Prediction: ND/Michigan

Submitted by rastafari on
Ok. Enough with the fluff. There will be a lot of scoring. Either defense will not dominate. The big house will rock loud. Tate will be on a roll. Breakout performance. Denard too. Minor in early knocking heads and stiff arming. No Hemingway but others in there. Zoltan. Watch out for # 2 breakout Vincent. Warren is on top of his game. Michigan 31 ND 24 You can take that to the bank.
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2009 Predictions

Wonk

September 10th, 2009 at 9:50 PM ^

Fortunately for me a free ticket landed in my lap this evening, so I will be going. Unfortunately, I am a horrible pessimist, and the final score will be 27-24 for the Irish. I fear the long ball.

Joined: 08/24/2008

MGoPoints: 1008

James Burrill Angell

September 11th, 2009 at 2:07 PM ^

I'd say our offense is more potent than last year and their defense is no great shakes but this will be first time big-game pressure for a lot of players. I think we can put up 21-24 points on them. If our defense keeps the Emu on his back most of the game, we win this one 21-10 or 21-14. If we can't get pressure on them, 28-21 or 35-21 Notre Dame. Not a pessimism thing, I just can't imagine beating this team unless Clausen has CONSTANT pressure on him.

Joined: 08/12/2009

MGoPoints: 15918

Korean Wolverine20

September 10th, 2009 at 9:51 PM ^

I say that the score is 35-28 Michigan. High scoring game Tate throws a TD to Koger, also runs for one. Minor gets the late 4th quarter TD at the goal line. Michael Shaw busts a long TD and outruns everyone, Warren has a pick six, and Brandon Graham comes up with 5 total tackles. 2 sacks, 2 TFL, and a solo tackle. Jimmy throws 3 TD, 2 to Floyd and 1 to Rudolph. Also throws 3 int due to constant pressure. They get no help from the run game, and Tate makes a freshman mistake and ND gets a pick six. It's 28-28 with Floyd hauling in his 2nd touchdown, Tate drives down the field, and Minor breaks a tackle and gets in for the TD. VERY Optimistic, but I'm an optimist regardless so :P

Joined: 12/16/2008

MGoPoints: 681

formerlyanonymous

September 10th, 2009 at 10:11 PM ^

I don't see it so much of a route as much as ND getting an extra late TD to make it look worse than what it is. I don't see them letting up with a 11 point lead. Like I said, I'm admittedly very pessimistic about things, and I think some of it is fear that the freshmen have a freshmen level game in their first real test. Add that we don't know how healthy Minor is, Hemmingway is out, our secondary (safeties and depth) may not be the strongest against a team that will pass quite a bit, their OL looking non-incompetent against Nevada, and the fact that this isn't ND's major contributors' first trip to AA, there's a lot of negatives that could be in place. So yeah, a lot of that is probably over thinking it, but that's what I do.

Joined: 06/30/2008

MGoPoints: 38964

psychomatt

September 11th, 2009 at 5:53 AM ^

... your psychologist is right. We lost by 18 points last year. We played in South Bend. We had Threet/Sheridan and a lot of guys who did not buy into the new system. We had five fumbles and two interceptions (most on our side of the field). And you are picking us to lose by the same amount -- 18 points -- again this year? You have a right to your opinion, but it's unnecessarily negative to me. Just my opinion.

Joined: 08/25/2009

MGoPoints: 3425

BiSB

September 10th, 2009 at 10:05 PM ^

31-28 Blue. Tate to Odoms with 2 minutes left FTW. Brandon Graham and Mike Martin set up camp in the ND backfield all day. Zoltan scares the bird-crap out of a flock of migratory birds overhead.

Joined: 08/15/2009

MGoPoints: 46071

OSUMC Wolverine

September 10th, 2009 at 10:02 PM ^

Michigan 38 ND 21.....Half time 24-7.....we play 4 quarters of football, dont sit on a lead, 10 different players with receptions, collective 300+ yards rushing. Charlie eats his head set out of frustration, followed by his shirt, bra and girdle. RR is carried off the field on the teams shoulders...

