Tag: BYU

CFN – AP Top 25 Poll, Rankings Prediction: Week 6

Will Notre Dame find themselves ranked again on Sunday?

What will the Associated Press college football top 25 look like when it’s released on Sunday after another exciting Saturday of games but no major upsets?

Pete Fiutak of College Football News always likes to project how the writers are going to vote and releases his AP Top 25 Poll rankings prediction after the major games get done each Saturday.

Notre Dame fans might be happy to know Fiutak has the Irish making their way back into the top 25 after their 28-20 win over BYU in the Shamrock Series. Fiutak has the Irish checking in 23rd. Check out his entire list of 25 at College Football News.

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Photos from Notre Dame’s Shamrock Series win over BYU

Here are some images you might have missed in this year’s Shamrock Series game.

Notre Dame defeated BYU, 28-20, in its annual Shamrock Series game. It might not have been the prettiest win, but nobody’s counting that. All we know is the Irish are above .500 for the first time this season, and that’s a great first step towards getting into a quality bowl game. Yes, it stinks that we’ve had to temper our expectations for this season, but that’s how it goes in college football.

The nice thing about this game is that it set the Allegiant Stadium attendance record for a college game (62,742), which previously was held by last year’s Pac-12 title game. It qualified as a sellout, so if you weren’t there, you only could imagine what it was like to be there in Las Vegas. We can’t replicate the atmosphere exactly, but we can give you some images to illustrate what people at the game saw. Here they are, and we know you enjoyed the outcome:

How Twitter reacted to Notre Dame-BYU: Cougars side

Some folks aren’t happy with this outcome (big shock).

BYU entered its contest against Notre Dame as a ranked team. However, it didn’t enter with the best momentum after it had trouble beating a struggling Utah State the week before. Fans took notice of that and wondered if it was an omen for when the Cougars played the Irish. It turned that were kind of right as the Cougars lost, 28-20.

Cougars fans shouldn’t feel too bad as the Irish have yet to lose a Shamrock Series game, and their team just happened to be the opponent this year. Still, that fact has to be of little consolation for them. This has been one of the best programs in the country to this point, and it’s worth wondering how much longer they’ll be ranked, if at all. In any case, Cougars fans took to Twitter to vent their frustrations, and it probably hurts even more given how close their team was to completing a comeback:

How Twitter reacted to Notre Dame-BYU: Irish side

How do you feel after that?

Notre Dame fans surely will tell you that their team’s 28-20 win over BYU in the annual Shamrock Series game should have gone better. That shouldn’t be a surprise given the high standard the program historically has set, and fans are right to want the program to uphold that standard. However, they don’t give extra points or wins for style, so the Irish and their fans will have to be content with getting over .500 for the first time this season. People probably aren’t happy that that had to wait until October, but all’s well that ends well.

If you want to know how Irish fans in general feel after this game, look no further than Twitter. No matter how they expressed themselves, they all are happy just the same with a victory not everyone predicted would come. Here’s a general sense of Irish fans’ thoughts after the victory in Las Vegas:

Notre Dame No. 16 BYU: 5 Instant Takeaways

A lot to clean up but it’s a win. What are your main takeaways?

It can never be easy, can it?

Leading 25-6 in the third quarter it looked like Notre Dame was certainly headed to 3-2 with relative ease and a second half that was in complete control.

It appeared that way until it didn’t.

BYU converted their first third down of the game with 6:44 left in the third quarter and suddenly a light when on for the Cougars.  Two plays later Jaren Hall found Kody Epps for 53 yards and a touchdown and it was game on instead of game over.

Notre Dame ultimately survived with a 28-20 victory in a game that shouldn’t have been as close as the final score said, but the Irish have nobody to blame but themselves for it ending up that way, either.

Here are five instant takeaways from the thriller on the strip that simply shouldn’t have been close.

Twitter reacts to Michael Mayer’s second touchdown against BYU

Once again, this dude is good.

Clearly, breaking the Notre Dame reception record for tight ends on a go-ahead score wasn’t enough for [autotag]Michael Mayer[/autotag]. He decided he needed to make the point as to who’s the best at his position in program history again and again. [autotag]Drew Pyne[/autotag], gifted with plenty of time to observe his options thank to his offensive line, has been more than happy to help Mayer make that point. Here they are teaming up to give Mayer his second touchdown of this Shamrock Series game:

We don’t know what else Mayer will do in this game or even the rest of this season, but we know that time likely is going to be filled with plays filling up highlight reels. Everyone make sure you appreciate what Mayer has to offer because once he’s gone, you’ll be yearning for his days to come back. Fortunately, that’s in the future, which means you can tweet things like this in the present:

Twitter reacts to Notre Dame’s Jayden Thomas’ first college touchdown

That was pretty impressive.

If you don’t know much about [autotag]Jayden Thomas[/autotag], don’t feel too bad. He had minimal playing time during his freshman year at Notre Dame, and even with more opportunities as a sophomore, he hasn’t done a lot to turn heads. However, you definitely will want to know more about him now after this amazing 30-yard touchdown catch late in the first half against BYU:

That wasn’t your typical long touchdown reception. Thomas had to battle with a defender on him to secure that ball and run toward the end zone only a few yards away. If this is the beginning of what will be a fine rest of his Irish career, Irish fans undoubtedly will be anxious to see what comes next for him. In the meantime, some of them took to Twitter to react to a touchdown catch that many will be replaying over and over for the next week:

Twitter reacts to Notre Dame safety against BYU

You loved this, right?

If you’ve been watching the first half of Notre Dame’s Shamrock Series game against BYU, you would think the wrong team is ranked. While the Irish haven’t had a perfect game against the Cougars to this point, they’ve made one devastating play after another. Perhaps the biggest such moment came in the form of a [autotag]Jack Kiser[/autotag] safety immediately after the Irish had a turnover on downs:

The Irish came into this game with the clear advantage in time of possession, and that is playing a factor right now. The defense mostly has done a terrific job holding its own, and it’s limiting offensive opportunities for the Cougars. If the Irish win this game, you could argue that game balls should be split evenly among [autotag]Al Golden[/autotag]’s entire unit.

Here are some folks who took to Twitter to react what might be the Irish’s biggest defensive moment so far this season:

Twitter reacts to Michael Mayer scoring Notre Dame’s first touchdown

Is this dude good or what?

Everyone knew going into the season that [autotag]Michael Mayer[/autotag] was the one Notre Dame offensive skills player you couldn’t sleep on. To this point, Mayer mostly has lived up to that reputation. However, he has been announcing his presence early and often in the first half against BYU. He had one big catch on third down, and he ended that drive by doing this:

As you can see from the tweet, that touchdown did more than only give the Irish the lead. That tight end receptions record previously was held by [autotag]Tyler Eifert[/autotag]. It’s probable Eifert knew his record was in danger for some time now, but records are made to be broken.

Irish fans and scribes undoubtedly remember Eifert well, but Mayer is in the here and now, and some of them took to Twitter to express their appreciation for this special kid. Here are a few of the things they had to say:

Twitter reacts to Notre Dame’s Shamrock Series uniforms

How do you like the unis?

Real Notre Dame fans have known about this year’s Shamrock Series uniforms for a while now. However, there is a difference between seeing a preview of them and actually seeing them in a game. Many college football fans probably didn’t see these uniforms before they tuned into NBC or Peacock for the game against BYU. That has to be believed after seeing these mixed reactions on Twitter: