You're listening to the back home network.
Presented by Home Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cast,
GAIL and Clavio joining you. Here it is Monday, December 16th
and folks, it is playoff week round one for Indiana as they
get ready to take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish this coming
Friday up at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend.
IN's first ever playoff bid, which duh, but also really you,
you got to go all the way back to the Rose Bowl appearance in
1967 or technically 1968. I guess that was that was New
Year's Day to see Indiana in a postseason game of this
magnitude. And that is that is the truth.
And so we've been trying, if you missed our podcast earlier with
Mitchell Page, go check that out as he had some great thoughts to
get things started. We've got some extra guests
booked throughout the course of this week that we're going to
try to tackle, but we wanted to start things off with Taylor
Layman from Bite Sized Bison, who has been our constant
companion throughout the course of the year as we have been
doing previews and talking about what's going on with this team.
Taylor, good to see you and happy playoff week, man.
It's hard to believe it's actually here.
Yeah, Yeah, yeah, there. Yeah.
First of all, thanks for having me on.
But also I, yeah, it's been weird.
Sometimes I ask myself, you know, in my in like some
somewhere like simulation, like what's going on here.
And then also like I was raised a reversible jacket fan.
And so this is a really, really in like a lot of my family, like
my grandfather and my my uncles, they're all like Notre Dame
fans. And so this is like a really
interesting matchup for me personally.
But I will say I have talked to some of them and a lot of them
are pulling for Indiana, which is, you know, really it it.
It's a fascinating phenomenon. And you know, the reversible
jacket thing. I mean, I've never really cared
that much about it. It's funny to me, mostly because
it's like the one thing that Purdue fans think is an insult
when it really doesn't resonate with most of the fan base.
But. A lot of the the reversible
jacket thing. Has been because these two teams
never play, you know the the fans have never actually been
confronted with the idea that they have to choose between the
two. And so as a result, now that
they're having to choose, I think you're starting to see
some people being like, you know, actually I like Indiana a
lot. So that's been fun to watch that
evolve. And I mean, where you're from,
you're from, you know, Northeast Indiana, that's, that's very
common. And, and, and it's one of those
things where I think ultimately what we're seeing from Indiana
this year in terms of program building and whatnot, this is
how you get some of those folks to, to finally maybe turn the
way that they're thinking about things.
And so we'll see what happens. Obviously this game could go a
long way towards that, but it's just the first step in a much
longer, you know, set of things that will happen, including a
series between these two teams that we think is going to happen
in 20-30 and 2031 and hopefully beyond that as well.
But yeah, I. Don't think it takes that much,
you know, and it just takes, you know, for them, them knowing
people who went, who went to one of the schools, you know, like
it doesn't, it doesn't take that much.
Yeah, but no, you're right. It it's, it's just a really
interesting dichotomy, I guess. It is and and we're gonna talk
about not so much that, but we're gonna talk about the
dichotomy between these two teams.
Really interesting match up and kind of a Rorschach test from A.
Not not just a statistical perspective, but also just from
a general like perceptional perspective, you can kind of
look at what these teams bring to the table and create whatever
narrative you want and, and be able to point to statistical
factoids that will support what you're thinking.
And, and so we're going to talk about that certainly as we go
through things. But First off, just to remind
our folks that we are here part of the back Home network and
that includes assembly call, includes the Doing the Work
podcast, includes Bison Chat, which has been on Tuesdays
throughout the course of of the week or the year.
I guess all of those brought to you by Home Field apparel.com.
Your place to go for the finest in college fashions, the softest
fabrics, the coolest designs. Home Field apparel.com just
launching their knit sweater collection, which has been
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Most of the people in our audience, what you're really
looking for is Indiana College Football Playoff apparel.
And, and this is, you know, it's one of those things where like
this was immediately ordered. I'm going to pop it up on screen
here you can see those beautiful Indiana versus Notre Dame.
Like what a collector's item, Taylor You know what a, what a,
what a way to commemorate this by getting a a hoodie or a crew
neck or a heavyweight tee. And it's not just red.
One right there. Yeah, that, that red one has,
has attracted a lot of attention.
I like the black ones. I got a lot of red hoodies.
But I, you know, I do. I like the black College
Football Playoff for Indiana one.
I think I got a crew neck actually, 'cause I just got, at
this point I've reached hoodie saturation.
Like I need a second closet just for the hoodies, but so much
other awesome stuff, these long sleeves, these retro kind of 90s
style crew neck designs, so many cool things.
And and you just this is what home field apparel does.
They come up with this stuff all day every day.
So what I would like you all to do is go to
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first order and be sure to follow them on the socials.
They do an awesome job across all of their different social
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Again, home field apparel.com, proud sponsor of the back home
network. Also a reminder that we're all
on Substack. We're all part of one big happy
Substack family. Although different Substacks
taylor@bitesizedbison.substack.com and one of the greatest deals in
subscriptions in media where you can actually pay Taylor and in
exchange he will write detailed statistical analysis about
what's going on with IU football.
I can't think of a better than deal than that, especially
Taylor at the price point that you're offering, which is what
again? It is $8 a month or $50.00 for a
year. Yeah, and and that that's that's
a great deal, you know. And, and so get over to bite
sized bison.substack.com. You can check out all Taylor's
written work and he'll keep you up to date not just throughout
the season, but in the offseason as well.
There'll be some cool stuff coming out with that.
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You get a couple of VIP videos. That's the only place right now
that you're hearing me talk about basketball is in the VIP
videos. Put one out this weekend and, or
I guess it was, yeah, it was this weekend because today's
only Monday and we'll we'll have more content coming relatively
soon on that front. So we'd love to have you folks
joining us there. One last thing, if you're
listening to this and you're in the Bloomington area, or even if
you're an indie because it's not that long of a drive now, join
us for the first of multiple live appearances throughout the
course of this upcoming week as Crimson Cast will be at the
Upstairs Pub at 8:00 on Tuesday night.
We'll be previewing IU versus Notre Dame.
And if you're there earlier, which you should be, Upstairs
pub is having their 40th birthday bash and they've got
some absolutely ridiculous specials available.
Go to their Instagram page, Upstairs pub or you can go to
Twitter. They've got the information
there and you'll see just how, I mean, we're talking about like
adult beverages under a dollar is one of the specials.
It's, it's nuts, man. I mean, they got $1.50
cheeseburgers. They it's, it's, it's crazy.
I I can't the FCC, it doesn't regulate podcasts, but if they
did, they wouldn't allow me to talk about the great deals at
upstairs. Like that's how hot they are 5
to 8 Tuesday. And right after that you get a
live version of Bison chat here from Crimson cast as we'll be
joined by Joe Cronin. I think Austin Platt's joining
us, Zion Brown's joining us some other special guests as we'll be
talking about IU, Notre Dame and everything to await us in that
one. So we'll also be up in the South
Bend area. We got a couple of live events,
IUAA event at Corby's, IU Alumni Association at Corby's at 7:00.
It's actually 5:30 to 8:30 is the event.
I'll be getting there around 7:00 if you want to meet and
greet. And then on Friday at noon, join
us at Social Cantina in Mishawaka.
Be there from 12:00 to 2:00. And then we'll just be out and
about and seeing what happens in South Bend after that.
Maybe we can, maybe we can hang out.
So come up, join us at that. We'd love to have you.
And so many great events already scheduled to go on throughout
the course of the day in South Bend.
It's big IU territory, Taylor, as you know, it's it's there's a
lot of IU people. There's even an IU branch campus
in South Bend. So this is definitely IU land up
there. So keep an eye on that.
We'd love to see you out there. So hopefully those of you making
it up to the playoff game, we'll see you there.
Yeah, I, I will say the, I'm I that sweet that was going around
about how there won't be a red wave.
You know, I'm not, you know, predicting a red wave or
anything like that, you know, but like I, I really do think
there will be a lot of Indiana fans there.
