The fallout from a very lackluster win against Louisville continues, this time over at Rivals. We looked at Kirk Herbstreit’s comments about the Irish yesterday, and today it’s Mike Farrell’s turn.
In his Three-Point Stance article, he looked at a variety of questions surrounding the college football season right now. One of those was Notre Dame’s validity of making the College Football Playoffs. In short, it’s not good.
The recruiting director doesn’t see the Irish as serious contenders for a CFP spot. “If this Notre Dame team falls behind by a couple of scores, it is done. The Fighting Irish don’t have the offense to come back as the passing game is bad.”
The passing game Farrell is talking about hasn’t obviously been great. The Irish are middle-of-the-pack as far as a scoring offense, putting up 33 points per game. Even with the blah outing against Louisville, the offense is still gaining 440 yards a game.
Yes, the offense needs work, but putting a fork in Brian Kelly’s group and declaring them done is way too premature. The defense has led the 2020 group, giving the offense an opportunity to catch-up. The whole narrative can change in a week, as we have seen.
This weeks matchup against Pittsburgh has just that much more juice to it. The Irish don’t need anymore locker room material to get fired up, but Farrell provided them with more.
Remember, there are many factors as to why the offense has struggled out of the gate this year. Breaking in a new starter at every offensive skill position wasn’t going to be easy. Tommy Rees’ has to settle in to becoming the guy calling the plays.
It was never going to be a smooth ride offensively for the Irish this year. There was bound to be some bumps along the way, but the schedule gods have given them plenty of time to get it right, but that time is running out.
Including this week, the offense will have two more games to get things right before big, bad Clemson comes to town. Hopefully by November 7th, the Irish offense is humming and can match what the defense has brought so far this season.
(Photo courtesy of Notre Dame Athletics)