Notre Dame (football only discussion)

[matcar]

I don't know that ND is "headed in the right" direction". Perhaps they are, but I do agree with what others have said about at least being competitive. Having said that, I would agree that the general lack of juniors AND seniors with appreciable talent IS a problem. tOSU suffered slightly because of the 2003 class, but if we had TWO classes like that...ouch. So, two lousy classes coupled with a different style of player needed is making things worse. Then, it would appear that CW has some things to learn about being a molder of men and a teacher. This seems to have created one of those "perfect storms".

But, the general level of talent being brought in over the past 2 years DOES appear to be significantly better. I don't know that CW is going to land ND any championships, but I do believe that with the talent they are bringing in, they can be just as competitive as LLLLLoyd Carr has been over the past several years. And while we laugh at TSUN, their overall record over the past few yrs isn't bad. And I could see CW being in the neighborhood of success that LLLLLoyd has had if he continues to bring in the talent. It's hard not to....even with a pig-headed egomaniac with marginal teaching skills.

[ysubuck]

BB73 kind of beat me to it.

But Ohio State basically could have taken the 03 recruiting season off after they got Patterson, Gonzalez, and Barton in the fold. That's it for that class. Of those only Barton is left as Patt used up his eligibility and Gonzo left early.

How is that any different than what NoD fans are alleging about Willingham?

EDIT: Oh yeah, there's a kid named Boekman on the roster from that class as well.

[ulukinatme]

Hmmm, there was never a complain about these guys until this season. puzzling. maybe thomas shouldn't have been moved from offense to defense repeatedly.

Actually, there were complaints about the O-line last year as well, Sullivan was among them. Lambert was among the backfield members making mental mistakes last year, to his credit he did make at least one big play on the MSU pick 6 at the end of the game. Travis Thomas wasn't spectacular the first time he was on offense, see a BYU game a few years ago where he fumbled 39 times. He showed some decent runs in '05 and '06 to spell Walker, I do think he did a decent job stepping in as a LB last year considering he never played there before. As mentioned, my only guess as to why Thomas lost the starting RB position is attitude or just doesn't have the same talent as Aldridge and Allen

here's where my little rant comes into play. all of the castigating blame on willingham for this season is just too laughable. All of these "duds" willingham recruited have been under chuckwagon's reign for going on 3 seasons. none of them has shown any real improvement. all you heard about was how good zibiboxer was in 2005. come 2007, you wouldn't even know he was still on the team. as the offense gets more reps, they'll get better? probably. unfortunately, your head coach was too busy racking up stats to bother getting any experience for his underclassmen. Sullivan was going to be the OL anchor this year, but now he's struggling.

Just like last season, ND returned 4 starting OL, Carlson, Quinn, Walker, He/She WR, and Rhema McKnight, yet were more inconsistent and less productive offensively. But, that couldn't be blamed on Willingham, so it was conveniently ignored.

Zibby has done decent this year actually, hes a leading tackler and has caused the most turnovers I believe. Hes had a couple nice returns too, see the PSU game where he handed the offense a first and goal and they couldn't punch it in.
Willingham hasn't been the only problem for this team, they were dying before then. People like to point out Willingham was 8-0 his first season, but he wasn't exactly dominating in those games. At least half of them were nailbiters that came off decent defense, special teams, and a lot of luck, then getting embarrassed by USC at the end of the year per usual. Thats as good as it ever got for Ty, that 8-0 run, and the progress he was showing at year end '04, '05 was going to be ugly with the fresh defense and inconsistant offense.
As far as O-line play last year, not sure what happened. I know we lost Schwapp with an injury early in the year, hes been a decent blocking fullback. The running game wasn't there, and the protection just wasn't as good. The offense could still score, but it seemed more eradic. As mentioned, I do think it was a poor mistake not to get the younger guys more reps last year, I think they would have been in a better position this year and the large number of Freshmen wouldn't be starting.

[Steve19]

How can a program that has not really challenged for a national championship in nearly a generation, having its worst year ever, and ranked at the bottom of the FCS be considered to be moving in the right direction?

[sandgk]

Originally Posted by Steve19

How can a program that has not really challenged for a national championship in nearly a generation, having its worst year ever, and ranked at the bottom of the FCS be considered to be moving in the right direction?

Nowhere to go - but up.

[SNIPER26]

Originally Posted by OCBucksFan

Their football poll was the best.



5% of em were right

There was another one, kind of similar to this one. "What do you expect from ND this season"

A. Good season
B. Great season
C. Not sure (We'll put you down for great)
So I assume 2-10 is good by ND standards?

[Bucklion]

Originally Posted by Steve19

How can a program that has not really challenged for a national championship in nearly a generation, having its worst year ever, and ranked at the bottom of the FCS be considered to be moving in the right direction?

And for that matter why in the hell is everyone saying they've turned the corner after one competitive HALF? I mean they could get blown out the next 3 games, or they might not, but I don't think playing one half even after being down 23-0 is cause for celebration...or has that taken the place of almost beating teams during rebuilding years?

[matcar]

Originally Posted by Bucklion

And for that matter why in the hell is everyone saying they've turned the corner after one competitive HALF? I mean they could get blown out the next 3 games, or they might not, but I don't think playing one half even after being down 23-0 is cause for celebration...or has that taken the place of almost beating teams during rebuilding years?

OK, I'll bite here. I don't know about turning a corner, but I think playing one half of solid football WOULD be something to get excited about if you had seen each and every other quarter/half of ND football this year. ND has been so completely outmatched and horrible that this is something I'd latch onto if I was a fan.