Joined: 09/06/2008

MGoPoints: 4403

teldar

September 10th, 2009 at 10:03 PM ^

I'd say it's a push. My only question, since I didn't watch any of the ND game, is how much Jimmah played in the second half. Looking at the box score it looked like he was involved throughout the game. While Tate did play for M in the second half, he only played to start the drives and the other QB's killed them and failed on the scoring. Rich didn't appear to really be trying to score in the second half, not that I remember (having sheridan and coner in is NOT trying to score, as is NOT throwing deep passes) So, mostly you have to compare first halves. Rivals felt that Nevada and WMU were basically the same quality (ranked one after the other). If you take out second half scoring when M basically quit on the attempted offensive production, you have a score of 31-28, M. Both teams had defenses that stopped similar quality offenses. Both teams had offenses which scored similar points on similar quality D's. I guess the biggest difference is that M had a larger drop off in the second half when defensive backups were in. So what does that give us? M has a (maybe) better offense. Minor being back will hopefully mean more than Hemmingway being out. The defenses MAY be similar in overall quality, but ND's is most likely deeper (duh). If nobody gets hurt and we keep their drives short, we should come out on the + side. Long drives or injured players, and ND probably scores more.

Joined: 07/14/2009

MGoPoints: 8127

teldar

September 11th, 2009 at 4:59 AM ^

It seemed to go down somewhat in the second half. I wasn't sure from the box score when Clausen was still playing, but I think the lack of production other than on an 88 yard td pass, 2nd play of the posession? doesn't show any sustained offensive production in the second half. If this is true, it's a possible showing that ND got outcoached in the second half, but that Nevada didn't have the athletes to compete for the long ball. This would favor M, who hopefully has better athletes than Nevada.

Joined: 07/14/2009

MGoPoints: 8127

Irish

September 11th, 2009 at 10:33 AM ^

I wouldn't really bank on that, we were content to keep the clock running and play good defense, plus we went 3 deep at WR, TE, 4 deep at RB, and the Oline saw a much more expanded rotation as well. We're deep but not deep enough to not expect a drop off at some point.

Joined: 06/05/2009

MGoPoints: 3696

teldar

September 11th, 2009 at 4:55 AM ^

SW Columbus, actually. But Hilliard city schools. So. I DO live IN columbus. And I'm tired of OSU fans. But Columbus is actually a very nice city. I think. As I say, except for the OSU fans. And my wife worked for OSU. I resisted the evil, however, and when I'm done with school (again and FINALLY) I'm still not going to work for them. Even with their tempting benefits.

Joined: 07/14/2009

MGoPoints: 8127

Topher

September 11th, 2009 at 12:58 AM ^

"My only question, since I didn't watch any of the ND game, is how much Jimmah played in the second half. Looking at the box score it looked like he was involved throughout the game." Not really sure why a three-year starter needed that much experience in a 35-0 blowout, but I'm not a Decided Schematic Advantage either. BTW, the untold story of the OU debacle last week (at least I haven't heard anyone talk about it) - remember last season when Sam Bradford was playing 60 minutes in blowouts and OU was pushing over 60 points every week? I think that came back to bite them. I mean, they have other quarterbacks on the team - they could have used the experience last year and been serviceable last Saturday. Even a couple of second halves might have produced a more game-ready palyer than a redshirt freshman in his first snaps.

Joined: 07/05/2008

MGoPoints: 742

petered0518

September 10th, 2009 at 10:24 PM ^

If this is way off, please correct me, but I always thought Sam Young look rather ponderous and slow. Not that he is bad, but I could see him having a really hard time handling Graham and Roh. I will predict M-31, ND-28 although I have to preface that by saying I always predict a michigan win(13-0 national champs woooo)

Joined: 08/05/2009

MGoPoints: 902