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but their offense (statistically speaking) appears to be overrated.

Aside from Love's beautiful 98 yarder (which I'm still upset they didn't play "All you need is Love" after..WTF guys, I was so ready to hear that crowd go to an 11 or 12 after singing that in unison, but I digress) they made us work for everything that we got. Sometimes a team or a side of the ball can just 'look' good because of who they played, but their defense is just really good.

Their offense, while streaky and dangerous when you don't get pass rush or the refs are helping them out 'just a little' is overrated because of their competition level. When our D was locked in and still playing on fire, we completely dominated their offense. After it went to 27-3 though and a BUNCH of IU fans hit the exits, there was a visibility noticeable let up in our defensive intensity. Without this allowing them to get going, I don't think they get any more points in that game. Once they did get going a little, it sure seemed like they got additional boost from ref assistance (but I'll reserve final judgment until after I rewatch at home).

I'm really interested to find out if Mills is OK, our DL "needs" him vs Georgia.

The crowd....WOW! This is what it can be like in Notre Dame Stadium when the right people show up, for the right reason. Respect to IU, they had a good number of people there (maybe 20% or so) and they made a good amount of noise for their limited numbers...but our crowd was GREAT...loud and proud all night and as far as the eye could see the whole crowd stood the whole game except during the infomercials.

It's was cold, damn cold, but I NEVER felt it! Assist goes to the crowd as they/we made ourselves known.

Pretty cool moment from the game that I don't think was shown on TV, during one of the breaks..jumbotron showed Shane Gillis in a suite with Bettis and crowd cheered, then went to an IU couple and crowd 'boooooooo'. They went back and forth between Shane and IU fans a like 5 straight times and each time loud cheers for Shane and Jerome then 'boooooooo' for the IU fans...very fun moment.

I loved everything about the game last night (and so did my wife, she's like 'When is the Sugar Bowl?') except for three things
1. I'll say it again because it's worth repeating, we missed a literal Golden opportunity to play "All you need is Love" after Love's long TD run that I think would have taken crowd from 9-10 to 11-12. Pissed me off!
2. There just has to, I mean absolutely has got to be, some better song we can play for successful defensive stops besides the Six Flags jingle..I get that you want a celebration vibe, but off the top of my head I can think of at least three choruses that would be light years better: September- Earth, Wind, and Fire, Please Don't Stop The Music- Rhianna, Celebration- Kool & The Gang
3. Rally Towels...love em, but it was a mess. They didn't hand them out or tell you about them coming through the gates and they weren't at the seats. Once you get up to your seats you find out from the few that have em they were just on a table to go grab down near the gates.... Uhhhh. Go back down at halftime and they're all gone with people leaving the tables with stacks of them. Could have been done better.

So outside of the game, things went pretty poorly. We were supposed to get into Chicago around 9am (CT) but got in after 11. Took FOREVER to get out of O'Hara and traffic was TERRIBLE from Chicago to South Bend. We only made one stop to get food (Which Culver's..Wow what a burger!)...we were trying to check into hotel about 3 local time and hit campus between 4-5, hit some tailgate activities, hit the bookstore, and FINALLY after all these years, get me a damned elephant ear.

None of this occurred because we didn't get to our hotel until a little after 5:30 local time. By the time we got layered up, got over to campus, found parking, and made it to the stadium it was like 7:15 local time GULP! Got to our seats with 8 minutes before kickoff. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

Still great game, great performance, F any of you pussies trying to shit on or slight this win in any way, no matter how minor...we kicked the asses of the #8 ranked team, IN THE POST SEASON! If you can't appreciate this then Notre Dame, This Team, Marcus Freeman, or Riley Leonard aren't the problem...YOU are!

Marcus Freeman is now 31-9 since taking over as HC after the '21 regular season, for a Winning Percentage of .775..and in the last 37 games, since his 0-3 start, he is 31-6 for a .838 Winning Percentage.

Get on the bus pussies!