To quote Mike Mayock…”Are you kidding me??” (he said it about 10 times on Saturday). And I’m only referring to the prediction and saying that Sparty will be too much for us. I agree with the other comments. I think we looked pretty good against Purdue and outside of 1 amazing athlete we held Michigan fairly well. Again, sure he had 502 yards of offense, but he only scored 7 points in the 2nd half. I’m confident in our defense against traditional style offenses, we just can’t defend backyard/pick-up game ball very well, apparently. I’ll take our Irish in this one. It’s always a tough game with Michigan St. I’ve got Notre Dame 34-24.

1.) While Dayne Crist has a great arm, his touch is lacking right now. He just doesn’t seem to know when and how hard to toss a pass. The end zone play at the end of the game illustrates this. You can’t throw a ball out of the end zone on the last play of the game. Ever. Hopefully, he develops some of the touch-stuff over time.
2.) We have decent running backs. Armando is tough. He makes people miss, breaks tackles and has a way of punishing defenders. Wood’s a decent back, too. He’s elusive and pretty quick.
3.) Defensive weaknesses are still very apparent. With the game on the line, on a few different occasions, we could not get the penetration we needed. Consequently, we couldn’t stop Robinson, who also exposed our tackling weaknesses (how many teams on UM’s schedule will give Robinson 280 rushing yards this season?).

Two questions:
1.) Will Rees/Montana respectably settle the backup dispute?
2.) Can the defensive line get to Cousins this week?

One prediction
Michigan State will be too much for the Irish on the road: Sparty 31-21.

The point is that if Robinson averages 250-300 all purpose yds against Big Ten teams while ND yielded 502 then you have to question the capability of the coaching staff to prepare for the offensive playmakers of opposing teams.

Crist WAS in the game for more than 10 minutes, he was in for the entire 2nd half and threw an interception, as well as launching that last ball over the endzone. Using the injury as an excuse is popular, but Michigan’s only decent DB was out too, and who’s to say he doesn’t stop any of those long passes?

Agreed. The defense gave up one drive, one broken play, and 2 short yardage scores set up by picks. There were also out there for a long time. The defense is playing fine.

Our prep of the second string (or complete lack thereof), our inabiliby to adjust properly, and our inability to exploit huge mismatches in our favor were what sunk us.

To answer your question regarding talent — the answer is yes. This team is built to win right now.

ND is stacked at skill positions. We measure better than Michigan at around 18 or 19 of 22 positions. Crist is not Claussen, but he scored on 4 of 8 possessions and ND was winning 24-7 when he was in the game.

Agreed that a couple of dropped passes are too many. Floyd is legit NFL player right now. Rudolph also has a nice NFL career in front of him. Allen is a well above average RB and there is depth there (Wood flahses brilliance and Hughes is still a load) and the O-Line is playing much more cohesively. Defensively, they are playing well as a group — gave up one legit drive, one big play, and 2 scores set up off picks.

Weis consistently brought in talent (although he could not convert with it). The cupboard is not bare for BK. It’s the coaches job to develop it and get the players ready and to exploit mismatches. the second string isn’t preppred. At all. No situational awareness at the end of the halves. Having a backup run a trick play on his very first play. Can’t work a mismatch with a 6-4 220 lb all American going against below average cornerbacks — these are all on the head coach.

Huge blunder by Kelly leaving three points on the field by trying for a td with an inexperienced quarterback in the closing moments of the first half. A coach is supposed to do his best job at putting his team in a position to win the game. The Irish got to the Michigan 27 yard line for the last play of the game. What was the best position to win the game, throwing an uncatchable pass into the endzone or having those three points and attempting a 44 yard field goal on the last play of the game?

If BK didn’t think Crist was coming back, he had to go for the TD. Based on the offense’s inability to move the ball without Crist and the fact that Michigan had already scored 21 (translation: on pace for 42), you can’t settle for 3. It’s easy to say kick the FG now when you have all the facts…like the final score and Crist’s ability to play in the 2nd half.