Yeah, it's, it's, I really do too.
I mean the number and the ticket prices have dropped quite a bit
here over the course of the last couple of days.
And now the get in price, I'm looking at SeatGeek.
Well, it jumped back up this afternoon.
It was as low as like 380. It's back up to 533.
It's going to ride that wave a little bit here over the next
couple of days. But I've heard from so many
people who are like, I'm going, I'm going to be there.
I'm, you know, and, and many of them bought tickets here in the
last day or two. I've probably, I was talking to
somebody yesterday. I've probably heard from 200.
People that I know they're going to be at the game in South Bend,
I know, I know other people who aren't going to go to the game
but are going. To South Bend just so they can
be there. It's going to be a blast.
It'll be a big party and everybody will be incredibly
happy afterwards as we're celebrating Indiana's victory in
in this game. So let's talk about it, Taylor,
as we get into this one, Indiana taking on Notre Dame.
This is a match up between 2:11 and 1:00 teams, two teams that
share a lot of DNA in terms. Of how their season has gone and
to some degree what they do and how they do it.
And you and I have been kind of going back and forth on text
about this over the course of the last week and 1/2 or so.
I guess a little over a week since we found out the the match
up this when we were talking about potential match ups, this
was a match up that you were excited for Indiana to
potentially draw as compared to say Georgia or Tennessee or some
teams like that. I'm would you explain to the
audience why that was your reaction even before you heard
the announcement of the draw? Let's just start with that.
Yeah, I, I think it's a, it's kind of for the same reason that
a lot of people look at Indiana and they're like, you know, I
want to play that team because the schedule was, you know, it
was fairly light. And, and I, you know, for Notre
Dame being able to pick their schedules is kind of ridiculous
that it was that light. So, you know, I, I think that
that was a primary reason why there are definitely some
vulnerabilities and I'm sure we'll get to those as well,
particularly Notre Dame's run defence.
And that is very foundational to what Indiana does, right,
including the passing offense. They need to establish the run
and Notre Dame is happy to oblige.
And you know, special teams is not very good for Notre Dame
really at all. And and you know, for Indiana,
field position is incredibly important.
We saw how difficult it was for them to play Ohio State when
they couldn't get out of. So they said it felt like they
were down on that side of the field forever.
So field position is crucial. And there are other things that
that we'll talk about as well, but mostly just the, the, the,
the light schedule I think was, was the big thing for me when I
was looking at it. And, and, you know, their
strength of schedules are, are pretty comparable as far as the
metric goes. But I was looking at a lot of
the, the matchups and it just doesn't seem like there, there's
some things where it's like, OK, there's a lot of overestimation
between these two teams. And Notre Dame failed to reach
overestimation against a pretty light schedule in a lot of
different ways. And I think some of those ways
can favor Indiana. But I will say between these two
teams, there is overestimation, which which Indiana fans have
seen in in in in the way that Indiana has played Michigan and
Ohio State. There is of course some
overestimation. The same thing applies in Notre
Dame. So any of the strengths that
Notre Dame has, there's a lot of strength on strength happening
in this matchup. And they're going to meet
somewhere in the middle. And if that's going to determine
who wins this game and, and it's going to it's, it's, it's
honestly, it's super interesting to me the the match up.
I, I think they did a really good job.
I'm really happy that it's on Friday night and that's the only
game featured because I think it is going to be a really
interesting night as far as, you know, just gameplay.
I just don't see Notre Dame, you know, they have more
athleticism, of course, but I think, you know, Indiana's
coaches have been as effective as anyone this season and that
that's just it is they're they're just like, like you
said, it's a Rorschach test. Like you can, you can really
spend any type of narrative that you want.
Statistically, it's just what do you pick?
Yeah. It's it's going to be really
interesting on a number of levels.
And I think so much of it really comes down to a couple of things
in particular that you've already drawn attention to.
Like, one of them is what exactly are we going to get out
of two teams who are clearly good, but we don't know how
great they are? But in a college football season
where that kind of applies to everybody.
And when you look at what, you know, the way Notre Dame has
played so far this year, what what leaps off the page is the
margin of victory that they've been able to maintain in most of
their games. And you just go down the list
like, you know, 66 to 7 over Purdue, 49 to 7 over Stanford,
51 to 14 over Navy, 52 to three over Florida State.
Now you know, the, the, the common thread through three of
those four teams is that they aren't very good.
Like Navy, Navy seemed like a legitimately good team.
They beat Army 4 or Notre Dame beat Army 4914 as well.
But what's also interesting to me is like the the way when you
look at Notre Dame's schedule, there's a couple of head
scratchers, like if a team was really that dominant, like, why
are they only beating Louisville 31 to 24?
Why are they only? Beating Virginia 35 to 14.
Why did they struggle against an ASA Southern California team
that's just essentially dedicated to shooting itself in
the foot all season and really needed like a couple of pick
sixes? To to give them the margin of
victory in that game. Now, that doesn't mean that
Notre Dame isn't a formidable opponent.
They certainly are. And when you think about like
the stand out stat for them, it's it's again, it's scoring
margin. And yet a lot of the teams they
played have been clearly outclassed by Notre Dame.
And I don't know that Indiana falls into that category.
And you look at Indiana and you could kind of say a similar
thing in that, well, they outclassed a bunch of opponents.
But when you look at the way that Indiana like the particular
opponents, they outclassed the most, Nebraska being a great
example of that. You know, Michigan State, I
think is another good example of that.
Like, I would probably stack those teams up fairly favorably
against most of the teams that Notre Dame really beat the crap
out of throughout the course of the season.
Both teams have a blemish on their record.
Indiana loses at Ohio Stadium and, and in a game where they
frankly shot themselves in the foot a bunch of times, Notre
Dame loses at home versus Northern Illinois and then kind
of changed the way that they did things a bit after that.
So, you know, it's like, how much can you take out of that
game? How much is that representative?
But you know, when when I look across the the board with these
teams, I guess the first thing that that comes to mind is, is
very similar to what you said, which is if you're going to try
to figure out exactly how strong these teams are, it's almost
impossible to do it because there really aren't common
opponents except for Purdue. And they beat Purdue by almost
the exact same margin. And even the types of teams that
they beat, either in Indiana's case, we're really
underachieving, or in Notre Dame's case, we're just.
Kind of very mid or worse than mid throughout the course of the
season with the exception maybe of the service academies.
Yeah, yeah. The way that I've been kind of
been framing it to myself as I've been thinking about it is
that Indiana is the best team that Notre Dame will have played
at this point, but Notre Dame is not the best team that Indiana
has played at this point. And so that experience that
Indiana has as going to Ohio State is really going to help
them in this. And honestly, Galen I, I don't
like giving Michigan credit, but like that Michigan team, it was
getting better at the end of the season.
Like I, I think, I think that that after that, after they beat
Ohio State, that looks a lot better for Indiana than the
people were framing it. Like if you look at some of the
look at the way that Michigan kind of finished out the last
like quarter of their schedule or so, they, they were getting
better. And so, you know, even though
they did fire their offensive coordinator.
So, you know, there's, there are, there are a couple of
points in, in the, in the schedule where you're like, OK,
you know, like that's, that, that is going to help them in
this matchup. And it is really hard to go
undefeated in college football. So like Notre Dame, you know,
they they absolutely, they're a good team that deserve to be in
the playoff. But when you're picking from the
teams that are in this field, especially if you're picking
from a certain class of team like this is probably the one
that you want. That's not, it's not very
frequently that like a team that is supposedly a higher class, it
has not played A-Team as strong as you.
So that's that, that's that's huge for Indiana.
Yeah, I mean, you know, the closest you would probably say
realistically speaking would be Texas A&M, but Texas A and MI
mean they were they were so up and down.
They're clearly a talented team. But you know, losing it, losing
the game to Auburn at the end, losing the home game to Texas, I
mean, they they kind of deserved their their final lot in the
season where they finished eight and four.
