A relatively young off-season has brought a host of changes to the Notre Dame football program. The Irish landed a solid, albeit not great, recruiting class and three new coaches were hired to replace offensive line coach John Latina, defensive line coach Jappy Oliver, and offensive coordinator and running backs coach Mike Haywood. A more […]

After two of the most prolific offensive seasons in Fighting Irish history, the Charlie Weis-led Notre Dame offense produced two inconsistent and wholly underwhelming campaigns in 2007 and 2008. The efficient, passing-centric offense led by quarterback Brady Quinn has been replaced by a one-dimensional vertical passing attack that struggles against relatively average defensive units. As […]

The off-season is here, and, save a few recruiting tidbits and coaching changes, there isn’t much for Irish fans to talk about. In light of this, I’ve decided to dissect some of the offensive woes for Notre Dame the past two seasons. Even though Notre Dame’s offense exploded to destroy Hawaii in their season finale, […]

Notre Dame has concluded their regular season, and a reflection on the Irish offense’s progress (or lack thereof) is warranted. The mid-year numbers are here, and this analysis was performed in similar fashion by benchmarking against the competition. Facing the 73rd toughest AV Ranking strength of schedule, the Irish only managed to go 6-6. But […]

The Fighting Irish limped through their season finale against USC last Saturday. The game proved to be a resounding exclamation point to a dismal second-half season and sparked a frenzy of conjecture over the future of embattled head coach Charlie Weis. Media pundits, Irish haters, and loyal fans all have opinions. The pundits compare his […]

For most Irish fans, including myself, this year was quite a let down for the Notre Dame Football team. At the beginning of the season, many analysts touted the Irish as a team with more cohesiveness and more experience. Gone were the days of poor technique and poor execution. However, most people still felt that […]

To put it mildly, USC had their way with the visiting Fighting Irish. In most games you can find a silver lining, but in this contest looking for good in the Irish performance is an exercise in futility. While Notre Dame stayed even in turnover margin, they failed to enter the red zone, held the […]

pro⋅gres⋅sion Pronunciation [pruh–gresh–uhn] – noun 1.    the act of progressing; forward or onward movement. 2.    a passing successively from one member of a series to the next; succession; sequence. Progression—in football, it’s used to describe two things. First, it’s used to describe the mental and physical process a quarterback goes through on a passing play […]

For the third time this season, and second at home, the Fighting Irish squandered a double-digit lead to lose the game. The first two times this occurred against average competition. Against Syracuse, Notre Dame’s implosion took place against an obviously less talented opponent at home on senior day. Make no mistake about it, Syracuse isn’t […]

The Irish welcome Syracuse to South Bend for their home finale this weekend. The Orange come in as a decided underdog against an Irish squad that hasn’t met many fans’ expectations this season. The Orange are anything but stellar themselves. Syracuse averages fewer than 300 yards of total offense per game, with 133.4 coming through […]