[Well, I suppose I can let the blasphemy below stand, but I’m going to bump this post above it, at least. :) -ed.]
* * *
With apologies to the Neudorffs…
GOOOOO IRISH!!! BEEEEEAT BOILERS!!!
UPDATE: We’ve got Erin Andrews! w00t! And apparently she’s been looking deeply into Charlie Weis’s eyes.
UPDATE 2: If you look deeply into Charlie Weis’s eyes right now, you’d probably see… panic. It’s 10-0 Purdue already, with 5:49 left in the first quarter, and the defense looks like s**t. Boilermakers moving the ball at will.
On the bright side, here’s one of the many reasons I love Becky: for the last three Saturdays in a row, she’s made some sort of a yummy dip for us to eat while watching football:
Mmm… vegetables.
UPDATE 3: What the hell was that? Darrin Walls just gave up on that tackle. It was like he just sort of assumed Greg Orton would go out of bounds… and as a result, Orton got loose for an extra 10 yards. Completely pathetic.
UPDATE 4: A sampling of commentary from ND Nation:
how f’n embarrassing
It cannot get worse than this.
HOLY F**K
F**k this. Good thing I have a kid’s soccer game to get to.
this is just bloody awful.
Unf**kingreal.
We Are TOAST
USC will beat us by 80
UPDATE 5: I wrote earlier this week that “I feel like some of my fellow Irish fans aren’t fully grappling with the enormity of the team’s suckiness.” Well, over on ND Nation, I think the “grappling” process is beginning. There are several comments along the lines of, “This is the worst team I have ever seen,” and there’s this post, which I agree with 100 percent:
We are inexplicably bad…in EVERY facet of the game. I can understand rebuilding. There is no excuse to be this bad, across the board. Yes, it’s Ty’s fault. But this is Weis’ fault primarily. This team should be competitive by this point, and they’re not even close.
The combination of our “improvement” against a very mediocre Michigan State team and our “brutal” early schedule (whose already clearly overrated “brutality” is looking even less fierce at the moment, with Penn State losing to Illinois, and Michigan — whose big “quality win” is over Penn State — losing to Northwestern) allowed some Domers to fool themselves into thinking that we’d be doing much better if we were playing weaker teams. Now, they’re saying things like this: “The sad thing is PU isn’t even good. That’s how bad we are.” “Nope. They’re a .500 Big 11 team.”
It’s 23-0 with 2:50 left in the first half. Two touchdowns and three field goals. If Purdue had any kind of a red-zone offense — if, say, we were playing USC or Boston College today — it’d be 35-0 right now. We’re lucky to be “only” behind 23-0.
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Categories: Notre Dame, College Football
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September 29th, 2007 at 11:17:57 am
Oh, you just HAD to pick on the BBD, huh? It’s SO ON!
September 29th, 2007 at 11:43:30 am
I love college football.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:43:52 am
I love college football.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:44:26 am
I love college football.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:44:40 am
I love college football.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:45:01 am
Whoa, sorry….something’s not working right.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:48:31 am
Maybe you just love college football A LOT.
September 29th, 2007 at 11:51:51 am
lol
September 29th, 2007 at 11:55:37 am
Wow, did you hear the boos in Oregon when they mentioned Weis???
September 29th, 2007 at 12:01:38 pm
lol, Brendan. You know I wouldn’t have done that if you didn’t have such a great sense of humor ;)
September 29th, 2007 at 12:38:04 pm
I love college football.
Just wanted to get that out there.
September 29th, 2007 at 1:10:13 pm
I’ve heard a rumor about someone loving college football…
September 29th, 2007 at 1:11:30 pm
I have got to tell you..reading the board at ND Nation is priceless….The constantly ascending levels of despair and anger are classic.
Every trojan should have that site bookmarked.
September 29th, 2007 at 1:22:06 pm
I finally, truly, understand the meaning of the word schadenfreude.
September 29th, 2007 at 1:31:31 pm
An Interception!!! Something good!!!
September 29th, 2007 at 1:33:05 pm
Mmmm. The best part of this particular game is eating yummy vegetables.
September 29th, 2007 at 1:36:26 pm
OK, I have to ask, Brendan: what exactly makes for a mediocre team? I’m not a college football fan, but I can read enough to note that MSU is currently 4-0, and projected by Rich Tellshow to finish 9-3. That would strike me as solidly good, though not in the excellent category.
