Notre Dame 2006

[jared]

33 solo tackles, 28 assisted, 1 TFL, 0 sacks, 1 pass defended, 0 INT, 1 FF, 1 FR for a TD.
He has 13 punt returns for 134 yards and a TD (10.31 avg).
http://web1.ncaa.org/d1mfb/natlRank.jsp?year=2006&div=4&site =org
He's third on the team in tackles. Not really having a "blow you away" type of season...

 

[backrow]

yeah, and no interceptions either... i hope he's not hurtinghis NFL chances this season

thanks jared

 

[Don Wassall]

What a huge game for the Fighting Irish in a couple of hours against USC. If they can win convincingly it will be interesting to see how high ND (#6 currently)goes in the rankings. #5 Arkansas lost, #4 Florida barely beat a weak FSU team, and USC is #3. It would be a choice between Notre Dame and Michigan for #2 if the Fighting Irish pull off the win on the road.

 

[Don Wassall]

Best Caste System moment of the USC-Notre Dame game was when Bob Davies declared that Jarrett of USC and McKnight of Notre Dame were "the two receivers in this game who are going to play at the next level."

Neither Musberger nor Herbstreit (big surprise there) deigned to mention the name of Jeff Samardzija either, preferring to talk about Ted Ginn and Calvin Johnson instead.Davies did talk about JS playing in the NFL near the end of the game (someone in the truck probably told him not to overdo it so much).


BTW I saw about half the game, enough to see McKnight have two crucial drops, one because of alligator arms. He'll fit in quite well "at the next level."

 

[Colonel_Reb]

Don, the play of the black Irish offensive "weapons" was more than sad, dare I say almost expected. Walker was slower than usual. McKnight had springs in his hands, Grimes dropped a few, and Freeman looked deer in the headlights on several misses. It was a tough one to accept, but I don't feel too bad. Maybe the Irish will win their bowl game, even if it is against Michigan. I hope Carlson will be back though. They could have really used him tonight. Quinn only went to Anastasio once tonight and it was an off pass.

 

[Freedom]

Zibikowski had very little help sometimes. His blockers I think struggled on special teams and he was often forced to tackle in the open field where the defender usually has to look bad to do an effective job and make the tackle.

 

[Sark6354201]

Notre Dame's offensive line limited the Irish's play calling. Any time a team has to use max protect you can't spread the defense, and it becomes near impossible to hit open recievers. This was made worse by Rhema's drops and the absence of Carlson. Although Notre Dame fell behind early, they made no effort to run the ball in a traditional fashion. Thus the defense didn't have to respect the run, making it even harder to move the offense.

That being said, Notre Dame's offense did post a fair amount of yards, and 24 points is nothing to be ashamed of.

The real problem is the defense. The front seven is pretty decent, but it doesn't matter when your secondary is one of the worst in the nation. Zbikowski can't do it alone, and even then he seems like more of a hard hitting safety than a cover man.

 

[NotreDameIrish]

Rhema McKnight as a pro prospect

The Guy cost us any chance of getting back into the game with his drops on 4th down.


Quinn was outstanding...that 59 yard run made my jaw drop...


Zibby will return for his senior year....he hasnt had as good a year as most of us expected....


Rick Minter needs to be fired as defensive co-ordinator.

 

[OC football]

McKnight did have a nice catch in the 4th. Made me look twice. He is not better then JS though. Jeff was double teamed while as McKnight was not. Still he had 60+ yards. Jeff ends the year ahead of McKnight in recieving yards by a confortable margin.

 

[NotreDameIrish]

Doesnt the Bowl game count for stats as well OC?


Notre Dame finish 10th in the BCS standings....its a good job because if we had gotten to a BCS game,we would have been blown out again...The defense bar Landri and Zibby is useless.

 

[ocaamikedm11]

They're gonna go to another BCS bowl, you have to be in the top 12 to be eligible and bowls will be trying hard to get the irish there to make money.

 

[bigman]

Zibby will return for his senior year....he hasnt had as good a year as most of us expected....

Zib played the USC game like there were 4 tomorrows. When he decided to pick up some cash boxing during the summer I knew hehad decided that being the bestDB he could be was not that important to him. Look for him in the HW rankings nextfall.

 

[Triad]

Zib actually looks very bulked up now.

 

[Colonel_Reb]

Yes, NotreDameIrish, bowl game stats now count in yearly totals as well. That is something that has changed in college ball over the last few years.

 

[NotreDameIrish]

Yes, NotreDameIrish, bowl game stats now count in yearly totals as well. That is something that has changed in college ball over the last few years.

Good stuff.It now means Shark bar injury will almost certainly go over 1,000 yards receiving

. Another few TD receptions wouldnt go amiss either.

