I'll give Pitt credit. They are a good, tough team.

[Revolver]

But this game was absolutely there for the taking. There were several critical plays where ND could have ended this game but failed to do so. This team just can't put a team away save Washington. When are they going to realize that they are NOTRE DAME and that teams aren't just going to go away against them?

Pitt played like their season was on the line, ND did not. They were clearly looking past Rutgers last week.

I knew we were going to lose when they had second and goal at the 3 in overtime and could not get a td. Are you fucking kidding me! I know the defense was thinking wtf?

The offensive line was just terrible. Especially in pass protection. Clausen was pressured on every drop back in the second half and in overtime. Many times with a THREE man rush. Unacceptable.

Really went consertive in the second half and overtime. Too many short passes....that had blanket coverage. I believe only two medium range passes....both to Rudolph over the middle.

Really brilliant on Pitt's last td to leave Baldwin single covered with no help. They had tried him twice before and it took two to stop him, their go to back was not on the field. Gee, I wonder what they'll try? WAY too easy.

Second and 18 after a sack in the 4th and you allow a 14 yard scamper on a damn screen? Nice.

I hope everyone is done making fun of 'The Wannastache'. I saw this guy win a national championship and two superbowls with Jimmy Johnson. He knows defense.

Even though I called it, I am absolutely disgusted by this loss. The rest of the season is now a dogfight, with frankly, only syracuse being a certain win.

[IRISHDODGER]

Agree w/ all your points. The only thing I'd change is I believe Pitt is an average, tough team. This team lost to Bowling Green & got boat-raced by Buttgers?

There were many a play & player to point a finger at (Hayseed's PF, play-calling on offense, not stopping McCoy when they knew he was getting the ball) but I put it on the OL. Like you said, no excuse for a 3 man rush to get pressure on the QB. My mind is boggled...I'll never know why this OL just can't gel and be consistent at pass &/or run blocking.

I thought they had improved over last year's debacle although I still say they never improved from game 1 thru game 12 last year, but now I'm starting to wonder when I realize they ND hasn't played nearly the competition they played in the first 8 games last year. I give up trying to figure this OL out.

[IrishR#1]

When it comes down to it, a good team would score a touchdown when given 4 opportunities from the 25 yard line. Neither team did that, hence neither team is good.

[stonebreakerwasgod]

I'll give Revolver credit for being gracious. The loss is on us...not what Pitt did or didn't do. Our coaching needs to improve, sooner than later.

[robertsgolf]

I'll give Revolver credit for being gracious. The loss is on us...not what Pitt did or didn't do. Our coaching needs to improve, sooner than later.

Agree. I think it needs to improve on game day and the preperation needs to improve. How about some sort of in game adjustment. They go to Mccoy or the other tail back on the direct snap, what 10-12 times and we can't figure out how to stop it.

Why the scared play calling late in the game and OT...

So far this staff has shown they can recruit. time to show they can teach and coach.

[mlcspinner]

Agree. I think it needs to improve on game day and the preperation needs to improve. How about some sort of in game adjustment. They go to Mccoy or the other tail back on the direct snap, what 10-12 times and we can't figure out how to stop it.

Why the scared play calling late in the game and OT...

So far this staff has shown they can recruit. time to show they can teach and coach.


Bingo ! reps for that line my friend

[robertsgolf]

Spin is the man...

[daytonirish]

Sounds like I missed some things. What's up with everyone ?

[SanDiegoIrishFan]

Pitt is an average team (especially without their starting QB) and we are a better than average team. I thought our defense played well in the first half and not quite as good in the 2nd half. I was dissapointed in the offense for pretty much the whole game. Too many execution flaws and not very creative play-calling. This game was ours to lose and we did.

[ndcufan]

we need to develop that killer instinct that the truly elite teams have. rather than kicking our opposition when they're down we're giving them a hand to get right back up. i really hope we knock bc down and continually kick them while they're down

[Revolver]

Yeah, you guys are right. Pitt is not a 'good team'. Particularly without their starting qb. They are a solid, competently coached team. A team that beat us without their starting qb and center. Ugh.

[irish_bobcat]

I'll give Revolver credit for being gracious. The loss is on us...not what Pitt did or didn't do. Our coaching needs to improve, sooner than later.

That's true.

[sonomairishfan]

i think that this tough loss shows the world that ND isn't as far along as we had thought. some things that really stuck out to me during the game:

JC- is locked into the primary target and that is it. i can't believe he didn't throw a pick. he needs to start surveying the field. i will give him the benefit of the doubt in the second half as 3 d-linemen were getting past our o-line. his accuracy seems to have tapered off over the last couple of games as well. missing that wide open pass in the endzone during OT was the game breaker for Pitt.