And then, I mean, it's just it's hard to army's a tough one to
get your head wrapped around in as much as like what, you know,
how good are they really versus just, you know, how much are
they just very well organized? You know?
And and so for Indiana, yeah, it's interesting because, you
know, certainly Ohio State was a better opponent.
Certainly playing at Ohio Stadium was a tougher test than
anything that Notre Dame dealt with.
Even if you want to try to argue winning at Texas A&M was hard.
It's like, well, it's not as hard as winning at Ohio Stadium,
especially given the relative strength of the two teams.
So I, I'm with you on all of that.
A lot of it then is like, well, look at the individual things
that make these two teams strong.
And I'm going to go ahead and call up your, your, your file
here for those of you watching along on YouTube.
If you're not, I would recommend going to bite sized bison going
and checking this out. So, you know, we start off by
kind of looking at the, the, the key strengths for both of these
teams. First of all, you know, we
talked a lot of this year about strength of record.
And both of these teams, you have to give them credit as much
as we gave Indiana credit this year for playing a subpar
schedule, all things considered, but they took the most advantage
of it. Notre Dame did the same thing
slightly better. I mean, we're talking margins of
like a couple of of percentage points.
Notre Dame 5th in strength of record, Indiana 8th in strength
of record. And then you start to go down
some of the individual items. You know, Notre Dame's offense,
according to to FEI, is slightly worse than Indiana's.
Their defense is better by probably 1 order of magnitude,
and they're both about the same in terms of FBI, in terms of S&P
Plus, Notre Dame is 9th, Indiana's 11th.
And a lot of that is, you know, Notre Dame's better in terms of
their offense and defense, but significantly worse than special
teams. Indiana's a little more even
across the board with top 15 units in each of those 3
categories. So, you know, the, if you're
looking for specific things in terms of the macros that
highlight most of these teams are really even like they, they,
they both have, you know, really successful overall approaches to
the game. Indiana's a bit more efficient
in terms of their offensive success rate.
Notre Dame has certainly struggled with that a little
bit. But then again, Notre Dame has
been. You know I would.
I think you could say they've. Been kind of more consistent in
terms of being able to, to, you know, to, to, to hold opponents
to, you know, not scoring that much that often.
Indiana's been better in turnover.
You know, they haven't lost as many turnovers, but Notre Dame
has been ball Hawks like all across the board and and they've
done a really good job of of generating turnovers.
So then you start to dive into the individual matchups between
these two teams. And as you mentioned earlier,
it's strength on strength. So this is your chart.
What you know, what jumps out to you the most in terms of the
strength versus strength and where are you looking for the
biggest potential difference maker as we go into this one?
Yeah, I think it doesn't exactly show in this chart really, but
the the Notre Dame's offensive rushing attack versus the run
defense for Indiana, Indiana's rushed defense since and then
the back half of the season since the Nebraska game has been
according to EPA, the best in the country.
And, and they had, they actually were tested in that second-half
with Ohio State and with Michigan too.
You know, Michigan wasn't super successful throughout the
season, but that was their offensive identity.
And, and Indiana really, I mean, holding Michigan from getting
into their offensive identity is really impressive any season.
So you know that that's, that's one because it doesn't really
show here because the success in rush, Notre Dame has 30, they're
right 35th for their rush rushing success rate and
Indiana's 11th because they, they got off to a slower start
against the rush. So I think that's that's the big
strength on the strength on that side of the ball.
And then the other side of the ball is it's going to be passing
versus pass defense. So Indiana's passing attack
versus Notre Dame's passing defense.
They have some really effective defensive backs.
They have a really effective interior pass rush, which is
something that's a little unusual for Indiana this season,
except for maybe Michigan because they have Mason Graham
on the inside. So that is that's something that
I'm watching for. So Indiana's ranked number one
in an offensive passing success rate and Notre Dame is ranked
8th in the country and defensive passing success rate.
Those, those are the strengths on strengths.
But when it comes to Indiana's offense, I'm watching them
running the ball because Notre Dame is ranked 101st in a loud
rushing success rate. And you know, there's there is a
conception that because they played two service academies
that this this would be influenced.
So you would you would assume that the service academies would
would find a bunch of success on the on the ground because that's
what they do. They don't really pass.
They're not very good at it. They're like Navy and Army are
in the bottom 3 in the nation and passing attempts.
So, but that actually doesn't affect this these statistics as
much as you would think because Army didn't really have a great
rushing game against Notre Dame. Navy had a pretty good rushing
game, but but neither of them had a very good passing game.
And there are several opponents too that ran the ball just as
much as Navy did against Notre Dame.
So. Just just just to throw this in
like Navy carried the ball 43 times for 222 yards against this
Notre Dame defense, Army 58 times for 207 yards and even
USC. Who I wouldn't.
Really think of as a running team carried the ball for 197
yards and 28 carries that ran for seven yards a carry in that
game. Sorry, go ahead.
Yeah, no, yeah, that, that bridges exactly into a, a, a
point that I've kind of been there or a drum that I've been
banging throughout the week, which is, you know, USC actually
has been sneak. Like according to analytics,
their rushing attack has actually been sneaky effective.
And so they actually have on on Notre Dame schedule.
USC had the highest rushing success rate of any opponent
that that Notre Dame played throughout the season.
And they're the only ones that are higher than Indiana.
And USC averaged 7 yards a carry.
So, you know, I think Mike Shanahan is really going to be
looking at getting some effective scheme in the rushing
attack. I don't know if I don't know if
Indiana could beat Notre Dame simply by running the ball,
which is something that we could talk about when it comes to the
weather, but but it's really going to affect how Notre Dame
can defend the pass, which is their strength on defence
causing havoc from defensive backs in this in the College
Football Playoff field, Notre Dame's defensive line is pretty
ineffective when it comes to creating havoc.
Riley Mills on the inside creates a lot of passing
pressure. But overall they're different.
They're they're individuals on the long the defensive line are
are not as good comparatively. So that is something that is in
Indiana's benefit. But I mean, the defense for
Notre Dame looks it. I mean, it really is kind of
similar to some of the things that Michigan and Ohio State
did, which was, you know, sending linebackers on blitzes
or stunts along the defensive line.
I think the interior offensive line for Indiana is going to
have to really step up. But but yeah, I mean, that's the
big, that's the big thing, like establishing something on the
ground which they can do to attack Notre Dame's strength on
defense. But I mean, then Galen, you
could also say that, you know, Notre Dame hasn't seen a passing
attack like Indiana, right? And, and it's not even close,
really. They got, I mean, they kind of
got torched by, by Georgia Tech and by Louisville and, and, and
those two teams are, are, I mean, they have like
analytically have effective passing attacks, but not like
Indiana and, and then USC, they averaged 7 yards of carry and
then got into the passing game that way.
So the, the two teams, Louisville and USC, they like to
run to get into the pass this season anyway.
And Indiana also likes to do that.
And both of those teams found success in the air.
So there, there are ways to get there.
I think that's the way the Indians going to try to do it.
It's gonna be, I think, very fascinating to watch as the some
of the different elements come into play that you just
highlighted. And sorry, that was a lot.
No, no, no. I mean, and where to where to
begin? Well, you know, one of the
things that I think is interesting, you talked about
Indiana's rush defense. I wanted to to touch on that
real quick before we moved off of it.
But, you know, Indiana's rush defense has been really
effective. The only team I think in the
last six games that Indiana played against that that, you
know, was maybe really effective on the ground was probably
Washington. Even even Ohio State, all things
considered, didn't have that good of a day on the ground.
They were under 4 yards of carry on, 115 yards and and 29
carries. Washington was about the same.
