gonna be a long one so buckle up
gonna be a long one so buckle up
I am an ND fan, that being said you have to look at these two teams playing in a location only bowl. I call it that because Hawaii created this bowl as a way to give their players and fans one more game in the pro bowl stadium. Hawaii has overachieved in the past few years and avoided going to this game but all in all it is a nice safety net for the Warriors. I hear a lot of good points so far in this thread but here is my opinion.
ND
ND needs this win? To say that means they did not need a Pitt win or did not need a Cuse win. ND has needed a lot of wins but they just have not gotten them. ND does have more talent but that has not helped them in most of the games this season and I am not sure if the edge in talent will be enough in this game. The talent is good but how you use it is more important. ND lost 4 out of 5 games on the road and the one win was against terrible Washington. Now I am not a Wies supporter but that beng said, in his interviews does he really look like a guy that truely cares about this program? I have seen him get heated and get abrupt with the media but it never translates into a team playing with a "chip on the shoulder". In fact teams often take over the emotion of the coach and in this case I would say the Irish look like a team that feel entitled to win rather than a team looking to earn wins. I saw a post that said ND won some good games, I look over this sched and see no good wins. Perhaps Stanford or Navy but outside of that who? Are we putting Michigan, San Deigo, Washington or Purdue on a higher level because of name? These are BAD teams this season any way you slice it. The irish underachieved against midlevel talent. What is expected when the go to Hawaii (another mid/low level) team for this game. So lets breakdown ND, on offense they have no blocking. The o-line cannot open holes nor can they pass block well enough to run a complicated offense like Wies wants to run. Wies wants to run the Patriots offense (Considering Quinn said the playbook in the NFL was not a hard adjustment considering Wies playbook..... Every QB says this along with game speed is the hardest adjustment). So the blocking is subpar, which means the running game should suffer. Well it has, even though the numbers are better than last season they are still low and are no where close to being as productive as ND is used to at RB. Well then most pressure falls on Clausen to move the chains. Clausen is completing 59 percent of passes. He has 21 TD's and 17 PICKS. So he cannot be counted on to make every correct read. This ND team relies a lot on defense and special teams. Considering ND opponets average ranking falls between 70-80 in every catagory the are OVERRATTED in all defensive catagories. Still they can force something or create something to be a game changing play like in the Navy game. To see ND to have to take off all blinders, that means hatred or love and look at the team. ND is lucky to be in a meaningless bowl, Wies is lucky to have a job, Considering the turnovers and a top ranked freshman on the bench, Clausen is lucky not to have heat on him over starting and the defense is lucky no one looks at opponetes averages and gives them credit for being a good defense or the defensive Co would be under pressure. I guess thats while it's called the "Luck of the Irish"
Breakdown on the game:
Hawaii is a bad team, normally a pass happy team have had to look elsewhere to get on the score board. Colt Brennan had more TD's in 3 games than the current Hawaii QB has had on the season. So this offense fits right along the norm for the Irish defense. This is an improved defense for Hawaii but again is mid-tier and so the Irish should be used to playing against this type of team. There are no surprises for ND when they go to Hawaii. Considering ND is a middle of the road team, they are playing a middle of the road team I give the advantage to the home field. Kickoff is at 3:30 which is (8:00 Eastern) the time difference shouldn't be a huge deal with all the time to prepare but the days events mixed in with the time change might be enough to wear down ND before they get on the field. Hawaii will play hard as they did against Cincy, Nevada, Fresno, and yes even Boise. The heart they show should pay off as ND will show up expecting to win and when the other team pushes back they will start to buckle. The only thing Hawaii needs to do in this game is play with high emotion like they want to win and they will do just enough to beat the ND defense and put more points on the board. Not gonna be a 49-45 game but IMO Hawaii 24-ND 17.
Just my 2 cents.... good luck either way you go.
Cheers
Irish
