Notre Dame Notebook: Underdog Irish Shift To Road Warrior Mentality
As a two-touchdown underdog at No. 3-ranked Georgia this Saturday night, Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly — whose own team is ranked No. 7 —pulled out the humble “we’ll do the best we can” card.
“We’ll try to muster together 22 guys, get them on a plane, go down to Athens and see what we can do,” Kelly said during his Monday conference previewing the showdown.
The opening point spread of 13.5 is even larger than the 12.5 Clemson was favored to defeat the Fighting Irish by in last year’s College Football Playoff at the Cotton Bowl. The Tigers went on to notch a 30-3 win over the Irish.
Because the five-game road slate this year includes the Bulldogs (who have a 15-game winning streak at home), a Michigan team that has won four in a row at home versus Notre Dame (and seven of the last eight) and Stanford, which has won five straight at home versus Notre Dame, the “Road Warrior” mentality was the popular offseason theme emphasized by director of football performance/strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis.
“Being on the road, being able to build that mindset is really what this has been about,” Kelly said.
The volume inside the Irish Athletics Center will be amped up to deal with the anticipated school-record crowd of 93,000-plus at Sanford Stadium, and temperatures are forecasted to be in the mid-80s this week in northern Indiana, similar to Saturday's expected weather in Athens. All that matters to Kelly at this point is preparation.
“There won’t be any excuses relative to acclimatizing to the weather conditions,” he said. “If we do a great job preparing, we can go play the game, play fast, play free and then the best team wins. It will be in our preparation.
“It won’t be because the crowd was loud or that it was hot … it is still about our preparation and how we execute.”
As for an opportunity for this to be Kelly’s biggest marquee victory in his 10 seasons at Notre Dame …
“It is not even part of what we do for preparation,” he replied. “It’s about our players, it’s about our coaches giving them a great game plan, it’s about my job to make sure we put together the best possible preparation for our team.
“The rest of that stuff, I really [couldn’t] care less about.”
UGA Quarterback Jake Fromm, ‘The Separator’
The team strength of the Bulldogs’ is a massive, NFL prospect-laden offensive line that opens up paths for a deep running back corps led by junior D’Andre Swift.
Defensively, Georgia does not possess a premier figure such as 2017 Butkus Award winner Roquan Smith or 2018 Thorpe Award winner DeAndre Baker, but Kelly contends the waves of bodies they bring at all three levels is what makes them most formidable.
“We have seen some really great defenses over the last three years, but [they] haven’t had the kind of depth that they have,” Kelly said.
However, he believes Georgia’s top asset is junior quarterback Jake Fromm, whose first career start as a freshman in 2017 was at Notre Dame in the Bulldogs’ 20-19 victory.
“He’s efficient, he’s unflappable,” Kelly said. “You can pressure him, and he doesn’t panic. He makes great decisions. He’s sound with the ball. Generally, when you get down to the really great teams, you’re going to get Trevor Lawrence. You’re going to get the great quarterbacks that are the reason why they start to separate.
“Fromm is one of those guys that gets you to start to separate.”
Notre Dame Tight End Cole Kmet Cleared To Play
Junior tight end Cole Kmet has recovered from the broken collarbone he suffered Aug. 8 and was listed as the starter on this week’s depth chart. Kelly cautioned that Kmet only has been cleared to play and will do so on Saturday, but maybe not start.
Either way, his presence to augment those of junior classmate Brock Wright and freshman Tommy Tremble is highly welcomed.
“He can control the point of attack with his physicality, he can go down the field, he can catch the football,” Kelly said of Kmet. “He balances it out now with two other tight ends that give us versatility within our formations where you could have two players on the field — or three at times— where you could break that formation out and now you have got to cover them with base personnel. And they're difficult to cover.
“It gives you a lot of flexibility relative to your personnel matchups.”
Personnel Notes
• Kelly said he used No. 2 quarterback Phil Jurkovec for only one series on Saturday because he is dealing with a thigh contusion.
“He got hit a couple of times where we felt like we want to be careful with him,” the head coach said.
• Sophomore running back Jahmir Smith, who scored two touchdowns in the opener at Louisville but missed the New Mexico game because of a sprained toe, was listed on this week’s depth chart.
• Senior drop end Daelin Hayes has played terrific the first two weeks of the season mainly because he is far more into detail than net outcome, per Kelly. Versus New Mexico he tipped the pass that freshman safety Kyle Hamilton intercepted and returned for the game’s first score, and he also added two tackles for loss.
“A much more focused player, driven by the fact that maybe he’s been overshadowed a little bit and he's playing with a bit of a chip on his shoulder — and that's a good thing,” Kelly said.
• Junior Avery Davis, who scored on a 59-yard jet sweep — officially a pass because it was a forward lateral — on his first touch versus New Mexico and received the game ball, will stay on offense. He moved to cornerback this spring, but recent injuries at running back shifted him back to offense, where he played last season.
“He ran almost 23 miles an hour,” Kelly noted. “We haven’t had that since Will Fuller. We know he has elite speed … a skill set is one thing. It is getting him the opportunity, and I think he has the best chance of getting those opportunities on the offensive side of the ball right now.”
• Fifth-year senior Buck linebacker Asmar Bilal was singled out by Kelly for his improved play against New Mexico, which featured a team-high eight tackles (two for lost yardage).
“He’s really getting to that point where he’s playing and closing space to the football with really high-level, elite [physical] traits,” he said. “So now he’s bringing along some of the things that he was lacking in terms of playing the position. That's coming.”
Reserve sophomore Mike linebacker Bo Bauer also received high marks after playing out of control earlier.
“We’re seeing a guy that's not overrunning a play but staying on the backside,” Kelly said.
• Special teams was a strength on Saturday, especially the coverage units. Kelly described senior wideout Chase Claypool’s punt coverage as “crazy good.”
“You’ve got elite players playing on special teams, that rubs off to the younger players,” Kelly said.
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