Was a little more impressive because that was at Memorial
Stadium. But, you know, 13 yards allowed
on the ground versus Purdue, 69 yards on the ground on 34
carries versus Michigan -36 yards on 32 attempts at Michigan
State, 70 yards given up to Nebraska, even only 93 yards at
Northwestern, which is a game I see.
I keep seeing people highlight as well, This is why Notre
Dame's gonna cause Indiana problems.
And it's like, well, that's the kind of problems they're gonna
cause. All right, I'm all for that.
But you talk about the passing game, and I think this is where
we probably need to talk about the weather.
So right now when you look at the weather forecast, it really
depends on what app you're looking at.
So a lot of the issue in this game right now looks like it's
going to coalesce around, you know, how hard is the wind
blowing and how are the gusts within that?
And what looks likely is it's going to be about a 10 to 12
mile an hour wind coming out of the northwest.
Will we get heavy gusts? AccuWeather seems to think so.
I haven't seen that same level of forecasting elsewhere.
But it's going to be cold, similar to the Purdue game, and
Indiana's got some experience playing in those conditions very
recently. I am interested to see, like, at
what point would heavy wind or hard wind be something that
would cause significant problems for Indiana?
But a lot of this is also gonna come down to, like, how does
Indiana decide they're gonna try to attack the passing game,
which goes right back to or, or how do they attack the past
defense, which really goes back to one of the larger questions
we've had about how does Indiana handle that interior pass rush
that you were talking about earlier on?
You know, so much ink has been spilled and so many words have
been spoken about how Indiana struggled in that Ohio State
game. We heard Kurt Zignetti talk
about it in the press conference immediately after the draw.
He talked specifically about the silent count.
He talked specifically about, like, you know, just the rhythm
that they had to get into and that that gave Ohio State a lot
of possibilities. Probably not going to be the
same type of experience here, given that it's as much smaller
stadium, there's going to be IU fans in the building and much
greater numbers. But it's also about like
Indiana's now experienced that. How do they adapt what they're
going to do in the passing game? And now it's not just the line
and the blocking and the protection, but you also have to
take into account the weather. That probably leads to a shorter
passing game, at least initially, as you try to get
some pressure off of the offensive line and off of Curtis
Rourke. Yeah, no, absolutely.
And I think what I think what we saw against Purdue is that
Indiana, I don't, I don't think Indiana's going to be scared out
of throwing the ball and the cold and, and I mean even the
wind because they threw 31 times against Purdue.
I, I think, yeah, I think you're right, GAIL.
And I think it it, it really gets into what you were saying
about a short passing game. I would, I would just like to
see more from that from Mike Shanahan anyway, because we know
that interior pass rush is coming and and they're half you
have to find ways to keep them from like obviously Ohio State
and Mitchell Page talked a lot about this on on your podcast.
I thought it was really good about how Ohio State was able to
time their, their blitzes and not even just the blitzes, but
just like getting the first step off the line because of that,
you know, silent count. And I think, I think he, he also
made some good points about how you can complicate the silent
count. And I think they'll probably go
some, somewhere in that direction.
And and honestly, they might not even need the silent count, but
the I think, yeah, I would like to see.
And OK, yeah, sorry. I the Notre Dame does a lot of
man to man coverage and their coverages and in probably the
most that Indiana will have seen this season.
And the slot receivers are going to be really important
encountering something like that.
I think the I think Keyshawn Williams and Miles Price are
going to be really important in this game because of that short
passing game that's necessary. The Mike Shanahan likes to use
Miles Price in the screen game. That's pretty much the only
receiver he really likes to use in this in this in the screen
game. So that's that's crucial.
And I think, you know, the screens will be important in
keeping Notre Dame from, you know, getting too fast in the
pass rush and, and then and then, yeah, and then just using
Keyshawn Williams and and mesh concepts and, and then, you
know, eventually take shots to Omar Cooper.
And so I think the the passing game already has to be short
anyway. Right.
And so I don't know if the like you were saying, I don't know if
the weather will really affect that as much, but but yeah, like
you were saying, there's no way to guarantee that that's the way
that this they're going to choose to attack Notre Dame
defense. Right.
And that, and that's that to me is one of the most intriguing
things about this because like you look at Indiana's offense
and they can run the ball. We've seen them do it.
They and and and run it very effectively.
You know, so much of it is going to be like where are the points?
Like all I've heard all week really for the last week and and
and day, I guess is how great Notre Dame's defense is.
And it's just kind of that that's it's like, Oh well, they
they can stop the run and they can pass rush and they also
cover you know really well. And it's like well, they they
they don't do all of they can't do all of those things.
I think to the degree that one might think now if.
They do, obviously. The game's going to be over real
fast. But as you say, like a lot of it
is hard to parse in terms of like how good is Notre Dame's
defense versus how bad have the offenses that Notre Dame's been
playing against. And, and I don't think we really
know because even even though like the really hyper efficient
offenses that they played, like Army, there is a clear talent
disparity there that Notre Dame was gonna be able to take
advantage of. And you look across like the
rest of what they did. And, and again, it's like it's
hard to take USC that seriously. They didn't even average 30
points a game this year offensively.
You know, they played Texas A&M. Texas A&M barely averaged 30
points a game. You know, the, the, you know,
Georgia Tech scored, you know, they only scored 13 points
against them, but they, it was again, Georgia Tech averaged 28
points a game. So I again, Notre Dame's defense
might be amazing. I don't think we've really seen
it against higher caliber competition, particularly team
like Indiana, which has been so hyper efficient and has enough
talent that you just can't take them lightly.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And and I think that kind of it
kind of points to. So, So, yeah, like you were
saying, you can look at these, you know, unit wide performances
against various opponents, but then when you look at, you know,
how these teams are actually structured and where their
strengths are and, and like, so Indiana's strength is one of the
real strengths is the depth of wide receiver.
And that's something Notre Dame has not seen this year.
They have not seen four wide receivers like Indiana has that
that can attack a secondary. So, yeah, Notre Dame can play a
man to man until they see a wide receiving core like that.
Like then, you know, then you get Zach Horton involved in the
passing game and yeah, like, like, good luck and also
stopping the run at the same time.
It's like you were saying they can't they can't do it all.
And no team has been able to do it all against Indiana.
Indiana has found success some way on offense even in in their
worst game against Ohio State, the rushing attack, you know,
looked like they didn't stack up a bunch of yards or anything,
but because they kind of got away from it.
But, you know, they they they looked effective in the rushing
attack against Ohio State. The game script also didn't help
that. But you know, like you were
saying this, this this Notre Dame defense is not
all-encompassing. They're they're they're going to
surrender success to Indiana's offense.
It's just where exactly would that be?
Yeah, it's, again, there's just a lot of really, really
fascinating little things going on in the mix here.
And, and, and again, I think what makes this such a a unique
and interesting match up is we don't, I feel like both of these
teams were kind of grown in a laboratory and and we haven't
really Rd. tested them that effectively yet.
And that's, you know, I think you can look at Notre Dame and
you could say, well, I could see slight, you know, slight reasons
why Notre Dame would be the team that you might think would be
you have a better chance of victory, even taking out the
home field advantage, you know, because of how effective they've
been in in certain aspects of things.
But then it then it comes back to, well, they've been effective
in that perhaps because they haven't played teams that can
effectively defend them in the running game.
You know, and you, you go through and you look at like
Notre Dame's rushed for almost 2700 yards.
They're averaging 6.3 yards per carry.
They've rushed for 40 touchdowns.
That's kind of their bread and butter.
And you know, nobody held them under.
I think that the lowest rushing total that they had in the year
was 117. That they they rushed against
Louisville, they rushed for 123 against Northern Illinois, They
rushed for 168 against Georgia Tech.
It is impressive that in the last five games they played,
they rushed for 200 or more yards in each of those games,
and including the game against Army where they rushed for 9.4
yards per carry. But even that, it's like, can
you pull that apart from the talent disparity?
You know, is that something that a stout rushing defense like
Indiana is going to be able to thwart?
