks earlier had been the most Notre Dame allowed this season.

8 for 86 – Navy’s penalties. A holding call wiped out a 64-yard Gutierrez touchdown run to open the second quarter, and a face mask and a personal foul on Navy kept two Notre Dame touchdown drives moving in the third quarter. Multiple other late hit penalties could have been called on Navy as well.

17-0 – Notre Dame’s all-time record in games played on Oct. 31. Eight of those wins have come against Navy.

Milestones, Firsts, and Career Highs

Carr’s 11-yard touchdown to Gilbert in the first quarter was the 41st of his career, matching Everett Golson for seventh in Notre Dame history. His 31-yarder to Bettis in the fourth gave him 42 to pass Golson. Carr is 148-of-222 for 1,849 yards with 18 touchdowns and one interception this season.

James has found the end zone in every game Notre Dame has played this season, eight for eight.

Faison’s 24-yard catch on Notre Dame’s first snap extended his run of games with at least one catch to 29, still second in program history behind the 40 TJ Jones put together from 2010 to 2013. Eight active FBS players have a longer one going. Faison has 1,815 career receiving yards and 136 receptions.

Drayk Bowen started at linebacker for the 36th consecutive game, the fourth-longest run of starts at that position in program history. Unfortunately Bowen was injured during the game and reports have indicated he could be out for an extended period of time.

Notre Dame has beaten Navy nine straight times, a streak that started in 2017, and Freeman is 5-0 against the Midshipmen.

Firsts on the day:

Jerome Bettis Jr. – touchdown

Career highs:

• Nolan James Jr. with a 52-yard run.
• Jerome Bettis Jr. with six receptions and 78 receiving yards.
• Luke Talich with 10 tackles.
• Armel Mukam with four tackles.

Positive Trends

The second-half adjustment was complete. Navy averaged 4.6 yards on 41 first-half snaps and 3.5 on 16 after the break, and its longest second-half possession lasted six plays.

The run game came back. After 30 carries for 115 yards at BYU, the Irish ran 29 times for 204. James, Jonaz Walton and Aneyas Williams combined for 187 yards on 23 carries.

Notre Dame did a lot with very little in the first half. Nineteen snaps produced 147 yards and two touchdowns.

Talich led the team with 10 tackles, and Jaiden Ausberry added eight.

The Irish turned the ball over zero times and were flagged twice for 25 yards.

Negative Trends

Navy controlled the first half. The Midshipmen ran 22 more plays than Notre Dame before halftime, and the Irish defense needed a Navy penalty to keep a 64-yard touchdown off the board.

The run defense gave up 163 yards in the first half alone. Navy’s first three drives featured runs of 14, 16 and 13 yards and converted both fourth-down tries.

Notre Dame’s only first-half punt came on a three-and-out with three Carr incompletions, two of them deep shots to Faison. It took 28 seconds, and Navy answered with an 11-play touchdown drive.

Shuler’s pass interference penalty handed Navy a first down at the Notre Dame 20 on the drive that ended in its second field goal.

The opening kickoff went out of bounds, which gave Navy the ball at its 35 to start the game. The Midshipmen used it to put together a 14-play, 8:17 drive.

The defense still isn’t getting to the quarterback. There were no sacks and one tackle for loss, and Notre Dame now has one sack in its last three games. Navy threw only nine passes, but the Irish didn’t record a quarterback hurry on any of them.

A 13-play, 7:02 drive in the fourth quarter came away empty. It survived an overturned 29-yard completion to Elijah Burress, then ended at the Navy 23 when Carr missed on third-and-7 and fourth-and-7.

Team Notes

Notre Dame’s coin-toss captains were Bowen, Carr, Faison and Shuler. The Irish won it and deferred, and they started on defense with the south end zone behind them.

The crowd at Gillette Stadium was 61,293. It was the first Notre Dame-Navy game in Foxborough, and Gillette became the 12th NFL stadium to host the series.

Notre Dame and Navy have now met 99 times. The Irish hold an 85-13-1 edge and is 52-8-1 at neutral sites. Outside of 2020, the two programs have met every season since 1927, and no opponent has played Notre Dame more often.

The Rip Miller Trophy is split in two. Each school keeps one half, engraved with its own captains for every season, and the two halves are put back together when possible during rivalry week.

Notre Dame is 143-23-5 all-time against American Athletic Conference schools and 7-0 against them under Freeman.

Final Word

The second half was what Notre Dame should look like against Navy. The defense gave the Midshipmen one first down, the offense scored on its first three possessions, and Notre Dame kept possession for 20:53 of the final 30 minutes. James provided the spark late in the first half and kept going after it.

The first half is harder to wave off. Navy put together three drives of 11 or more plays, ran the ball 35 times for 163 yards and held the ball for all but 1:31 of the second quarter. A Notre Dame team that had just lost at BYU needed a holding penalty and a 50-second drive to go into the locker room ahead.

Two straight opponents have now topped 100 rushing yards after seven straight didn’t, and the pass rush has one sack in three games. Navy’s option offense explains part of both numbers. It doesn’t explain BYU, and Miami comes to South Bend next on Nov. 7.