Gameday is here
Well for those of you who two decades ago said Notre Dame and Miami wouldn’t play a meaningful game until hell freezes over, you were pretty close. I’m not sure if any of the blizzard conditions in El Paso, Texas last night carried over the border and into Juarez, but it certainly hit the Sun Bowl Stadium.
El Paso itself, while not a booming metropolis, has proved to be a nice city with even nicer people — many of whom where quick to warn us visitors from crossing the border to the closest thing to hell we’ve got on this side of the Atlantic. Currently Sun Bowl staff and managers from both teams are working fervently to remove the blanket of snow from the field using everything from garden rakes to folding chairs and tables. Whether or not the field is ready for gametime remains a question, but the Irish should be.
Notre Dame has had five weeks since its victory over Southern California and according to head coach Brian Kelly, the team’s battery is fully charged and they are ready to go. Tommy Rees apparently taken the 15 bonus practices and made some serious improvements according to his coaching staff. Yesterday, Kelly told the media that Rees would have to be a major factor in any Irish win. That basically translates he’s going to have to play well just to survive against the Miami defense.
The Hurricanes are known for their fast and physical front four. Not unlike the defensive front that carried Miami to the top of the college football world in the late ’80s, this unit has been the key to Miami’s success. But lost behind them behind them has been a pair of shutdown cornerbacks that have speed and athletic ability that Rees has never seen.
If Notre Dame is able to move the ball today it will have to be due to creative play-calling from the booth. Kelly and Offensive Coordinator Charley Molnar need to have a game plan designed to get the ball in and out of Rees’ hands as fast as possible as well as developing a solid running game to keep those speedy defensive lineman on their toes.
For the Hurricanes, the big question all week has been who will start at quarterback. Jacory Harris, the man who won the job, started the first eight games of the year before missing the final month of the season with a head injury. Freshman Stephen Morris took over in his absence and led the team to a 2-2 record down the stretch which included losses to Va. Tech and an embarassing season finale OT loss to USF. Why there was even a discussion about who should start is puzzling, but it didn’t seem to matter to the Irish.
Both quarterbacks play a very similar style — a style which the Irish defense should be able to handle if they play as well in December as they did in November. The key for Notre Dame’s defense today will be avoiding the big play. It seemed in the past few games that the Irish had exorcised that big play demon, but the Irish secondary will have their hands full with Miami wide receiver Leonard Hankerson. If the defense can’t keep Hankerson at bay, the Irish will have a good shot of winning this one.
Prediction:
Notre Dame 17, Miami 14
A long break and unexpectedly cold weather keep both offenses from clicking early on. Expect both teams to come up with a few turnovers during the first half and eventually settle into a groove. Michael Floyd and Hankerson will trade touchdown catches and eventually it will come down to the most reliable foot in South Bend, Indiana. David Ruffer kicks a game-winner late in the game as the rivalry is officially renewed. Hopefully, it’s not his last kick for the Irish.
Notre Dame – Georgetown Preview
Nothing like jumping in head first to a conference schedule. Notre Dame opens up its Big East schedule tonight in a primetime showdown with No. 9 Georgetown. The Irish then follow with matchups against No. 5 Syracuse and No. 4 UConn. This week isn’t exactly sink or swim for the Irish but it could set the tone for the remainder of the season. One thing is for sure, by the end of this week we will all know if this Irish team really has a chance to compete in the top conference in the country.
Notre Dame jumped five spots in the AP rankings this week to No. 15, but will have to work hard to keep from falling back down in tonight’s game. The Hoyas (11-1) are currently slight favorites and probably deserve to be. Austin Freeman has so far proved why he was given the nod as the Big East Preseason Player of the Year and he has a strong supporting cast. JTIII has his boys at Georgetown moving the ball well and taking great shots. They are currently second in the NCAA in field goal percentage (52.8) and 10th in assists per game with 18.4 — just under Notre Dame’s eighth best mark with 18.7.
The Hoyas have slipped once in a 68-65 loss to Temple, but haven’t blinked since — steamrolling through the rest of their non-conference schedule. If the Irish are going to come away with the upset they will have be strong on the offensive boards and play at the paint-drying pace they finished the season with last year.
A few things you may not know about the Hoyas: (more…)
Notre Dame tours Ft. Bliss
Mike Golic Jr. and the rest of the Irish had a good time playing around at Ft. Bliss this afternoon.
The last time Army fatigues and Miami football met at a bowl game, the event defined Miami football for a generation. This time around the impact likely won’t be as dramatic. (To learn more about Miami’s camoflauge intro at the 1987 Fiesta Bowl Click Here)
On Tuesday, the ‘Canes and the Irish both tried on fatigues during their trips to Fort Bliss, which is located right next door to the El Paso Airport and only a few minutes from the teams’ hotels. Ft. Bliss is the Army’s second largest facility in the country and has been undergoing a transformation since 2008 making it a Heavy Armor Training post. Miami toured the facility in the morning and Notre Dame got their chance after finish practice around 2 p.m. For some reason the folks at Ft. Bliss didn’t want both teams firing M4′s and riding around in tanks at the same time – probably a smart move.
