Notre Dame’s path to Monday’s national championship game against Ohio State at Mercedes-Benz Stadium included a win over Georgia on Jan. 2 in New Orleans.
One month before that game, Georgia beat archrival Georgia Tech 44-42 in Athens in eight overtimes. But even though the Bulldogs prevailed on the scoreboard, the Yellow Jackets may have exposed enough holes in the UGA defense for future opponents like, say, Notre Dame to study.
“I thought (Tech) did a really nice job of, even kind of, revealing a blueprint, even though it’s not exactly the same blueprint that we used, to give you an idea of how you could not only stay in the game but win the game,” Notre Dame offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock said Saturday at the Georgia World Congress Center.
Tech ran for 260 yards and threw for 303 yards on Nov. 29 against Georgia. The Jackets scored 27 of their 42 points in regulation, averaged 5.5 yards per carry and 6.7 yards per play. Tech quarterback Haynes King totaled 110 yards on the ground and scored three times with his legs.
Notre Dame, which often deploys quarterback Riley Leonard in the ground game, got 80 rushing yards from its senior QB in the win against Georgia. The Fighting Irish rushed for 4.2 yards per carry inside the Caesars Superdome.
“We definitely watched the (Tech-Georgia) tape,” Denbrock said. “I don’t know that we’re exactly the same type of team as Georgia Tech. I have a great deal of respect for their staff and what they do to generate offense, and I thought they did a great job with the quarterback run game in that (Georgia) game for sure.”
Notre Dame quarterbacks coach Gino Guidugli said the balance in preparing for Georgia’s defense in the quarterfinals of the College Football Playoff and studying the film of the Bulldogs’ defense against Tech was that the ND offensive coaching staff noticed the UGA defense diverted away from its typical defensive structure.
So while the Irish took note of King’s success in the run game, and Tech’s ability to move the ball as a whole, they weren’t sure they would see the same defensive looks UGA showed against the Jackets.
“It seemed like (Georgia) came out in that game and played a totally different defense. They were playing a lot of base personnel to 11, which we hadn’t seen them do in a bunch of other games,” Guidugli said. “We felt like it was more geared to be able to handle all the shifts and motions and the quarterback run stuff that Georgia Tech does. So when we watched that game it just didn’t add up to a lot of the other games, so we didn’t put a whole bunch of value into that game because we didn’t think we would see those looks.
“All the unbalanced and shifts and motions that Georgia Tech does, we do a little bit of it, but they do a ton of it. I think (Georgia) was just trying to make it easy for their defense, but I bet if they could go back, they would be like, ‘You know, we probably shouldn’t have did that. It put us at a disadvantage.’ They ended up giving up the most yards and points that they had all season, so I’m sure looking back at that they would rethink that game plan.”
In Notre Dame’s victory over Georgia, the Irish had a 23-10 lead with 9:25 to play and the ball at its own 9-yard line. Twelve plays later, and after a punt, ND had drained more than 8½ minutes off the clock and left UGA little hope for a comeback, pinning the ball back at the Bulldogs’ own 20.
Notre Dame ran the ball 11 times in that series, including three times on third down. Leonard picked up first downs with his legs on two of those three calls.
Leonard’s ground game success was certainly somewhat reminiscent of King’s in November in Sanford Stadium. And it helped the Irish clear on a major hurdle on the path to Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
“It’s a game of adjustments and a game of taking care of the football and taking advantage of the opportunities that are presented, and that’s what we did versus Georgia,” Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman said last week. “We took care of the football, and we took advantage of opportunities that were presented and found tough, gritty ways to get first downs.
“For us, we have to be able to run the football, and we’ve got to find ways to do that. At the end of the day, you’re going to study teams that have had success against your opponent, but you still have to do what your team does well. Again, for us to have success, we’re going to have to be able to run the ball, and we’re going to have to be able to stop the run.”
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