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ND Rivals site with the report:
Irish Illustrated @NDatRivals
A source tells Irish Illustrated that Jamoris Slaughter suffered a season-ending Achilles injury on Saturday night at MSU.
Notre Dame secondary has been decimated this season if the report is true. They would now have lost 2 starters (Lo Wood) and may have 2 freshmen starting in the secondary next week. Elijah Shumate looked good for them last night, but you never know when inexperience will rear its head.
to take advantage and throw the ball a lot next Saturday night. Maxwell couldn't do it. Denard needs to. ND has two inexperienced CBs and is thin overall in the secondary. Denard accuracy forever!
We'll see how our Oline responds to the blitzing linebackers. They looked great last night. Pressure has a pretty adverse effect on Denard accuracy.
Yes, but now we have a huge TE to dump to in a pressure situation.
I wouldn't want to make a living blitzing Denard. Even Alabama did not do it.
but Narduzzi has and his record is looking pretty good against M lately.
yea but denard also single handely lost the game without being really pressured in RR last year.. Missing easy throws in the endzone to Roundtree. Instead he throws 5 ft behind him right to msu
You don't blitz a QB that has legs like that. A blitz works when you contain and then collapse on the QB. Fast athletes will be able to find that small weakness and run that direction. That is why I think Denard should get the Heisman. He scares defenses even the defenses at the top of the heap.
It looks like that's not so much the case as in previous years. He's got some big targets and more importantly, it looks like he's starting to respond to pressure and coverage with his legs.
I like his chances against the old "stack the box to stop Denard" strategy this year given the above and that he looks quite a bit better making reads and throwing the ball. If he keeps calm, he can be a DC's worst nightmare.
Wonder what happened to that ND DE that was celebrating that batted pass jumping up and down towards the sideline and looked like he hurt his knee.
According to the ND rival's page he returned in the second half. I don't remember hearing his name called though.
His name is Sheldon Day, we wanted him pretty bad, and he was once rumored to be a soft lean. He was at Hoke's first Spring Game.
It looked like he could have been hurt but he played the rest of the game and was fine. We have to take advantage of their secondary with the TWO DEVIN's. There is no way they can defend that size and speed.
The devins gotta step up again and denard need to take advantage
They're in trouble. They dominated sparty, but teams that can pass the ball (USC, Oklahoma, Stanford, Michigan, ect) will put some hurt on them. "Going deep on 1st down!" After yesterday I wonder if Pitts offense might even show up like they did against VT.
It's a pretty big stretch to put M's passing game on par with that of USC, OU, and Stanford. Our passing-game strikes fear in the hearts of few. The good teams that have beaten us have done so by stacking the line and forcing Denard to throw. The ND game will be won or lost on the ground.
our passing game would of worked against Bama if we weren't playing against future NFL 1st and 2nd round draft picks. against the young... I repeat that very young back 4 of ND I think we will have a field day
Even if Denard = Maxwell as a passer which I think denard is actually superior looking at maxwell. Denard > Maxwell with his legs, so thats 1 more person ND has to account for with someone from there back 7. they want to load the box fine. they will be 1 on 1 with no help over the top against Devin and Devin. oh you want to give saftey help to your corners? ok well then denard is going to run wild.
This was basically the game plan aggainst Bama and it was solid, problem is Bama has a bit better of a secondary (ALOT BETTER) so it didn't work
There is no "think' about it as the stats say Denard is a better passer. The eyeball test says the same. Maxwell looks exactly like a first year starter playing with a young offense.
Is this the guy that injured himself celebrating after a big play last night or was that someone else?
I believe that was Sheldon Day
The ND v. Purdue game because we need to operate the same game plan as Purdue, whatever they did almost worked and our athletes are much better than Purdue's
I think ND/Purdue played the same time we were playing Air Force so I doubt anyone saw it.