The players broke up into groups and each got a chance to shoot on the virtual reality training course used by the soldiers, play around inside some heavy duty equipment and learn to repel from a cliff.
Tommy Rees can sleep soundly this week with this type of protection.
I had a chance to catch up with Chris Stewart and Darius Fleming before they left for the base and both said they were looking forward to the trip more than any of the other events planned for the Irish this week. Both have family members who serve in the Army (Fleming’s cousin in Alabama and Stewart’s godmother is a drill sergeant) and said they were excited to get an up close look at the training and, as Stewart put it, “get the chance to blow some things up.”
All of the players seemed pretty impressed by the once in a lifetime opportunity as they fired away on their tweets (thanks for the pictures, fellas) describing the experience and expressing their thanks for the troops who play for keeps every day.
Book Review: “Perfect Rivals”
Notre Dame and Miami have both settled into El Paso and have started the week-long bustle of bowl week. In four days the storied rivals will write a new chapter in their shared history as the series begins to pick up two decades after it came to a stormy close in 1990.
The teams didn’t like each other back then and if Twitter Trash Talk is any representation, it seems that this year’s crop of players is just as unfriendly…
The Irish and the ‘Canes were the main event in college football during the late 1980′s, but stopped playing when – according to the Notre Dame head honchos – the rivalry started to turn both campuses into war zones as the games approached. To prepare for the upcoming battle, I recently read Jeff Carroll’s “Perfect Rivals,” which chronicles how both teams rose to the top of the football mountain during the ’80s and also their epic clashes at the top.
Carroll’s exhaustive research shows how Miami’s bad boy image and renegade ways were not much different were not much different than the way Notre Dame rose to national recognition a half of a century earlier. The rivalry, which has been reduced to a T-shirt catch phrase, was the result of decades of decisions made by dozens of well-known names. The book retraces the steps of all the key players like Jimmy Johnson, Lou Holtz, Tony Rice and Steve Walsh to show how they landed in the center of the long-remembered battles.
As a bonus, Carroll also documents Notre Dame’s fateful decision to establish their own television contract and how it cemented their position as an independent football team in a time when giants like Miami and Penn State were succumbing to conference pressure. The Irish administration was highly criticized for the move that some see as a shady insider trading-esque scenario with NBC. Carroll, who covered the Irish for the South Bend Tribune among others for several years, remains fairly objective making the book a good read for football fans of any allegiance.
Carrol’s timing — the book was published a few months ago — was lucky for him as well as for readers who now have a great way to learn about the rivalry before the two teams face off in El Paso on Friday. For those of you that don’t have time to read all 250 pages this week, Carroll’s recent article in the South Bend Tribune provides a good, quick synopsis of the two teams’ history.
Stay tuned into the Legion all week as I will be in El Paso covering the game for Blue & Gold Illustrated and frequently updating the blog with all of the many events designed to keep the players and fans from crossing the border.
Carroll’s book on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Rivals-Battle-College-Football/dp/0345517105
Final Tune-up Before Big East Play
In its final game before starting the conference schedule, Notre Dame will take on UMBC tonight. The biggest challenge for Brey and his troops will be to keep from picking up any bad habits.
The winless Retrievers(0-11) have played only one other major conference team which ended in a 94-61 loss to UConn two weeks ago. But the loss to the Huskies was hardly an abberation for UMBC. They have averaged more than a 17-point deficit in their 11 losses to date and that number isn’t likely to go down against the No. 20 Irish. The low points so far have been a 32-point loss to Duquesne and a 42-point loss to Rider College in a game where the Retrievers only managed 39 points.
UMBC hasn’t always been a doormat. The team is a few years removed from representing the American East Conference in the NCAA Tournament in 2008. More recently, the school was named The Carnegie Foundation’s No. 1 “Up and Coming School” this year, but I doubt that has anything to do with success on the court.
A little more background of the Retrievers:
- The school’s Chesapeake Bay Retriever mascot is named True Grit. Several UMBC students on Twitter marveled that #TrueGrit was trending on the social media giant in the past week. Apparently they don’t watch a lot of movie previews.
- There are currently 10 UMBC alums playing professional sports – five of them in the National Lacrosse League
- Earlier today a former UMBC employee was found guilty of stealing nearly $10,000 from the school to buy new rugs for his home.
- UMBC’s most famous alumnus is most likely Oscar-nominated actress Kathleen Turner. She has acted in a handful of well-known films. In my opinion some of her best work was done while lending her voice to Jessica in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
