Remember in my preview post I talked about how the Irish were out to get revenege after losing in the final 16 seconds of last year's Michigan game? Well, rather than get revenge, they tried to best their 2009 suffering. Michigan scored their game winning TD with 27 seconds on the clock to bust the Irish late in the fourth quarter for the second year in a row. My fears of Denard Robinson running all over our defense were realized, as he ran for the longest rushing TD in Irish Stadium history (87 yards) en route to his insane 502 total yards of offense on the day. It just takes a game like that, and he's already being called "the Heisman frontrunner" on ESPN's First Take this morning on ESPN2. It's interesting, because if Dayne Crist would have been able to play the whole game, Michigan wouldn't have won, and Robinson wouldn't have gained this superhero status.
Dayne Crist put together a nice opening drive where the Irish had 2 TDs called back before he finally snuck it in himself. However, he was bashed hard on the play, and it was reported that he had blurry vision, memory problems, and couldn't speak at times. It was prett scary stuff, and he missed the rest of the first half (yeah, he's so tough that he came back after all that crap!). ND was kind of sketchy about it, as NBC's sideline reporter provided us the symptoms, but said that the Irish refused to go further into detail about what was wrong. Weird. The backup tandem of Tommy Rees and Nate Montana couldn't really get it rolling. Rees went 0 for 2, promptly throwing a pick on a flee flicker in his initial drive. Montana went a sligtly better 8 for 17, but also threw a pick, and had passes deflected a couple of times. His mobility looked promissing, though. So, we were down 7-21 at the half, but with Crist coming back, hopes were high that anything could happen.
Once Dayne did return, I think all of Irish Nation realized that we would have won if he was on the field for the full game. Crist connected with freshman TJ Jones (second in as many games?) for a 53 yard TD in the third, and we pulled within 4 after 3. Then, with his back against the wall, Crist hit Rudolph for an insane 95 yard TD pass that set the place on fire. The storybook ending was all set up. Once Michigan got it back, though, it was clear that it just wasn't going to happen for us. Robinson was able to eat the Irish defense up with the run, the threat of the run, and an underrated passing game. With 27 seconds to go, he calmly and cooly jogged it in from 2 yards out. Surprisingly, Notre Dame had a nice march down the field on their final drive, and even got helped out by a late hit on Michael Floyd. But, about 40ish yards away, Crist's game ending Hail Mary (full of grace...) flew well beyond the end zone (which was kind of bizarre to me), and the Irish lost for the first time this year, 24-28.
Is there any doubt in anyone's mind that ND wins 42-28 with Crist in the whole game? I'm not trying to make excuses, because Robinson and Michigan played well enough to win, but I think things kind of worked out their way. I guess revenge will have to wait until 2011.
Some other things worth mentioning from the game:
+Armando Allen rushed for 89 yards, and Nate Montana was our #2 rusher with 4 for 23.
+Kyle Rudolph finished with 8 catches for 164 yards, followed by Jones' 73, and Floyd's 66.
+The defense had zero sacks this time around, although Te'o led the way with 13 tackles (6 solo) and should have had a pick that he dropped.
+Denard Robinson finished with 244 yards passing and 258 yards rushing, probably making Wolverine bloggers get a serious boner this morning.
+ND's defense held Michigan to 3/16 on third downs, but the offense only went 3/14.
+Notre Dame had 3 turnovers, and got nothing in return, and were almost -10 minutes on possession.
So, at 1-1, Notre Dame hits the road next weekend to go toe to toe with Michigan State. The Spartans are an expected 2-0, but have only beaten Western Michigan and Florida Atlantic. So, there 2-0 may not mean much. Junior QB Kirk Cousins may be leading the team well, but he only has a 57.9% completion mark. I'm more concerned about Sophomore running back Edwin Baker and his 183 yards on the ground and 12.2 yards/carry average from over the weekend. He's no Denard Robinson, obviously, but he's a solid back, and we'll have to figure out how to stop him.
I'm sure Coach Kelly is going to be getting at it hard starting today, and hopefully the Irish players will respond positively from the loss and adversity they faced against Michigan to turn it around and steal one from MSU next Saturday night.
-- Sent from my Palm Prē
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