Notre Dame vs. Navy: Game Grades, Analysis for the Fighting Irish
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish escaped another scare from the Midshipmen of the Naval Academy, overcoming a third-quarter deficit to win on the road, 49-39.
Everett Golson found the end zone six times, three each via the air and the ground, to lead the Irish to the win. Notre Dame improved to 7-1 and looks to move on to some resume-building games down the stretch here in November.
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| Pass Offense | A- | B+ |
| Run Offense | A | A |
| Pass Defense | B+ | B+ |
| Run Defense | B | B |
| Special Teams | Incomplete | D |
| Coaching | B | B+ |
Pass Offense
Everett Golson had another accurate outing tonight at FedEx Field, finishing 18-of-25 for 315 yards, three touchdowns and an interception. Most of that production came in the first half, and the Irish added only 101 passing yards in the second half, but it was more than enough to edge past the Midshipmen.
It's also worth noting that a good potion of Golson's ground yardage came during designed passes, after Golson scrambled out of the pocket and took care of things himself on the ground—including two of his three rushing touchdowns.
Because Notre Dame's passing production fell off after halftime, the passing offense's grade drops slightly, but we're not going to issue any great reduction, as the game's situations determined much of Notre Dame's play-calling after the break.
Run Offense
Here is where we were pleasantly surprised tonight. Notre Dame's rushers combined for 218 yards and four touchdowns on 39 carries (5.6 yards per carry). Tarean Folston led the way with 149 yards and a touchdown on 20 carries, including some game-clinching runs late in the fourth quarter.
Everett Golson added 33 yards and three touchdowns on nine carries.
Navy's defense is usually much more stout against the run, but the Notre Dame offensive line did a fabulous job of bottling up the Navy front seven and opened up some massive holes for the Irish runners to scamper through.
Brian Kelly and his staff have to be happy with this kind of performance.
Pass Defense
Navy isn't known for passing the football, and the Midshipmen attempted only 17 passes against the Irish, completing just six for 118 yards, two scores and a pick.
It's hard to judge a pass defense with such a small sample of plays to look at, but the Irish did a great job of disrupting the late upset bid by Navy when the Midshipmen were forced into throwing the football.
Justin Utupo had the Notre Dame interception, snagging a pass that was deflected at the line of scrimmage late in the game, providing Notre Dame with a brief momentum shift (although the resulting Notre Dame drive ended in no points).
Run Defense
If you're only looking at stats, or don't know anything about Navy, you might think giving up 336 yards and three touchdowns isn't very good. But considering Navy ran the ball 60 times in their triple-option attack, 336 isn't such a terrible number.
Consider this: Notre Dame's impressive ground game against Navy averaged 5.6 yards per carry. Navy averaged 5.6 yards per carry against Notre Dame. That's a draw in our minds.
And considering how difficult it is to prepare for and defend an option attack that is rarely used anymore these days, we'll give credit where credit is due.
We were also impressed with Notre Dame's post-halftime adjustments, and despite giving up two rushing touchdowns in the second half, Navy's per-rush average dropped dramatically with some great team pursuit from the Irish.
Special Teams
This facet of the game was surprisingly awful for the Irish. Kyle Brindza, usually reliable, was 0-of-2 on field goals (one of which was blocked) and the punt-return game from Cody Riggs managed to muff one of Navy's few punts on the evening (although the Irish recovered). On the other punt that Riggs was credited with the return, he gained zero yards. Two punt returns and no return yards? Not good.
At least Brindza was 7-of-7 on extra points, and his lone punt (Notre Dame's first punt against Navy in two years), he booted it for a solid 45 yards.
Coaching
It's always interesting to see how coaching staffs approach a game against Navy. Early on, it looked as if Notre Dame—like most other non-academy teams—would struggle against the triple option. That's not necessarily bad or surprising; Ohio State struggled mightily against the Midshipmen way back in Week 1, and plenty of other teams have had a difficult time finding ways to bottle up an offensive scheme based on misdirection and so many options, it's impossible to know where the ball will end up on any given play.
After halftime is when the coaches really earn their keep, and Brian Kelly earned it Saturday. Notre Dame is probably more familiar with Navy than most "power" teams that face the Midshipmen, but Kelly was able to retool his defense after halftime, moving to a three-down defensive scheme, putting seven or even eight or nine guys in the box to pursue the football.
That kind of defensive pursuit won't be 100 percent successful against the triple option, but Notre Dame has the athletes to seriously disrupt the Navy attack. Notre Dame held Navy's run game to nearly identical averages per rush in each half (55.54 in the first half, 5.60 in the second). And while the Midshipmen were able to score more often after halftime, so too were the Irish.
It wasn't always pretty, and it certainly wasn't perfect, but the Irish stuck with the game plan, and it paid dividends, if late in the fourth quarter. The result is a 7-1 record heading down the stretch.
Unless otherwise noted, quotes or references to quotes were obtained firsthand by the writer.
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