O-Line- really needs to get more athletic. you can't play a zone blocking scheme with these guys. the o-line coaches need to realize that by now. pass protection was the worst performance of the year in my opinion. 3 man fronts should not pressure the qb. they did seem to be able to open some running lanes out of the spread formation in the first half, but for some reason we gave up on that running formation as the game progressed.

WR- Tate and Floyd are freaking awesome. I wish Duval could get going a bit to really spread the DB's thin. Tate's catch was the best one of the year.

RB- AA was fine. JA looked powerful and didn't get enough touches. Hughes looked slow getting to the holes, his power was there, but no spunk. they need to run out of the spread more with AA.

Special Teams- I have to give credit to our kicker. He made some good kicks even though he missed at the end. the game shouldn't come down to Brandon Walker. I will give him props for the drastic improvement.

offensive coaches- not sure why no adjustments were made to attack the defense by Pitt in the second half. with the DB/LB's all sitting 10 yards off the line, we should have used the TE more and maybe run slants, but i didn't see any of that. just a basic offense with no creativity. not sure what the reasoning was. the 4 and 1 call late was absolutely horrible. Burning our timeouts like that was lack of organization on the coaches as well. it seemed to me that CW was calling plays towards the end of the game, by his body language.

D-line- not sure what to say. they can't stop the run, period. no pressure on a consistant basis on the qb. i think this unit is the weakest part of the team. they seem to get pushed off the line of scrimmage. i think that if they could create some type of penetration our blitz scheme would be very effective. it's a proud unit and i know they will improve on this performance.

LB- okay but could have been better. these guys are the leaders of the defense. would like to see them wrap up more on tackles. they seem to fly in there with shoulders and miss a few tackles. would like to see them penetrate more on blitz packages.

DB/S's- allowed too many critical pass plays. i think our guys are more athletic than Pitt's WR's. Not sure why we didn't double team the tall guy on the TD late. Especially since they went to him like 3 times previous. overall, they played decent.

defensive coaches- can't understand why they can't coach up the run game. it was obvious that they were going to get a heavy dose of McCoy late and nothing was really done to shut him down. i will give pitt credit on executing and McCoy is a bad ass. i'm not sure if the CB/Tenuta experiment is working. Too many cooks in the kitchen????

Overall, this loss hurt bad. To see a two TD lead evaporate was very concerning to me. Our guys have to realize that they are not a good enough team to let off the gas pedal. It is a problem to see zero urgency in parts of the game. I really feel that they needed to stop Pitt early in the 3rd and put another TD up to win, and they didn't. These kids have to realize that they have to earn respect, it doesn't come just because they play for Notre Dame.

[SpanishElite]

Nice Summary. And I agree with you and think it is pretty evident that the weakness is our DL and our consistency on offense. I think on offense we just take to many negative plays. To many sacks, to many runs for negative yards, to many turnovers. We rarely fall forward for 2 or 3 yards. We either get 5-7 or -2. And we just cant have those negative plays.

We knew the DL could be an issue this year and it has been. E. Johnson and D. Flemming have been doing a nice job but are far away from being dominate players. Kuntz is doing ok, I. Williams I think has been affect mentally by his lack of playing time, and it is affecting him on the field when he is playing. And when the DL isnt doing well, and they dont keep OL off the LB and there is no need to double the DL it really creates and issue for the LB. So that why I think our LBs have been having issues.

It was tough loosing after the early lead. I thought that if we could get up early (Check) limit McCoy (half check for the 1st half) and throw the ball with some success (Check) that we would win. But we just couldnt hold on.

[rontdtarchala]

several... more than several times our lb's overran the play... they had the rb dead in the backfield and took a bad angle.... the one where mccoy ran into a stacked line bounced off two baaaad tackles and made something like 25 yards made me want to eat someones liver with farbre beans....

[Sureal]

I actually had the opportunity to post after the game. Chose not to. Too pissed. I ain't givin' Pitt credit for crap. We gift wrapped that bleepin' game.

[goldenlid]

I watched this game four times and ND played pretty well for the most part. What I saw more times than not was just one wrong step or one shift right before the snap and ND would be out of place and Pitt had the guy who could take advantage of it. On offense Pitt would just make a play and that would stop a good drive. As far as the play calling goes it wasn't bad it was just one guy missing a block or not seeing a cut back lane or just the QB and WRs not being on the same page. ND almost won the game in the 1st OT running the ball. This team is not bad, I've got friends that are MSU,UNC, and PITT fans and I've asked them what they thought and all of them have said that ND is a good team.