STATE COLLEGE, Pa.—Jimmy Clausen will have better days in his college career. But thanks to Irish head coach Charlie Weis, he likely won’t have many, if any, worse than his modest debut.
Clausen completed 17-of-32 passes for 144 yards, one interception and no touchdowns in Notre Dame’s 31-10 loss to Penn State.
“He completed 50 percent of his passes under duress for the first time,” Charlie Weis said. “I’m not doing cartwheels, but I can’t say I’m displeased, either.
“I’m not saying he was error free, but it was a fire drill out there at times.”
The 6-foot-3, 207-pounder from Westlake Village, Calif., was sacked six times behind an offensive line that has now surrendered 15 sacks in two weeks.
But Weis made sure that when Clausen fell, it was a relatively soft landing. Most of Clausen’s throws were underneath so as to minimize the number of shots put on him. To be sure, he took some pretty good hits. But not nearly as many as he could have had Weis decided to place a futile attempt at winning ahead of the long-term benefit of Clausen.
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