 

[ToughJ.Riggins]

It's unfortunate Notre Dame lost to
USC so bad. Dwayne Jarret t also
outplayed Jeff Smijdarja which unfortunatley
almost guarentees he will be taken
ahead of Jeff in the NFL
draft. There were actually a few scouting sites that had Jeff going
ahead of Dwayne. I think Jeff has
more talent than Dwayne, but oh well!

The only two receivers who I think are better than Jeff are Tedd Ginn because of upside and probably Calvin Johnson.

 

[Jimmy Chitwood]

ted ginn isn't even the best receiver on his own team, that would be Gonzalez. so where do you rank him?

as for calvin johnson, no doubt about it he can play. but what does that tell you about Weddle's performance when he matched up against cj one-on-one all game in the slippery conditions, and with no safety help, and held him to 2 catches for 19 yards?

it tells you Weddle is the best DB in America.

 

[OC football]

Well the media is already calling for Notre Dame to get "better players"... We all know what that means.

Ok bitterness aside Notre Dame lost for several reasons by my estimate.

1) They had to play in LSU's house
2) Brady Quinn wasn't as sharp as he normally is.
3) The teams corners couldnt keep up with LSU's recievors
4) Charlie Weiss made tried a fake punt too early on in the game
5) Charlie Weiss was too cautious towards the end of the game.
6) No fullback in the game to stop the blitz
7) The two TE set even though the second string TE is not a good blocker.
8) Notre Dame has an under sized DL. Edited by: OC football

 

[OC football]

On the positive... I felt that the Offensive Line held up rather well. There was just no FB to stop the blitz.
Jeff had a decent game. LSU's Jacob Hester played well.

 

[Sark6354201]

Having watched most of Notre Dame's games this year, it seems to me that the entire team rests on Brady Qinn's shoulders every time they play. Sometimes Darius Walker comes through with a running game, but usually he either isn't very good or is fine through the game until you need to depend on him. Their defense is abysmal, especially their secondary who seem to get beat badly every game no matter who the opponent is. Their front seven isn't too bad, but it definetaly can't make up for the porous secondary. The recieving corps is great with Carlson and Samardzija, but this only comes into play if Quinn can make the throws to get them the ball. When the other team has a lead and doesn't need to worry about ND running the ball, they can double cover easily and start to take away the recieving options of ND.

 

[white tornado]

L.S.U. was a far better team.

 

[ocaamikedm11]

You have to remember that Weis is still playing with Willingham's players. He had a very good recruiting class last seas (in both mainstream and anti-caste views) and is set to have another one this year, including the signing of the #1 player Jimmy Clausen. He put Notre Dame on the map, but it's going to take about 2 or 3 years for them to be legit national championship contenders. For now, I can deal with a couple bowl losses if it means better recruiting. It seems like Weis doesn't neglect the fact that he needs good white players on his teams, just look at his last class and this year's class so far.

 

[Jimmy Chitwood]

you guys are forgetting that Notre Dame's defensive problem areas are almost all black... the LBs and DBs. how much "better" can players be?

LSU threw away from Zib, the secondary's lone bright spot in more ways than one, when he was back in coverage and ran away from him when he came up close to the line of scrimmage. that just shows you how much respect for him they had and how little talent all those "superior afaletes" really had.

on offense, Brady Q's early accuracy problems really came back to bite the Irish. the Shark was toasting #19 even blacker than he already is the whole first half, but Brady couldn't get him the ball. in the second half, LSU was giving 19 lots of help and daring Brady to throw to Rhema McKnight. Brady did, and Rhema dropped more balls than a lotto machine, including one pass that hit him in the chest, deflected up in the air, and turned into an interception.

LSU's defense often had 5 white men on the field at once, and they were obviosly very fast. safety Steltz had several big hits and pass break-ups. defensive end Pittman was in the backfield against Notre Dame's only "afaletic" o-lineman so much, it looked like the Irish benched him in the second half. Hester did what he always does: make play despite limited opportunities.

all in all, it was not as bad for our guys as some of you seem to think.

 

[Triad]

LSU is very light on defense compared to the rest of the SEC.

After watching most of ND's games this year, I rate them as a top 20 team. Definitely not BCS worthy. I would wager they would be blown out by every other BCS school for the reasons OC mentioned.

As far as individually, Samardzija is a stud. He was open consistently all night.
Quinn is overrated (blasphemy?) His protection was adequate and he constantly made inaccurate throws. I've seen several more accurate passers this year. In the big games he has been disappointing at best.
Rhema McKnight is the worst Division 1 receiver I have ever seen. It is a testament to Samardzija's ability to draw a double team and somewhat to Quinn that this clown has 15 TD's this year.

 

[OC football]

Notre Dame's Offensive Line played better then I had expected. A good sign going into next year being that 4 of the 5 are comming back.

The Question is, what do you guys think the problem has been with the line? They are definatly not undersized. Is it just inexperience?