Or is it a situation where Notre Dame is just that overwhelming
on the ground that you can't do anything about it?
That is going to be a really interesting thing to watch.
Just like IU, you know, as a hyper efficient as they've been
on offense. Is that something that this, you
know, apparently from a statistical perspective, stout
Notre Dame defense is going to be able to stop?
I just don't think we really know.
And I and I am really fascinated to see how that plays out
because even even if you want to take some of the games that
Notre Dame played and and say, well, there's some reasons why
we think Indiana could be effective.
A lot of their worst games were at the very beginning of the
year. And it appears that they have
evolved quite a bit throughout the course of the season.
Yeah, yeah. And like, like you were saying
Galen the, the, the, the, and this is just more this
statistical comparison, you know, like we were just saying,
but you know, Notre Dame has found a lot of efficiency on the
ground, especially in the last like 5 or so games.
But I I was looking into like how effective are those
defensive fronts that they're playing?
And Florida State statistically is the best one.
They rank 79th and front 7 Havoc Great.
Like that's really not good. And and Notre Dame's entire
average, like the average across their entire schedule was ranked
77th and in front seven had a great, but that's it's they
haven't really played good front sevens and and Indiana's has
been the best. And, and and, you know, like,
like we were saying, though, fairly untested, you know, like,
like Michigan and Ohio State and and then, you know, they had
that rough game against Washington.
And that's really, and that's really it.
And so, yeah, I, yeah, I think this, the Notre Dame offense has
a lot of talent. Of course, Jeremiah Love is
incredibly talented. Jadarian Price is massively
explosive. And Riley Leonard is he runs the
ball better than any quarterback Indiana has played.
And you know, you can point to the Northwestern game and I kind
of broke this down in the in the preview too, for by sized buys.
And you point to the Northwestern game because Jack
Loush got 38 scrambling yards against Indiana.
And that's that's that's the worst.
But you know, we're talking about designed yards here.
Then I don't I don't know if. And, and I like Brian, Brian
Haynes's comments about it today where he was saying, you know,
like. When the quarterback runs, he
gets hit. And I was like, whoa, OK, I that
that that explicit, that explicit sentiment is something
that you don't really hear that often.
And so I was like, OK, you know, they're OK That that's the
attitude that this defense is coming into this game with.
And that if I'm Notre Dame, like, I don't know, that's
that's a little frightening to me because like this, this
offensive line, it could be, you know, it's graded great.
But who have they played? I mean, not really anybody
fearsome. So this is the best front that,
you know, that Notre Dame has played.
Statistically, this is the best front and this is not the best
offensive line. And well, I mean, it is the best
offensive line, but but it's an untested offensive line in a way
that, you know, in Ohio State's offensive line is it was already
tested. It was tested by Oregon and and
other teams before that. So you know, like, is this the
best offensive line Indiana scene?
I personally don't think so, but you know, we'll see.
We'll see how they play on the Friday.
Yeah, I'm, I'm really very curious to see how that plays
out. And and you know, the, there's
just, there's all these little things like you said, where
where I, I think you can, you can highlight evidence one way
or another. And there's a lot of like both
these teams have some interesting statistical
anomalies. Like when you even when you're
comparing some of their individual stats, like I was
looking up earlier, like if you look over turnover margin, you
know, Indiana's generated 23 turnovers, Notre Dame's
generated 28. But eleven of the 28 Notre
Dame's generated came against Navy and Virginia.
But then on the flip side, you know, 10 of the 23 that Indiana
generated were against Nebraska and Purdue.
And, and so, you know, these are these are the kinds of things
even even sacks. Like if you look at their
defensive performances, Notre Dame sacked their opponents 30
times this year, but eight of those came in one game, and that
was against Florida State, who had pretty much given up by that
point. Indiana sacked their opponents,
34 * 7 of those came against Michigan State, you know, which
is a team that you know, that's why they had -36 rushing yards
in that game. So again, it's just kind of like
you, you look at all of the different factors and you look
at where these teams are AT. And you can, again, you can
paint whatever picture you really want to paint.
I, I do think ultimately there's a few things as I look at both
teams and the way that they've performed, if Indiana's going to
be successful in this game, it feels like they have to get off
to a relatively quick offensive start.
You know, what we've seen from Notre Dame's schedule so far
this season is that when their offense gets going, it doesn't
stop. And a lot of their opponents
have just not gotten their offenses going throughout the
course of the season. And I think with Indiana, if you
look at the Michigan game, the Ohio State game, even the
Michigan State game, if we want to be honest, like Indiana
started to really have problems and they all kind of started
with Curtis Rourke's injury and you and even you could really
throw Washington there as well. Like Indiana's hot offensive
start there came on a pick six that you know, that that
happened early on in the game. So we asked Mitchell Page about
it on Sunday and he was like, well, it's a timing thing with
Rourke and his receivers. And but it's also how are you
gonna commit offensively? And I think one of the things
that was frustrating about the Ohio State game was, you know,
they figured out how to do things on that first play on the
scripted Dr. and then they seemed to run out of ideas a
little bit in terms of how to keep the offense going.
They've even in the in the Purdue game, like they didn't
get off to a red hot start. I think they had to punt on the
1st possession or something like that.
And so to me, that's a key for Indiana.
You cannot let Notre Dame get out to A2 score lead.
You've got to put some points on the board in the first quarter.
And I think you need to show a nice mixture of running pass so
that Notre Dame can't settle in on whatever you're doing.
And defensively, I think you've got to try to force some stops
early to try to get Notre Dame back on their heels a little
bit. You know if the the the ideal
like Death Blossom scenario for Indiana here is got if you could
get 3 scores. On the board early Notre Dame's
not really built. To do that kind of a game, they
haven't had that all season. I mean, you know, you look at
the the, the full extent of what Notre Dame has been able to do
in terms of their schedule. And as I mentioned, like they're
averaging getting up about 13 points a game.
The only teams that have scored, you know, significant amounts of
points by significant, I mean like over 20.
Those were the close games that they had outside of the Northern
Illinois game. You know, Louisville was within
7 and Southern Cal was within 14, and both of those teams
scored above 20 points. But that's been the exception.
So how does Indiana take what they did and put that into what
they're trying to do in this game is a big question mark for
me. Yeah, that's a good that's a
good point about about Notre Dame.
I mean just their general offensive philosophy as run the
ball and and if you you know, they can pass for sure, but it's
not one of those like volatile passing attacks.
It's more like, you know, we have all of these capable pass
pass catchers and you can't cover them all while also
covering the run. And so that's the way that they
approach it. But if they get into pass like
obvious passing scenarios, it's difficult for them.
They're they don't have the top end talent that that some of
these other teams have. And so, yeah, that that's a
really good point. Galen, if they can get up there,
if they can just put 3 scores on the board, it's hard to keep up
with something like that. And, and like we've seen and I
think like what some folks probably forget from earlier in
the season, given the way that Michigan or Ohio State went, is
that this Indiana team can put up some points pretty
effortlessly. And so they, you know, if they
if they can, if they can establish precedent on offense
and then break that precedent, you can get some explosive
plays. And Mike Shanahan loves to do
that. And if if it's just a matter of
getting into those situations and you know, yeah, it it it's
going to be, it's going to be you kind of like round 3 of that
for Indiana, because Michigan and Ohio State, you know, they
they made Mike Shanahan really work for those things.
I expect Notre Dame to too, but maybe just not to the extent
that that an Ohio State might. And so, so yeah, yeah, that's,
that's a, that's a really good point.
And also like stop being Notre Dame earlier in the earlier in
the drives, that's where they're most susceptible is early in the
drives. Yeah.
I mean, you know, you look at like, again, like go back to
that Notre Dame USC game, USC out game.
Notre Dame in that game, 557 to 436, they got six more first
downs. They actually beat them in time
of possession. You know, you look at the box
score of that game and you know Notre Dame ran for 258 yards.