The key to beating ND next week is offense, specifically passing offense. Gholson is good, but ND can't go score for score. Purdue almost edged them in South Bend, so Michigan should be able to. Defense is important, but both Purdue and Sparty held ND to 20, and they were tied at home against Purdue until Rees came in for the final drive. ND is beatable, especially now that Slaughter got hurt again. Surprisingly Purdue and State had very similar numbers offensively, (roughly 190 yards passing, under 100 rushing, 15 first downs) but with a very different result (17 points versus 3).
thats a big loss but I was pretty impressed by #22 Shumate he looks like a he's going to be a really good one.
Denard and Borges...we will see what they learned. They will, and by they I mean ND as well as Michigan State ( depending on what happens earlier to some degree) force Us to prove we can pass first in accordance with the RollTide Dictum.
I believe that bubble screens, Norfleet, and Dileo will be the difference.
Denard and Borges...we will see what they learned. They will, and by they I mean ND as well as Michigan State ( depending on what happens earlier to some degree) force Us to prove we can pass first in accordance with the RollTide Dictum.
I believe that bubble screens, Norfleet, and Dileo will be the difference.
Does this mean that miraculously ND can bring Gary Gray back for this weekend?
Even better - they're going to start guys who couldn't beat Gray out last season.
We were supposed to bring up high school seniors?....Gonna be a fun weekend!
Wow. Haven't seen you here in awhile... Welcome back?
So is that the plan? Start a pair of true freshmen at corner? Sounds like fun indeed.
those young Irish DBs played a helluva game against MSU. Granted, the MSU Oline is a mess, but the ND lines were both impressive. The lines are what worries me for next Saturday.
Covering Fowler, Lippett, and Mumphrey definitely helped them though
Boise was breaking in 9 new starters and they still completely shut down MSU's passing attack while picking off Maxwell 3 times (had a couple go through DB's hands as well).
State just sucks at throwing the football.
Unfortunately, it's not as simple as ND has a weak secondary = we can simply pick them apart through the air. ND didn't need strong DBs last night because its d-line didn't give Sparty time to throw. Fortunately, M's offense appears to be better and less predictable than Sparty's. And now M has seen some (though surely not all) of ND's tricks. But still. If ND's d-line is as nasty as it seems to be -- emphasis on seems -- M's offense will have a tough time.
But it's not as simple as what you're saying, either. ND blitzed Maxwell mercilessly because he's a statue. Teams do not blitz us that much. Even Alabama rarely did. What they will probably do is try to stay home on the edges and keep him in the pocket. He may not find a lot of running room but he should have time to throw.
Yes, of course it's true that Denard has better scrambling and pocket-presence talent. But the advantage still goes to teams that get in his face and force him to throw on the run. Because that's when he goes tacopants. ND's line is better and faster than it was last year. And I don't think we can rely on the fact that our current band of receivers will bail us out via Hemingway-esque hail-mary grabs.
I really don't think ND's going to be gameplanning to get Denard out of the pocket. The last thing they want him to do is get out in space. They're going to want him to stay put there, just as Bama did. I'll be very surprised if they blitz much, aside from a few obvious passing downs.
As for the jump-ball throws, don't forget that it was Gallon and Roundtree that caught two of our TDs against ND last season. Gardner and Funchess show some ability to make plays in the air as well.
That's what it comes down to. While our O-Line hasn't done the best job in the world in the run game, in pass protection, they've been pretty good so far. So hopefully it can hold up against blitzing LB's long enough for Devin Squared to get open
I think that's the one aspect of the team that people aren't giving enough credit to, pass protection. Sure, Bama's philosophy wasn't to sack the quarterback, but they did blitz in ways that collapsed the pocket quickly to force quick throws and cut off running lanes. I'm not sure if that'll be ND's approach, but it should be.
Regardless, It'll be interesting to see how good or bad ND's secondary is as they haven't really been tested yet. Michigan obviously needs to run the ball, but they'll have to execute in the passing game to loosten up the defense. I'm pretty confident that the line will be able to pick up blitzes well enough to give Denard the time to throw. Hopefully he and the receivers will execute.
Tough break for the kid.
but this can only help Michigan's chances
This game reminded me why I was so bummed we missed on him...