[ulukinatme]

I don't know if the team has "turned the corner" yet, but if they can play 4 quarters of football like the last two at Purdue and the first two at MSU, they'll win some games. That remains to be seen though.
As far as the team going in the right direction, I'm thinking long term here, not short term. Short term, yeah, lot of youth and inexperience out there, lots of mental mistakes, they're correcting them as the season goes though. If they continued to make the same mistakes at the same frequency, the future would be pretty dismal. From what was mentioned in the post-game reports, the team hasn't had a lot of confidence in the locker room after games, which can be expected the way they started. There was a different energy after last week. If they can ride that and continue to improve, then yes I would say the team is in the right direction long term and have a good future.

[Bucklion]

Originally Posted by matcar

OK, I'll bite here. I don't know about turning a corner, but I think playing one half of solid football WOULD be something to get excited about if you had seen each and every other quarter/half of ND football this year. ND has been so completely outmatched and horrible that this is something I'd latch onto if I was a fan.

I would too if I was a fan...of Florida International. But this is a team with arrogant fans, an arrogant coach, and arrogant expectations...the last of which isn't necessarily a bad thing, I think we all have them if we believe our program is elite. If Ohio State loses a game, I think to myself OK, we'll bounce back and get the next one. IF we were 0-5, I certainly wouldn't be trumpeting a competitive half against 2 teams that will not win the Big Ten this year. If I'm an Indiana fan, I'm ecstatic last week, wow, we beat Iowa on the road, awesome, but as an Ohio State fan, it's yeah, we beat another overrated Kirk Ferentz team...next. It's expectations versus results, and I just don't see one (OK 2 in separate games) half of football as being worthy of trumpeting anything for a prgram of Notre Dame's former stature...turning a corner or otherwise.

[cincibuck]

Originally Posted by ulukinatme

I don't know if the team has "turned the corner" yet, but if they can play 4 quarters of football like the last two at Purdue and the first two at MSU, they'll win some games.

Ukulele, you need to lay off the orange cream Margarita Kool - Aid. Almost every team "plays better" when their opponent starts trading opportunities to score more points for time off the clock. Fourth and eight or nine and Charlie rolled the dice. Lucky for him Purdue went ahead and played prevent.... I don't know why ANYBODY ever plays "prevent, but that's a whole other issue... giving the Irish a great opportunity to make some yardage and another score. Then Purdue went back to work and put the game back out of reach.

I'm not sure about UCLA and what happened to them in Utah, but BC and USC don't look to me to be the kind of teams you can expect to "get better" with.

The more I watch, the more I become convinced the problem isn't talent. It's The Genius.. and you're stuck with him for some time.

[Dryden]

FWIW, JT mentioned in both his pre-Purdue Tuesday presser and today's call-in show that nothing Purdue has done in the second half of any of their games this season is worth analyzing. OSU is essentially breaking down only Purdue's first half film, as Purdue has 18 returning starters (7 of them seniors on defense), so the Boilermakers are rotating their defense heavily in the 2nd half of every game trying to manufacture depth and get some guys prepared for 2008 (there's a hint in there for Charlie). As JT pointed out today, all the opponents have lit up Purdue's secondary this season in the 2nd half, because of the combination of the defensive rotation and the fact that Purdue has been up so big that other teams are forced to throw to try and claw back into the game.

[Steve19]

Originally Posted by ulukinatme

I don't know if the team has "turned the corner" yet, but if they can play 4 quarters of football like the last two at Purdue and the first two at MSU, they'll win some games. That remains to be seen though.
As far as the team going in the right direction, I'm thinking long term here, not short term. Short term, yeah, lot of youth and inexperience out there, lots of mental mistakes, they're correcting them as the season goes though. If they continued to make the same mistakes at the same frequency, the future would be pretty dismal. From what was mentioned in the post-game reports, the team hasn't had a lot of confidence in the locker room after games, which can be expected the way they started. There was a different energy after last week. If they can ride that and continue to improve, then yes I would say the team is in the right direction long term and have a good future.

It must be dreadful to be a Domer fan these days and I will not pile on. I would say that my belief is that you may be seeing things through a very different perceptual lens than an unbiased observer. If they stick within 4 touchdowns of UCLA this week, I will be very surprised.

[matcar]

Originally Posted by Bucklion

I would too if I was a fan...of Florida International. But this is a team with arrogant fans, an arrogant coach, and arrogant expectations...the last of which isn't necessarily a bad thing, I think we all have them if we believe our program is elite. If Ohio State loses a game, I think to myself OK, we'll bounce back and get the next one. IF we were 0-5, I certainly wouldn't be trumpeting a competitive half against 2 teams that will not win the Big Ten this year. If I'm an Indiana fan, I'm ecstatic last week, wow, we beat Iowa on the road, awesome, but as an Ohio State fan, it's yeah, we beat another overrated Kirk Ferentz team...next. It's expectations versus results, and I just don't see one (OK 2 in separate games) half of football as being worthy of trumpeting anything for a prgram of Notre Dame's former stature...turning a corner or otherwise.

You're probably right, but I guess I'm thinking that if my team was 0-5 and I was used to winning, I'd be looking at ANY momentum shift as the turning of the corner and hoping to be correct. Logic wouldn't play a big role in it...

[Dryden]

Notre Dame fans grieve, coping with the reality that nobody gives a [censored] about them, unless they're watching because they don't give a [censored] about them. Hysterical. They're 0-5, and some are seriously dumbfounded how ABC could bump their market share for Ohio State/Purdue, calling it a bad business decision.



IrishIllustrated.com - Message Boards

It kills me that the myth that people will watch Notre Dame lose more than watch them win continues to perpetuate. Nobody likes watching bad football, no matter what color the jerseys are. Ratings are down, and these clowns are trying to rationalize that a national broadcast of UCLA/ND would rate better than OSU/Purdue.