Notre Dame vs. North Carolina State: Game Grades, Analysis for Irish

Notre Dame and North Carolina State braved the lashing by Hurricane Matthew, and the 10-3 victory for the Wolfpack is indicative of the kind of game the weather allowed. We suspected going into this game that special teams and limiting mistakes would be the two biggest factors.

Our suspicions were correct.

N.C. State capitalized on Irish turnovers and made the game-deciding play on special teams to edge out the Irish by seven in Raleigh, North Carolina. While playing a game in a hurricane may not be the best barometer of how good or bad any particular unit is, there were still plenty of takeaways from Saturday's not-so-stellar performance from the Irish.

Let's go through the bad and the ugly in this week's game grades—because there isn't much good to talk about.

Pass Offense

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It probably shouldn't surprise anyone that a passing game would lack consistency when playing in a hurricane. Not only does the rain affect the throw and catch, but the wind makes the football do crazy things en route to the receiver.

The first half didn't go well for DeShone Kizer, who finished with just 38 yards on 6-of-14 passing.  There was also a costly interception throw on 3rd-and-goal, where Notre Dame had an opportunity to at least tie the game before halftime.

Things didn't get a whole lot better after the half. Kizer finished 9-of-26 for just 54 yards.

The conditions had a lot to do with that pitiful output, and we're curious as to why Notre Dame threw the ball 26 times (N.C. State threw the ball 14 times by comparison). But that's on the coaching staff.

Still, we're not about to reward Kizer and the receiving corps for an admittedly weather-induced poor performance.

Pass Offense: D

Run Offense

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If the 38 yards passing in the first half looked bad, the 38 yards of rushing looked worse. If anything, one would expect a team to lean on the running game in such sloppy conditions, but curiously, head coach Brian Kelly didn't go to the run often in the first half.

It took until the fourth quarter before the coaches really started to try the run game with any regularity. Still, Notre Dame often found itself in 3rd-and-long situations that necessitated throws.

That wouldn't have been such a problem if the Irish had decided to run on first or second down, but we digress...

The "best" performance of the day was from Josh Adams who had just 51 yards. The long run for the Irish? Just 12 yards.

Yes, the field was akin to a swamp, but N.C. State played on that same field and managed to pick up 157 rushing yards compared to Notre Dame's 59.

Run Offense: D

Pass Defense

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OK, this is where the evaluations get difficult. Overall, the Wolfpack were just 7-of-14 throwing the football for 41 yards. Ordinarily, that would be a spectacular performance.

But with Hurricane Matthew making the biggest impact on the passing game, it's probably unfair to N.C. State's offense to say Notre Dame's secondary bottled it up.

We'd still love to see some better coverage, especially in man-to-man situations, but this wasn't really the best showcase for any secondary. At least in this case, Matthew helped out the Irish.

Pass Defense: Incomplete

Run Defense

Grant Halverson/Getty Images

Here is where Notre Dame needed to be solid, and here is where it fell short.

N.C. State ran for 157 yards on 51 attempts, which doesn't sound so terrible. But given the conditions in Raleigh, that was more than enough to keep the Wolfpack in control of the clock for most of the game.

Matthew Dayes had 126 yards on 23 carries, and the Irish struggled to bring him down all afternoon. Again, we saw far too many arm tackles and D-line holes for anyone to pretend that Notre Dame has anything close to a halfway decent defense.

One good sign was Notre Dame's newfound ability to make stops on 3rd-and-short. The defensive line and linebackers were—really for the first time this season—meeting and challenging the opposing offensive line at the line of scrimmage and causing disruptions in the ground game.

Yes, it helped that everyone knew that passing wasn't going to be a big part of any game plan, but we've seen Notre Dame sniff out the play before and still look silly.

Baby steps...

Run Defense: C+

Special Teams

Associated Press

On one hand, we'd love to shower Justin Yoon with praise for knocking through a 40-yard field goal in a hurricane. It makes you wonder why Kelly opted to keep him on the bench one drive later when Yoon could have attempted a 41-yarder...

Just as we're about to hand out that "A," we remember that the deciding play also happened on special teams. In monsoon-like conditions, it's often the special teams that come up with a game-changer. Curiously enough, it didn't appear that the weather was the reason the play in question was sound.

Late in the game, Notre Dame was punting for the umpteenth time. Despite some earlier issues with holding onto the football, the snap looked spot on, and the punter wasn't facing any substantial punt rush. Still, Tyler Newsome took an extra half beat to make sure he had the football in his hands before attempting the punt.

That extra moment resulted in a blocked punt that was returned for a touchdown.

And just like that, the special teams cost the Irish the game—after scoring Notre Dame's only points.

Special Teams: D

Coaching

Matt Cashore-USA TODAY Sports

If you look closely at the stats and brush off your math skills, you'll notice that adding sacks to passing plays and subtracting them from run plays gives the Irish 31 pass plays and 33 rush plays. In a hurricane.

What, exactly, were offensive coordinator Mike Sanford Jr., associate head coach Mike Denbrock and head coach Brian Kelly thinking? Did they seriously just call 31 pass plays in a hurricane?

Yes, they did.

So now the next question has to be why. Throughout the week, that question will likely be asked of Kelly every time he's in front of a microphone—and he better come up with a good answer.

For now, his postgame comments of the coaching staff feeling as if they "let them [the players] down" will have to stand on their own. Then again, he followed that up by saying, "I don't think I would second-guess that" when asked about the decision to call so many passing plays.

We encourage you to watch the postgame press conference. It has an odd sense of being disconnected from reality and even contradictory at times.

Something isn't quite right under the hood, and Kelly is going to have to diagnose the problem quickly, lest the restlessness turn into something uglier.

Coaching: F

All recruiting information via Scout. Stats from NCAA.com, CFBStats.com or B/R research. Quotes obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Follow Bleacher Report CFB Featured Columnist and Notre Dame Live Correspondent David Luther on Twitter @davidrluther.