Also, if you’re going to call the team mediocre, shouldn’t you include that as part of the argument against ND’s schedule thus far being brutal?
September 29th, 2007 at 1:45:20 pm
Looks like ND Nation took their board down again…..
September 29th, 2007 at 1:53:32 pm
Mike, MSU hasn’t played anybody good — Notre Dame included, obviously — and they just barely beat a Pitt team that UConn absolutely crushed. They might well finish 9-3, but that’s more a reflection of how awful the Big Ten is right now than a suggestion that they’re a good team. Watching them play, it was clear to me that they aren’t that good. I’m not basing “mediocre” on statistics, I’m basing it on watching them.
September 29th, 2007 at 1:55:17 pm
Gahrie, it looks to me like both boards — Rock’s House and Game Day — are still up. Must have been a momentary glitch that you witnessed, or something.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:06:55 pm
Since Purdue is such a “bad team” that only make ND look worse in their loss. Same goes for the other “bad” teams they have played thus far. It doesn’t bode well for ND that they can’t even beat these “bad” teams, now, does it?
I also think that mediocrity is in the eye of the beholder. One could say the Big Ten is full of mediocre teams, but what does that make ND, then? Only as good as a 1-AA teaam?
(Don’t get me started on the “They played nobody” bologna. I already did a post on why strength of schedule should not EVER be considered in ranking of teams and especially the BCS. I stand firmly by that, too.)
September 29th, 2007 at 2:07:02 pm
OK…I can get on ND Nation again. Whew that was close. That board makes watching the ND game worth it…..
September 29th, 2007 at 2:12:40 pm
Trisha, what are you trying to prove by saying “what does that make ND, then?” My WHOLE POINT is that Notre Dame sucks. You’re not going to hurt my feelings by pointing out what I’ve already said.
But Notre Dame clearly isn’t “only as good as a 1-AA team.” That’s absurd. Appalachian State would wipe the floor with the Irish.
:)
And, um, entirely excluding strength of schedule from consideration for polls and the BCS is, with all due respect, completely non-sensical. Reducing its significance, or calculating it in a different way, fine, but if you have no strength-of-schedule element whatsoever, then there’s no way to differentiate between a team that goes 12-0 against twelve winless teams and a team that goes 12-0 over twelve 11-1 teams. If USC (or LSU, or Oklahoma, or whoever) and Hawaii both go undefeated, is there really any doubt who has “earned” that undefeated record more?
(And I’m the person who always argues for the mid-majors to get respect. But c’mon.)
September 29th, 2007 at 2:14:40 pm
Wow…missed the extra point…that kind of says it all doesn’t it?
September 29th, 2007 at 2:20:14 pm
The problem with SOS is that there is no way in hell a team like USC or some other really tough team is going to play a team like Purdue or other weaker team. They just won’t do it becasue it will weaken their SOS. So, how are teams like Purdue or even Hawaii going to strengthen their schedule when the tougher teams won’t give them even a passing glance? If you can’t get rid of it, fine. But make it worth very little compared to wins and losses. Otherwise, it’s a lopsided ranking system that is biased toward the schools like USC or Oklahoma or LSU.
[p.s. The “only as good as a 1-AA team” was in question form, and a serious question at that. I wasn’t necessarily aiming any of that at you, personally. Just to ND fans in general. I know that you think ND sucks.]
September 29th, 2007 at 2:23:38 pm
P.S. to Trisha: Please don’t take my opinion of Purdue and the Big Ten personally. I’m not trying to be mean. I’m just being honest. You’ll notice I’m also very honest about Notre Dame being horrible, so it’s not like I only pick on teams I don’t like or something. I’m just saying, based on watching Purdue and Michigan State, these are not elite teams by any means, in my opinion. At least, they’re not playing like it right now. Nor have they proven it with signature quality wins (hence the strength-of-schedule point — it’s not “balogna,” it’s reality). They’re winning by a big margin because Notre Dame is AWFUL. And I’m not pointing this out because I want to insult Purdue/MSU fans, I’m pointing it out because I want my fellow Irish fans to face reality here. A lot of Domers have been using our “brutal schedule” as a crutch to explain away how bad we are. That needs to stop. People need to realize we haven’t actually played anybody that good yet. That’ll happen next month with Boston College and (especially) USC.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:28:07 pm
Trisha:
Don’t worry…the SEC will always schedule the cupcakes……
September 29th, 2007 at 2:30:33 pm
I know, Brendan. I am not offended. I was trying to make a similar point about how bad ND was, albeit in a different way ;)
I will say this, though. Clausen has got some potential. I think, given some time to mature, he’ll be a great QB. He’s made some impressive plays. Yes, some of that is due to his receivers being able to catch what he’s thrown or being in the positions they needed to be in. But I think Jimmy will be a great asset to ND in the future.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:32:40 pm
Trisha, I feel your pain about the scheduling issue (although it’s not true in ALL cases - there are SOME big-time teams that schedule fairly, and USC is one of them), and I agree that certainly, wins & losses should matter more than SOS. But, they already do. It’s not like you see a bunch of 10-2 SEC teams going to the championship game ahead of 12-0 Big Ten teams or something. That said, I certainly agree that the current system needs a lot of tweaking. But the only real solution is a 16-team playoff, with all conference champions getting automatic bids.
