Pursuit of perfection and improvement fuels Notre Dame NT Howard Cross III
SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Howard Cross III has a perfection problem.
After the graduate senior nose tackle recorded a career-high 13 tackles, one sack, 3.5 tackles for loss and two forced fumbles in Notre Dame’s 21-14 victory over Duke on Sept. 30, Cross found himself in the spotlight. The national honors for his performance included Bednarik Player of the Week, Senior Bowl Defensive Player of the Week and Lott Impact Trophy Player of the Week.
But when the 6-foot-1, 288-pound Cross reviewed the film of his performance, in which he played with a sinus infection that impacted his breathing and hearing, he still found something to nitpick.
“I think I got driven off the ball once,” Cross said. “I’m like, ‘Dang.’”
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In between his battles with opposing offensive linemen on Saturdays, Cross battles with himself in trying to find the right balance of being self-critical and self-confident.
“Just keep going and have fun,” Cross said. “That’s my biggest thing. Even now with the pressure and everything that’s going on, naturally I start to be like, ‘Oh man. Can I keep doing this? Can I keep this up?’
“I know I can keep it up, but it’s just the fact of me telling myself, because I overthink everything. My dad makes sure I’m still in the mindset. I’m still that dude. I just have to keep it up. I can’t lose focus.”
Cross’ father, Howard Cross Jr., has plenty of sage advice to offer as a former Alabama and New York Giants tight end with a Super Bowl championship on his résumé. Cross Jr. congratulated his son on his performance against Duke. Then he warned him that opposing offenses were going to start accounting for him in different ways.
Sure enough, Louisville made Cross III a focus a week later. On the very first play, he watched the center call for a slide protection in his direction.
“Basically what I’m doing is I’m approaching it from two different ways: what they’ve been doing and what could be possibly going on for me,” Cross III said. “I’m working on shedding double teams, beating double teams in pass rush.
“If I want to be where I want to be, which I am not there yet, because I obviously strive to be perfect, which is something I have an issue with, I have to beat that. Even if I’m going against two people that probably outweigh me by 400 or 500 pounds. I’m not going to beat them 90% of the time, but my mentality is I should be beating them.”
The extra attention on Cross III certainly hasn’t come by surprise, even if he’s outperforming outside expectations on him heading into the season. Through eight games, Cross III leads Notre Dame in tackles for loss with 5.5, and he’s second on the team in tackles with 45. His lone sack, which also forced a fumble, ended Duke’s ability to make a last-minute comeback.
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Pro Football Focus analysts like what Cross III has been doing for the Irish. Among interior defensive linemen who have played a minimum of 200 snaps this season, Cross III owns the second-highest PFF defensive grade (89.7 on 392 defensive snaps) behind Texas lineman T’Vondre Sweat (90.6 on 242 snaps). Cross III is also among the top five nationally in run defense grade (No. 4, 86.5), pass rush grade (No. 4, 85.7), pressures (No. 4, 25) and stops (Tied at No. 4, 21).
Cross III isn’t as concerned with the accolades or numbers. But the success allows him to keep his confidence high.
“Just having the season I’m doing, I feel like I can play with anybody,” Cross III said. That’s why if it’s double team, triple team or single team, I feel like I can beat any dude in front of me. I make sure that I stay in that mindset.”
In the two games since his Duke explosion, Cross III tallied 10 tackles, 2.5 tackles for loss and one pass breakup at the line of scrimmage against Louisville and USC. Not quite good enough for his standard, though.
“I nitpick all the time,” Cross III said. “The next game I had Louisville, but I didn’t play my best game against Louisville. Even though I had seven tackles, I looked at it like I did not play well.
“Last game against [quarterback] Caleb [Williams], running all over the field, making good plays. Everybody did great. But I looked at it, and I could have done better. Even if we had a great game, even if I had an outstanding game that probably hasn’t been seen in a long time, I’m nitpicking everything I do.”
That didn’t take away from the enjoyment of what Notre Dame managed to do against Williams and the Trojans. Cross III remembered how difficult it was to stop Williams in last season’s 38-27 loss at USC.
Last season, Williams completed all but four of his 22 passes for 232 yards and one touchdown in addition to three rushing touchdowns on nine carries for 35 yards.
The Irish prepared earlier this month for Williams by emphasizing the patterns Williams uses to escape the pocket and the techniques required to keep him in the pocket and physically tackle him in space. Having seen Williams in person last season helped the Irish understand what was needed.
“You’re more prepared,” Cross III said. “Every scrambler has a pattern. They don’t just pick. Yeah, some dudes do. But 95, 90% of the time, there’s a specific two or three places that they go to. Or if you go to a specific point on the field, like if you run behind him, he’ll spin around and go behind. If you come in front of him, he’s probably going to step up or go sideways.
“We watched it. We game-planned it all week. We were looking directly at it the entire time, so we were ready for it.”
The plan couldn’t have worked much better. Williams threw three interceptions for the first time in his career, and Notre Dame sacked him on six occasions. He finished with a net of negative-two rushing yards on 13 carries and completed 13 of his 37 passes for 199 yards and one touchdown.
“It feels good for everybody on the entire defense to have a great game, especially against one of the best, if not the best, offenses in the game,” Cross III said. “It was huge for us, especially coming off the Louisville game. We were looking for redemption. We were ready to show what we can do and prove to everybody that we’re still here and we can do what we’ve been doing. That’s our standard.”
After a grueling eight-week stretch of eight games to the start the season, which ended with four consecutive night games against undefeated teams, the No. 14 Irish (6-2) were able to recover with last week’s idle Saturday.
“If you’re in the game, you don’t really feel it,” Cross III said. “But when you come back now, everybody here feels great. Everybody can move around.”
The four offenses remaining on Notre Dame’s schedule aren’t nearly as prolific as USC. But with such a veteran-led defense, the standard remains high with a desire to finish strong.
What can the Irish do for an encore? A struggling Pittsburgh (2-5) will find out Saturday in Notre Dame Stadium (3:30 p.m. EDT on NBC).
“This is going to sound nerdy, but it’s kind of like a superhero cartoon mentality of every day we get better,” Cross III said. “Every game, every season, no matter what, you always get better.
“If you have 10 tackles in a game, the next game I’m going to get 13. If I have 13 tackles in a game, I’m going to get 14. If I somehow break a crazy record, then next week I should break that record. That’s the mentality for every guy here. If they’re not doing that, they’re striving every day to make sure that they’re at that level.”
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