Through week of 10/27,
total offense: ND is 35th, 447 ypg
NW is 93rd, 371
total defense: ND is 32nd, 341 ypg
NW is 50th, 366 ypg
penalties: we both average 8 a game, but ours tend to be for more penalty yards, by a little.
given the points for homefield advantage if we don't gag, and we won't, we win by 10 points or so.
the best unit on the field will be our defense, which is allowing 19.1 ppg (15th for non FCS games). NW's offense is 85th vs. FBS at 25.1 ppg. That's a good matchup for us.
their defense is pretty good, allowing 23.6 ppg (38th). Our offense is pretty good (25th), averaging 34.0 ppg. Still favorable to us, less so than the other side of the ball.
They did a good job limiting J. Taylor, but they still allowed Wisco to run for 165 yards at 5.2 per carry. Both teams had 3 TOs, but Wisco's came earlier in drives and were more costly. The story of the game was that NW was able to build a lead in the third quarter and then shorten the game by limiting Wisco's number of plays in the second half.
We need to take care of the ball and we should win this game pretty easily. If we average 5 ypc and don't lose the turnover battle, something weird would need to happen for us to lose.
In a normal world, we are not losing to these guys.
We wouldnt lose right? After all we are ranked #3
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I think OSU/Purdue is an example of how limited the predictive validity the data is.
That was one of the most F-ed up ND games I have ever witnessed.
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I looked at my son, and said, "I would not want to be an electron on an ND message board right now."
Just clarification...ND averages 4.25 penalties per game and NW averages 3.25 per game. Both good enough to be top 10 in the country.
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Not sure why... I'm just feeling that Kelly has the offense he always wanted at last.
...and score high 30s or 40s....this offense is really close to breaking out I think. Navy wasn't great on D but they're fast, scrappy and good open field tacklers - get to the ball quick. We just physically dominated them, Claypool carried like 3 defenders on his back at one point. I think NW is more traditional, and I think our athleticism will beat them down. I know the numbers for NW are good, but I think the O could kill them. I hope :)