They only threw the ball 23 * 178 yards.
You know Jayden Maiava from from USC passed for 360 yards.
They had 200 yards on the ground.
The problem was they threw a 99 yard pick 6 while down seven in
the fourth quarter and then followed that up a couple
minutes later with 100 yard pick six that finished the game off.
But, you know, the part of it is US CS got a higher caliber of
talent and can go head to head against Notre Dame.
Indiana's not going to quite have that capacity, you know.
But if you go back to the Louisville game, you know, the
the, the story is, is not that different.
Louisville out gained Notre Dame 395 to 280.
They had eight more first downs or Notre Dame only had 11 first
downs in that game. They actually out rushed Notre
Dame 1:31 to 1:17 and Notre Dame only threw the ball 23 times.
You know it. It was one of those situations,
though, where, you know, Notre Dame made the plays they needed
to make. I mean, I'm not taking the game
away from them. But if you're if you're Indiana,
I think you look to some of those games and you're like, OK,
what was the secret sauce here that allowed those teams to out
game Notre Dame? I don't see a scenario where
Indiana beats Notre Dame without out gaining them by a fairly
significant margin. But you know, I think those
games at least tell you like there's a because I would put
Indiana's talent level around Louisville's talent level, maybe
slightly higher. It probably lower than USC, but
Indiana was more efficient than USC all season.
And it's not like Indiana doesn't know how to play
offense. And if Curtis work and his
timing is back with his receivers.
And as long as the the, the, the conditions there aren't bad,
this is going to be a different caliber of offense than what
Notre Dame is really used to. And that is a really intriguing
thing when you combine it with the caliber that we know the
Indiana defense is. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And and, and, and at the same time, I don't, I don't know if
we've mentioned this either, but in Indiana's defense has not
really played a lot of high-powered offenses either.
And, you know, they, they haven't exactly played an
offense where the quarterback can run.
They haven't played an offense with a playmaker like Jeremiah
Love. You know, that that is, those
are, those are very real things. And, and not necessarily that,
you know, not necessarily that USC is, is a better defense than
Indiana is, because they clearly aren't.
And you know, and Louisville, you know, they, I, I would not
say that that Louisville is really in the same category as
as Indiana defensively either. So I, I think, you know, Indiana
could, what we see from Indiana's defense will probably
be similar to what we see against Notre Dame.
And, and if it's anywhere where it was against Ohio State, I
think, you know, this, this is a very close game.
But yeah, yeah, I think, yeah, I think you know, when again I
was, I plotted all of the in the preview, I plotted all of Notre
Dame's opponents offenses by total EPA for passing and
rushing. And, and the ones that like
Louisville and Georgia Tech, they had successful games.
They were closest to the to to the efficiency that Indiana has
achieved and EPA on pat and passing and, and both of them
had great passing games. And, but what a lot of them had
was a bit more efficiency and, and rushing and, and over the
course of the season. And so, you know, I think that
kind of pulls back to Indiana's offensive line performance.
And I think that's kind of where it's always started and, and the
entire season. And so, you know, if, if, if the
offensive line doesn't look better than it did against,
against Ohio State, against Michigan, frankly against the
Purdue in the beginning too, like there was some rough plays
in the beginning too. If it doesn't look better, it
might be a struggle to to get that timing like you were
talking about when in the passing game and then, you know,
in the Russian game, I think there might be a bit more
cushion. But yeah, that's that's
something that I just keep coming back to is just that
interior offensive line and, and, and how that can really gum
up some of the things that we're talking about here, right.
Yeah. I mean, ultimately, it's one of
those big things like the the Indiana's offensive line becomes
like the key to to so much. And it's really been the key to
a lot of the season when you get right down to it.
And if they can't, if they can't protect Curtis work in the
passing game and they also can't open up holes for Justice
Ellison and Tyson Lawton to run through, It's it's a real tough
sled. Because, you know, ultimately,
if Indiana can't move the ball, you don't feel good about
Indiana's defense being able to keep Notre Dame from moving the
ball, just given how much muscle memory they have with having
moved the ball. And and yet by the same token,
Indiana's like got to figure out early, like, can we actually
stand up physically to this Notre Dame defensive front?
If you can, well, that opens up a lot.
But if you can't, you're going to have to change the game plan
in a way that is more effective than what they did against
Michigan and Ohio State, who are frankly, I think the two teams
talent wise that Indiana's played that are the closest to
what they're going to see in this Notre Dame game.
Now. I would expect there to be more
contingencies in place. I'd expect Curtis work to be,
you know, hopefully fully back to where he was before in terms
of of his his thumb health and just you know, where that is.
But you've got to have an early feeling out period.
And it would be great to be able to do that while you're up by a
few points rather than being in a situation where you're having
to figure it out on the fly. You know, I, I, I think it's a
legitimate concern. And it's where if we sound like
we're equivocating here or we're not like taking a stand, it's
really, again, I'll go back to what we said before you can, you
can look at all of these numbers and you could say definitively,
Notre Dame's going to win. You could say definitively
Indiana's going to win. I've seen pundits across the
country doing one or the other and I to a degree that I'm not
seeing with the other games. Taylor, like people do not know
which way to land on this game. Has that been your impression as
well? Yeah, yeah.
And that's where that's where like that's where when we were
talking about, you know, you said these two teams are made in
a lab because they're they're untested.
You know, that feels like this match up in general, because
there is it's a lot of strength on strength, but a lot of
strength that isn't necessarily as tested as other as other
teams. And then also you just look at
the look at the trenches and like Notre Dame strength is this
interior defensive line, while Indiana's weakness on the
offensive line is the interior. Like, everything is like
designed to have been playing each other to to face each other
at some point this season. And it just happens to be this
playoff game. But that's where that's why I
came back to like the the thing that is not really a strength on
strength and a thing that can actually really make a
difference here is Indiana's rushing attack versus Notre
Dame's rushing defense. And that's where that interior
offensive line just really has to step up because like, like
that's, that's where Indiana can make that that sort of
difference that we've been talking about.
And where the statistical anomalies don't really exist in
the same way that they exist in other areas.
Like, like they're starting a true freshman at cornerback.
And, and like, how long is that going to last?
You know, is that going to last against Indiana?
Can they stay in man to man? Like I, I, you know, it's going
to be really interesting. It's going to involve a lot of
great coaching at the end. Now that's what I'm really
excited about in this because like you were saying, like
Indiana has to identify if they can stand up physically against
this Notre Dame defensive front. And So what do they, what does
Mike Shanahan change? What is what does Bob Oostat
change with his offensive line Like that is it's going to be
really fun to like watch the the the insurance and outs of this
as far as adjustments go. Here.
Here's some trivia, Taylor. Let's see if you can nail this.
How many games this year? How many games this year did
Indiana allow over 400 yards of total offense?
You can play along at home. It was. 11 game can you name Can
you name the game? It would be.
Was it Washington? No, no, actually, no.
It was Maryland. They let 400.
And one yards Maryland, yes, they let 4. 101 yards up against
Maryland and and the the next highest total that IU allowed
defensively was 336 against Northwestern.
Believe it or not, Notre Dame has only had 1234 games out of
the 12 that they played where they had less than 400 yards of
total offense. You know, so, so this is this.
And the, and the last time that happened was the Georgia Tech
game where they allowed 385 or they where they gained 385.
They've they're on A5 game streak where they've been I
think 436 yards or better in each of the, the last five
games. And so again, it's one of those
where Indiana doesn't give up a ton of yards, Notre Dame gains a
ton of yards. You know, how does that play out
in a game like this? And what's interesting though is
like if you flip that and you look at at total yards gained, I
mean, Indiana, they've had essentially 1 bad game, maybe 2.
I guess you could throw into Ohio State, they gained 151
yards offensively. Washington, they gained 312.
Indiana didn't have another game.