Besides, frankly, Purdue is arguably part of the problem here. Teams from BCS conferences aren’t the ones who are truly disadvantaged by scheduling, it’s the top tier teams from mid-majors who really suffer. The biggest problem is BCS teams who will only play the dregs of the mid-majors, not the good teams. (The theory being, if they’re going to take an SOS and public-perception hit anyway, they want to be sure they at least WIN.) I don’t see Purdue playing home-and-homes with any Boise States or Hawaiis or Tulsas or TCUs, etc.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:34:36 pm
I agree that Jimmy has lots of potential, if Notre Dame ever manages to cobble together, y’know, an actual football team around him.
Watching the Irish right now reminds me of watching Newington High School football back when they were having their 0-10 and 0-11 seasons. When they get the ball, you don’t dare hope for anything good to happen; you just pray they won’t fumble or throw an interception, and if they get a first down, you celebrate as if they just won the Super Bowl.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:37:13 pm
P.S. You have to admit, Trisha, Purdue’s red-zone offense isn’t exactly spectacular. That’s four field goals now. And this is against Notre Dame’s defense. From Purdue’s perspective, this should be a 42-6 game.
September 29th, 2007 at 2:48:14 pm
Agreed about Purdue and their red-zone offense. But I will mention that at the start of the season Purdue was using a dual back system and one of their back is out or the season so Sheets is doing all the work now.
I will be the first to admit that Purdue is not an Elite team and middle of the pack Big Ten team BUT they have shown me they are better than they have been in a long time. And could cause some problems for the top tier teams in the Big Ten.
Also I want to point out that when Purdue did play the MAC teams and I-AA Eastern Ill. they beat them soundly like you would expect. So they did what they should have with those teams.
I will disagree that Purdue is a “BAD” team but Purdue has to start playing 4 quarters of defense these strong First halves and weak second halves suck and I am concerned for Purdue
September 29th, 2007 at 2:50:13 pm
another missed extra point?!?
September 29th, 2007 at 2:57:21 pm
This is what I was afraid of with Purdue. I thought Purdue could actually lose this game and that is not out of the realm of possibility from how they are playing in the second half. Over the last 5 years of watching Purdue football anytime Purdue was expected to do very well and win a game with a wide margin they seem to “CHOKE” I hope that is not what I am witnessing today
September 29th, 2007 at 3:04:05 pm
Can you say quarterback controversey? I knew you could…..
September 29th, 2007 at 3:19:15 pm
I think Clausen has the potential to develop into a great QB but he’s certainly not there yet. He needs some time to work with the QB coach for a year or two.
Sharpley doesn’t telegraph every pass and he releases the ball more quickly so the line doesn’t have to hold up the defense forever. He looked like bung compared to Quinn, but he looks good right now.
September 29th, 2007 at 3:52:32 pm
Purdue isn’t a good team until they beat a good team.
1-3 Toledo, 2-2 1-AA Eastern Ill., 2-3 Central Michigan, 1-3 Minnesota, & this craptastic 0-5 Notre Dame squad don’t make 5 impressive wins. It makes them a win away from bowl eligibility, which, given the strength of the Big 11 this year, means they’re in the postseason.
The team can improve, but 8 wins seems like the best case scenario at this point for an average-looking PU squad.
Better to be a Biolermaker than Irish, though…
September 29th, 2007 at 4:25:07 pm
I’d still rather be Irish…I saw some glimpses of awesomeness beneath the horrendous lack of discipline and errors.
Also, Golden Tate.