Earlier this week Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly discussed right guard Tommy Kraemer returning from an appendectomy and said that he would only play versus Syracuse in an “emergency situation”.
As it turns out it only took until the midway point of the second quarter for Notre Dame to find themselves in that “emergency situation” as Kraemer entered the game for the Irish while trailing to 1-9 Syracuse, 7-3.
Notre Dame’s first drive with Kraemer in the contest was stopped on fourth down, but the Irish responded the following possession as Ian Book capped the drive with a 28-yard touchdown run to retake the lead, 10-7.
It has been anything but a pretty first half by Notre Dame, but as bad as it has been the Irish still lead.
I didn’t expect it to come easy today as Senior Day seemingly never does, specifically early on, but I wasn’t expecting this, either.
Stay tuned.