I Hate Moral Victories, But Notre Dame Has a Lot of Positives in Loss

Before the game yesterday, I was at a friends house. We have an annual work tradtion, to get together with all Notre Dame fans and USC fans. There is one USC fan who is a good guy but is particularly loud and wears his emotions on his sleeve. The year before this guy was going nuts because USC was hammering the Irish.

This year I, like the other domers, were hopeful for a victory. At the same time we were scared that they would completely destroy the Irish again. We thought it has to be closer than that.

On the first Notre Dame drive I was feeling positive. They didn't score but they did pick up a couple of first downs. Ordinarily that would be nothing to get excited about, but last year they didn't get a first down until the closing moments of the third quarter.

Defensively the Irish were really playing to stop the run particularly Joe McKnight. Unfortunately Matt Barkley lead them with three quick passess to take a 7-0 lead.

Unlike in previous years, the Irish answered with a score of their own. The amazing thing was the drive didn't really feature that much of Jimmy Clausen. It featured a lot of wildcat. It also had a fake goal. That play was really the result of Weis doing a good job of watching tape of the Cal game. The ball was on the one and Hughes punched it in.

Then USC got a couple more scores but had to settle for field goals. It was 13-7 at halftime. I had mixed feelings at that point. The halftime score was a lot closer than it had been in previous years. However, outside the one drive the offense, particularly Clausen, wasn't playing well.

I was impressed with the defense in the first half, particularly Manti Te'o. But of course I had doubt that they would be able to continue to hold up.

The Irish were to get the ball first in the second half. Hopefully, that could spark the unit. Clausen and company did put together a good drive. Unfortunately, it stalled when Weis made the controversial decision to go for it on fourth and one when in makeable field goal range. James Aldridge was stuffed.

While I was okay with the decision to go for it (although I may have called a different play), my friend thought they should have kicked the field goal. He said, "Remember these points at the end of the game. Let's see what the final score is."

The next drive USC takes the ball in for a score when Barkley hits Damian Williams for a 41 yard touchdown pass. We then started to get a little nervous because we knew the Irish had to answer. Clausen did answer with a 45 yard touchdown pass to Golden Tate.

We sensed that the Irish offense was beginning to heat up but could the defense hold them. Unfortunately, McKnight and Allen Bradford had a pair of short touchdown runs. The score was now 34-14. The good news was that there was still 13:33 minutes left and Notre Dame was used to coming back in the fourth quarter.

Notre Dame did get a quick score on a Clausen touchdown run with 11:13 left. Unfortunately, they missed the extra point. With that miss and not kicking the earlier field goal, that is four points on the board. Remember that.

Then the defense had to stop them. I was thinking a turnover would be huge. Then it happened. Barkley for the only time looked like a true freshman. On third down, he forced a throw over the middle while he was under pressure. He should have just ate it there, but instead the ball was intercepted by Gary Gray and returned 30 yards.

Clausen quickly cashed in with a 13 yard touchdown pass to Tate. That made the score 34-27. The ironic thing is that USC really helped with a few bad penalties. The ones that typically haunt Notre Dame.

The Irish would once again stop them on defense with about four minutes remaining. This is where those four points left off the board could have been huge.  The Irish would have only needed a field goal to tie it and send it into overtime.

As it was, they needed a touchdown. Clausen did a great job of moving them down. A couple more USC penalties helped. Clausen got his team so close but missed three goal-to-go passes to lose it as time expired. Personally, I would have like to see him pump it and tuck it on the last play since the receivers were covered.

Although I was disappointed not to get the win. I was proud to see that the team never quit. It was also nice to see that the talent gap between USC and Notre Dame is closing. That is good for the rivalry.

Most importantly, all week haters said that Notre Dame's offense couldn't score against a real defense. That proved faulty. This game showed that Notre Dame may not quite be back to elite status, but they are getting close.

This article is also posted on http://fightingirishgameday.com/