Sep. 11—SOUTH BEND — The offensive concerns are not going away anytime soon for Notre Dame.
After offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock, quarterback Riley Leonard and a handful of receivers joined the Irish in the offseason, the belief that Notre Dame’s past offensive struggles would take a sharp dive in September became to be more realistic through fall camp.
A win on the road at Texas A&M wasn’t perfect from the offense’s perspective, but a win does a good job of covering up concerns.
A week later, in the wake of a shocking upset in their home opener, it’d be difficult to name one offensive positional group that didn’t receive some time under the microscope.
The passing game and Leonard have taken the brunt of the impact.
“There’s a lot of different things that go into the passing game that we have to improve on, but what we gotta do is make sure that we’re doing things that we feel like our guys can execute on game day,” Freeman said.
Leonard finished 20-32 with two interceptions, one on a 2nd-and-1 at midfield with six minutes remaining in the fourth quarter and the Irish up a point. That underthrown ball to a double-teamed receiver downfield led to the Northern Illinois game-winning field goal.
Freeman says that there was “no consideration” to ever switch to backup quarterback Steve Angeli at any point last Saturday. But the trust in Leonard seems to be at least limited as the Irish opted for a 62-yard field goal instead of one last throw to the endzone. Kicker Mitch Jeter had already seen one of his kicks blocked that day, and predictably so, this one was too.
Reports on Tuesday indicated that Leonard injured his posterior labrum on his non-throwing shoulder and had an MRI taken. The Notre Dame depth chart still lists him as the Week 3 starter.
Both of Notre Dame’s scoring drives last Saturday were on their first…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/nd-football-irish-seek-offensive-021600220.html
Author : Goshen News, Ind.
Publish date : 2024-09-12 02:16:00
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