I said, I guess mayor, I guess Michigan, they only gained 246.
Those are kind of the three clunkers from an offensive
perspective. And again, they all came post
work thumb injury, but they've chewed, they've chewed up a ton
of yards overall throughout the course of the season.
Notre Dame's coming off of, you know, a a very interesting game
in my opinion. Notre Dame up until the USC game
had not allowed more than 395 yards offensively in a game.
They let they let they let USC rack up 557 yards in that game.
And so I, I don't know what to expect.
Like is that just was that a one off?
Was that like, well, we're on the road and we're playing, you
know, a good offensive opponent or, you know, are there what
what exploits have Mike Shanahan and company been able to pull
out of that that USC game? I need to go back and watch that
game. Now.
I can tell between the time the game starts because it is really
especially in the passing game. And again, as you mentioned it,
that was the only game this year where Notre Dame allowed over
269 yards passing and they allowed 360.
But they also allowed nearly 200 yards rushing in that game as
well. So I am really curious if
there's some things that IU can borrow from USC as they try to
figure out how to best game plan against this Notre Dame defense.
Can I give you a trivia question?
Please, I'm worse at this than you are so.
I, I, I'm building this live here.
So, so they have played. So I'm looking at this EPHR and
so they they've played. Let's see 1234 Power four teams
that have positive total EPA on both sides or in both phases of
the offense. So passing and rushing, they've
played four. And how many of them do you
think that they have allowed 300 total yards to I'm?
Guessing three of them. Three.
Yeah, they they held Texas A&M under 300 total yards.
And so after that, they allowed over 300 yards to USC, Georgia
Tech and Louisville. And then the only other two
teams that they played that had positive EPA in, in both phases
were Army and Navy. And then Indiana is the next
one. And so like when they actually
play a decent offense that has decent attacks in both passing
and rushing, they struggle. And, and so that, you know,
it's, it's one of those things where it's, it doesn't all look
the same, but it produces similar results.
And so that's yeah, I'm also going to have to go back and
watch and watch that USC. And that's the one that the one
thing that I want, that I have left, that I want to do still in
my research for, for this team. But yeah, I, I, I find it, I
find it really interesting. And, and that's why I think that
there might be some opportunities here for Indiana
in the passing game at the very least.
Yeah. So again, that's going to really
come back to like, what does the weather look like?
And then, you know, what is the adjustment that needs to be made
to make sure that Indiana is is being efficient offensively.
They're going to have to do both.
They're going to have to run and pass.
And, and ultimately, from my perspective, I think if Indiana
can establish themselves early and if Indiana can not allow
Notre Dame to get up by a couple of scores early on, you know, I,
I always, I try to think about like, what's the, if the punt?
Being dropped by James Evans was the trap door that Indiana fell
through in the Ohio State game. Like try to try to game theory
out what would have happened. If that doesn't occur, you know
they punt the ball. Even if you want to argue that
OK, Ohio State might have gone down and scored, I don't think
you can necessarily argue that with the way Indiana's defense
was playing. But even you want to say they
scored a field goal at the end, it's a 3 point game and it's a
completely different setup going into that second-half.
You know, would Indiana have won that game ultimately?
Probably not. Would it have been close?
Probably. And I would argue that talent
wise and location wise, Ohio State better across the board
than Notre Dame, certainly more battle tested.
You know, so from the standpoint of that Indiana had so many
things go wrong in that Ohio State game that you almost have
to, you either have to throw the whole thing out if you're trying
to evaluate what Indiana will do, or you have to take into
account that there were a lot of things they did right in the
game that got significantly overshadowed by how much went
wrong in the game. On the flip side, you know, I do
think from the Notre Dame perspective, it's a pretty
straightforward script. If Notre Dame comes out and they
start gashing Indiana early in the running game, it's going to
be real hard for Indiana to recover on that front because
Riley Leonard can throw the ball.
Like, it's not like he's completely incapable of
throwing. Notre Dame's going to be
watching for that kind of thing. You you worry about Indiana
loading the box so much, putting a spy on Leonard, trying to
account for all of these things, like do they get burned on some
some easy passes down the field? The more success Notre Dame has
and the the less answers Indiana is able to provide of their own
offensively, the more likely that Notre Dame starts to
snowball just because of the the various weapons that they've got
on offense and. You know, so it's.
Really going to be about like can you get penetration in the
running game? Can you make it hard for Notre
Dame to gain first downs? You know, that's probably the
other thing I've noticed that's been really interesting when
looking at Notre Dame. And, and I just mentioned it in
both the Louisville game and the, and the USC game, like we
have seen teams out first down them at times.
And you know, that's been something Indiana's been really
good at picking up first downs, picking up first downs on time.
And you know, if you can disrupt Notre Dame enough in that phase,
maybe that gives you some help because you want Notre Dame
obviously to to kind of be out of sequence on downs because
it's harder to feel good about running it on 3rd and eight
versus running it on 3rd and three or is.
As as we've, as we've. Looked at, you know, a lot of
Notre Dame, their success offensively has been, well, they
rush for a touchdown on 1st down, you know, you know, they,
they're able to get out of sequence that way.
So Indiana's got to try to keep Notre Dame like at or behind
schedule. That's probably as key, at least
to the first half of success for Indiana as anything going into
this. Yeah, that, that brings up
another point too. I, I don't think, I don't know
if we're, I don't know how much special teams are going to see
from Notre Dame in this game. Like I, I think, I think
stopping them early, like in their own territory is very
important because their kicker is not very good.
They have the lowest field goal percentage in the country and
their kicker missed 2 field goals in practice today.
And so, you know, like it's, it's going to, that'll be
interesting. I don't know how much I think
they're going to try to stay out of punting situation as much as
they can and also kicking situations.
And it's going to. Be windy.
Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah, exactly.
And so, you know, and then, you know, there's some also like I I
think a couple, I think a few defenders for Indiana that are
really important are the mid level defenders.
And we were talking about defending like a rushing attack.
The mid level is the important thing.
I think Terry Jones, he's already played a lot on the mid
level, even like the first level, like he he he plays more
snaps along the defensive line of any safety since he's, you
know, took over at Rover. So I think, you know, Terry
Jones, Aiden Fisher, Jalen Walker, those three guys in
particular are very important in this in this game and stopping a
rushing attack. And then, but I also think that
they might take an approach where like they did against
Michigan, where they're like kind of like bend, don't break,
give up them passing, you know, but like, like, is this, is this
Notre Dame team going to beat you through the pass?
Like probably not. And so if you really still have
to stop the run, as long as you're not giving up too much in
the passing game like a like, I think that might be a solid
strategy. Yeah, you mentioned the field
goals. Notre Dame hasn't kicked a field
goal successfully since November 9th, and they've only made 3
field goals since the start of October. 3 total.
They've made three total field goals in that time.
They made one against Georgia Tech, they made one against
Navy, and they made one against Florida State.
They're eight for 18 in in field goal kicking so far this season.
That is a potential advantage for Indiana, even though we
haven't seen Nicholas Radicich that much.
And yeah, passing game wise, you know, it's interesting, Notre
Dame has has yet to eclipse, OK, they eclipsed 250 yards once in
the passing game. That was against Florida State.
They had 252. And and many of their games
they've been at or below the 200 yard mark.
I think 6/6 of their games they've been they've been at
AT2O one or less. And most of the time they're in
the one fifties, one sixties, one 70s range.
And so again, it's like, does Indiana have the horses to be
able to stymie the running attack?
Would Notre Dame really be capable of pivoting and throwing
the ball effectively enough? They've been very efficient.
Like they're very, I think one of the things that you you have
to give Notre Dame a ton of credit for when they throw.
They've been pretty accurate overall.
You know, the the last, like USC, they were 18 of 23.
Army, they were 14 of 18. Virginia, they were 22 of 33.
They didn't have a great game against Florida State, but they
don't really need to have it there.
