Notre Dame and Virginia Tech will battle Saturday with neither team looking particularly impressive, at least not lately. The Irish remain terrific at converting on third downs, returning kicks and winning the turnover battle. They even have done a nice job passing the ball, even if they aren’t sure who their best quarterback is right now. As long as whoever starts under center can play well and play smart, it doesn’t really matter.
The Hokies are even better at special teams returns, don’t give up a lot of first downs, and are extremely disciplined. However, there are quite a few areas where they pretty much have no place to go but up. They are the worst red-zone team in college football overall, don’t pick up many of their own first downs, and are terrible in fourth-down situations, too. On top of that, the offense simply does not move the ball well, and there’s no reason to expect this won’t happen again Saturday.