Trojan invasion

Southern Cal comes to South Bend this weekend riding a seven-game winning streak against Notre Dame. It won’t end anytime soon. It’s too bad, really; the campus has chalk all over it saying “Beat SC” or some variation, tons of recruits are coming in and some people seem to think this is the year. But despite how it looked against Washington, USC will still beat Notre Dame. Doesn’t matter how loud the students are or what they wear.

The nice thing is, Charlie Weis understands how difficult this game will be and has his head in the right place about it.

“We know the challenge we have to face, we’re not oblivious to that fact,” Weis said. “We’re going to give it a fair go.”

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Washington post-game notes

After three close games, it’s starting to look real.

Yeah, they needed some help — Michigan State overthrowing an open receiver in the end zone, a last-second touchdown against Purdue and a huge two-point conversion against Washington. But the Irish have won all three games, so you have to figure it’s not luck at this point.

Positives:

• Clausen. The accuracy, the fourth-quarter poise, the ability to run the passing game effectively in the absence of Michael Floyd. He’s good.  Charlie Weis said he might give Clausen a rest this week because of the bye coming up this weekend, but he reconsidered. “I think the more rest I can give that turf toe, or maybe on the flip side of that, maybe we should give him another turf toe,” he joked Sunday.

Washington pre-game notes

In no particular order, here are some thoughts about the Washington game:

Jake Locker equals scary. He’s quick, and still has the read-option capability he had before he got hurt last year, and now new coach Steve Sarkisian has him running a pro-style offense. Against Notre Dame’s suspect defense, the options for what Locker can do are endless. The defensive line, while getting better pressure on Purdue’s Joey Elliott last week, still can’t be relied upon to disrupt the quarterback.

ND-Purdue postgame thoughts

Last post on Sept. 19? Wow. We’re slacking. Forgive us, we’ve been working hard on our new podcast, which can be found  here:

http://www.ndsmcobserver.com/podcasts/

Anyways, onto Purdue:

Lots of things to take away from this game, first and foremost being Jimmy Clausen’s play on a bum foot. He threw a game-winning touchdown pass to Kyle Rudolph with 24 seconds remaining to give Notre Dame a 24-21 win.

New plane, same effect

The fabled “abortion plane” left in May, but today campus is blessed with a new aerial message, “WWW.WEISINTERNSHIP.COM.”

I wonder what Michigan State fans will think when they read the banner behind the prop plane, courtesy of a former Notre Dame football player.

The Only Way to Feel Better

Yesterday, It came back.

The Pain.

Every Irish fan out there knows what I’m talking about. It sits right above your stomach, on the left, and  It gets stronger every time you think of ruined expectations, dashed hopes, deferred dreams. It’s been lurking around for years now, and the fact that we thought It was gone made our collective relapse that much worse.

Unsportsmanlike Conduct Costly

If you are on the Notre Dame campus right now, you can hear door after door slam in frustration.

Michigan just beat us with a last-minute touchdown 38-34.

It sucks.

Already Notre Dame students are rationalizing the loss, myself included. But anyone arguing that there should have been two seconds left on the clock after the last play is simply lying to themselves.

Final: Michigan 38, Notre Dame 34

Welp, no go. Kyle McCarthy tried his best to pull the Irish back. He intercepted Forcier, setting up an Armando Allen touchdown and two-point conversion. But it wouldn’t do, because the Irish defense allowed Michigan to drive down the field after the teams traded punts and score with 11 seconds left.

Notre Dame ran one play, a pass over the middle to Golden Tate, which he caught, but he was tackled out of bounds as time expired.

Welcome to the Big House

It’s very yellow in here. I guess maize is the correct term, but I’m going with yellow. We’re about 15 minutes from kickoff, so check back here for live updates.

Some things to watch for:

Tate Forcier showed he can pass the ball well, even though he’s a true freshman, last week against Western Michigan. Denard Robinson showed he can run as well. Robinson, however, attempted only four passes. How much time will he see?

Jimmy Clausen faces an actual secondary today. How will he react? I don’t think he stays as perfect as he has been.

Will Brandon Minor and Junior Hemingway be ready to go?

Check back for updates.

Depth chart day! and various other thoughts

Back again at the football blogging, seeing as we’re four days away from game day. First, a very important bit of self-promotion: Check out The Observer’s new sports podcast, called the Irish Insider podcast, where football writers Sam Werner, Matt Gamber, Michael Bryan and myself pretend we know something about Irish football.

Download the podcast by going here: http://www.ndsmcobserver.com/podcasts/. Or search “Irish Insider Podcast” on iTunes. We’ve got an introductory podcast, two that preview the schedule and one coming out later tonight talking about the depth chart.

To the football: the only possible surprise on the depth chart was WR Robby Parris being named the fourth receiver.