Most of their games with that one accepted, they've been at
66% or above at least at least since the beginning of October,
which is kind of really when I start the clock on on how to
look at that team now. So you know that it is there for
Indiana. They obviously need to be
cautious of play action. They need to be cautious of
situations where N.O.R.E Dame, you know, tries to get them to
to completely sell out for the run.
But I don't think it's, it's not an impossible scenario to
imagine Indiana is really effective in dealing with Notre
Dame's rushing attack. And as long as Indiana can score
to go and compliment that, it does put Notre Dame in a tough
spot. And it's interesting 'cause I
think the one thing, even if that scenario doesn't work out,
even if Indiana's having trouble stopping the run, the one thing
about Indiana that I would like still in that scenario is kind
of what I liked out of USC statistically, which is that
they can throw the ball. We know that they can throw it
as long as Indiana can figure out a way to get enough
protection to give time, they can nip.
And, you know, kind of, you know, like that's what they did
against Michigan. It's how they got the lead that
eventually gave them the win against Michigan.
That was all built up with short passes that led to the Serat
touchdown, you know, led to the Omar Cooper throw that allowed
them to get down the field. That's what they've done all
season. So effectively is nickel and
dime you until they're half dollaring or dollaring you.
That's a terrible metaphor. I'm not even sure what I'm doing
there, but you know what I mean? Like they they've been smart
about not going for the the home run until they get some guys on
base essentially. And I think that's if there's a
success that that's the alternate path of success for
Indiana. But I really do think
ultimately, like so much of this is going to come down to can
Indiana's defense stop Notre Dame's offense from what they
want to do the best and forced him into something else?
And can Indiana's offensive line create enough of a barrier
between what Indiana's choosing to do offensively and what Notre
Dame's trying to stop, that it gives them enough time to
operate within that environment? And and that's, you know, again,
I don't think we really are gonna know how that plays out
until they get out there and they start playing.
I think we're gonna know relatively quickly how these
strengths actually match up. And I think that's what makes
this so intriguing because it really does like you.
You can do all the exercises in your brain, but it doesn't
matter until you the the actual ball goes up in the air for the
first time. Yeah.
And I think there's one more player that is that is a factor
that we haven't really talked about that much, which is the
Notre Dame tied in Mitchell Evans.
He's kind of coming back. He's he had a pretty bad knee
injury last year and I think he's probably at 100% now.
He had a preview game against USC.
He's caught 3 touchdowns in the last four games.
And he's not exactly like, you know, shifty, like a Colston
Loveland or something. But he's really reliable, kind
of like AI. Don't know if anybody watches
the NFL, but like Mark Andrews, kind of a comparison that I
would make and, and just really reliable.
One of their probably their top target in the passing game.
And but he creates some, some match up issues because if
you're talking about trying to spy on Riley Leonard, well,
that's a linebacker thing, you know, and if you're defending a
tied in, that's also a linebacker thing.
But then also if you want to defend Jeremiah Love, you know,
that's probably a Jaylene Walker thing.
So like I I, you know, that that's where it also becomes
very difficult and where we could see a lot of mismatches
pop up and some bigger plays from Notre Dame through the
passing game. Yeah, yeah, I know.
Like you were saying, Galen, it's really hard to kind of plot
it out because, you know, we can we can analyze statistically and
even on tape, I mean, you can analyze what they do.
But until they're these two teams are out on the field
against each other, it's it's going to be really hard to know.
So that's that's why, you know, it's going to be a huge coaching
game. And I think this is where like
Mike Shanahan and Brian Haynes where they kind of where they
kind of make their money and, and, and also, you know, Tino
Cinceri in his last little, potentially his last game with
Indiana. So yeah, I, I'm, I'm really
looking forward to it. Should be quite a match up and I
still haven't even like I. I haven't got my head around
even what score to predict on this but.
Like SP Plus actually I thought they, I thought that was, I
thought that was pretty fair. I don't know if you saw what SP
Plus projected score was. I didn't.
What was it? They have Notre Dame winning
282438 percent chance for Indiana to win.
I thought that was that was pretty decent.
I thought that was. Fair, Yeah.
I mean, I will say this, I, I don't think either team, you
know, I think if there was, if there was going to be a blowout,
I think it could be more likely that Notre Dame would be the
team doing the blowing out simply because of, of the fact
that it's at Notre Dame and you're relying on a rushing
attack that's got multiple proven AVEN news of success.
But, you know, I think it's most likely to be a relatively close
game. I think both of these teams will
stymie each other. It could be a relatively low
scoring first half. I don't think it's going to be a
low scoring game per SE in as much as I think both teams are
going to get well into the 20s. You know, I, I, I do agree,
though, I think if, if it, if it is low scoring, it might favor
Indiana a bit simply because if it's low scoring, that means
they've managed to keep Notre Dame from doing what they've
been doing for most of the last couple of months, which is
racking up a lot of points. And so that's, that's going to
be a really curious thing to keep an eye on.
Ultimately, both of these teams, they've had a lot of time to
prepare. Both coaching stats are good.
I think both sets of personnel are very capable and it really
looks like a, a dynamite match up in the first round of the
CFP. I'm really excited to see what
happens with it all. Me too.
All, all the athleticism of the,
you know, potential Heisman. Jeremiah Love had some Heisman
buzz around him, which he he has like a, it looks like he has
like a knee issue of some sort. And in practice he was kind of
he he didn't look like he was completely 100% in some of the
videos I saw. But you know, yeah, absolutely.
I think you want all the best players out there.
You want this to be the, the, the highest powered matchup
possible between these two teams And and, you know, see who wins.
But I, I guess Galen, I, I, I know these aren't like bowl
games, but if Indiana wins, is that like a bowl win?
Like what? What do we?
Call them. It's better than a bowl win.
And you know what, you stick that right up in the stadium
alongside what, you know, the, the alongside the, the Liberty
Bowl and the Holiday Bowl and the Copper Bowl.
It's I've heard a lot of talk about that.
It's like, well, man, you know, I wish we were in a bowl.
And it's like, why this is so much better.
And it, it's, I mean, it, it, this is where I think to some
degree we got to get out of our traditional approach to college
football and think more about like what, you know, where the
landscape is and where it's going.
Even losing this game is better than winning a bowl because
you're in the College Football Playoff.
And I think that that's, I will count it as a bowl win, 'cause
it's a postseason win. And that's to me, that's all a
bowl win is. It's a win in the postseason in
college football, except it would be in a game that
mattered, unlike a bowl in most cases.
Right. Exactly.
Yeah, Yeah, No, I'm along the same lines as you.
I was curious what you were thinking.
Yeah. So anyway, well, that we we went
pretty long. This is the longest I think
we've ever done a preview podcast.
But the cause was sufficient, as they say, and we will be back
later on in this week. We got more podcast coverage
coming of Indiana taking on Notre Dame in the College
Football Playoffs. So stick with us for that.
Taylor, as always doing some great work at bite Sized Bison.
Thank you for joining me on the show.
As always a a pleasure talking through this stuff with you.
Yeah, thanks for having me on it.
It's sometimes, you know, I, I, I sit in my, you know, corner of
the world and then write these little data-driven pieces and
it's nice to actually speak it out and and hear how terrible
some of the takes are. No.
No, no, no, no. You know, it's wait, wait.
I do that all the time on the podcast.
So it's, it's fine. I my takes are always terrible.
No, I'm kidding, no Taylor Layman from Bite Sized Bison
joining us on the show and thank you so much.
Thanks to all you folks for watching or listening.
Be sure to subscribe to Crimson Cast on Substack.
We'll be back later on in the week with more IU football
coverage and we'll be up in the South Bend area for the game for
Taylor. I'm Galen.
This Crimson cast will catch you folks.
On the flip side, bring back the Bison stay never daunted.
It's all on everybody and goodbye YouTube.