SOUTH BEND, Indiana (AP) – Brian Kelly doesn’t stop at one of Notre Dame’s key goals in the school playoff semi-final against Alabama on Friday.
“We need to run the ball, we have to run the ball,” Kelly said. “Depending on who we are and how we behaved this year, we’ll have to run the ball more successfully than the last time we play.
Last time it was a 34-10 defeat in the ACC Championship against Clemson No. 2, a bitter note to the Fighting Irish before the confrontation opposed to the first Crimson Tide. 30 hauls, six catches by Field Marshal Ian Book and only 3 out of 12 in third.
The powerful Alabama offensive then led a couple of Heisman Trophy finalists: Quarterback Mac Jones and receiver DeVonta Smith with tough runner Najee Harris batting for a team that averages 49. 2 points in 11 straight wins.
Kelly believes the most productive way to prevent this is to keep the offense out. Notre Dame’s offense averages 33:57 minutes of ball consistent with the game (eighth nationally).
“We are aware that this is an electric attack that brings back fanegas and fanegas of points,” Kelly said of the Tide. “Our attack has been a ball control attack. We can’t go into this game and replace who we are. He’s kind of our DNA this year. There can’t be three of us. We need to remain football”.
After a 12-7 victory over Louisville on October 17, Notre Dame has won six directly in which he has earned time for possession in each game with an average of 217 yards per ground, 279 yards per air and more than 40 points per game. Game. Included in that sequence, there was a 47-40 victory in double overtime over Clemson, then first-placed, in which Book finished with 377 yards overall offense and on offense Kyren Williams had 140 yards on the ground, one of his six games in more than a hundred yards in a 1,061-yard season.
The Irishman, fourth-placed, will be junior intermediate Jarrett Patterson, the vocal leader on the offensive line with 21 consecutive openings before foot surgery at the end of the season in late November.
“Jarrett is the middle of the country, if I’m honest,” insisted Liam Eichenberg, a team at the time of the Associated Press All-America. “We miss one of our players. “
The Irishman began as a freshman Zeke Correll, who suffered a sprained ankle in the past due to North Carolina, and now Josh Lugg in Patterson’s position. But the line was not the same due to poor functionality: Correll and Lugg had rupture disorders. – and returned 10 book catches in the last 3 games.
“We want to play one game at a time, especially on the third attempt,” Book said. “That’s how games are won. We want to win this third battle. And that’s what we plan to do. “
Book has been electric sometimes this season, spreading games with his feet. If this street is closed, it can mean shorter passes with the wings closed Michael Mayer and Tommy Tremble and, in all likelihood, Williams screens.
That may open the way for an Alabama defense that features American cornerman Patrick Surtain II and supporters Dylan Moses, Christian Harris, and Will Anderson Jr. , a freshman who led the SoutheastErn Conference with seven catches of quarterbacks.
First-year offensive coordinator Tom Rees, a reserve quarterback for Kelly’s Irish team in 2012 who lost 42-14 to Alabama in the BCS championship game the last time the groups faced each other, doesn’t think Book wants to put everything on his shoulders.
“I don’t think you want anything heroic that can win the game on your own,” Rees said. “For us (it’s about) being more consistent at the beginning and time of failure. don’t put the chains on us and put us in 3rd and long situations.
___
More advanced school football: https://apnews. com/tag/Collegefootball and http://www. twitter. com/AP_Top25