Final thoughts on Notre Dame-Loyola
This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.
I’m battling an acute case of Saturday-morning insomnia thanks to downing a couple of aspirin with some Bulgarian fruit juice to cure a Friday night football headache. Anyway, the whole episode inspired me to go with a different format for my weekly ‘final thoughts’ blog. So here we go:
He’s coming: Loyola sophomore RB Anthony Barr is the real deal and, by the time this kid’s a senior, he’ll be one of the best around. The 6-foot-3, 220-pound battering ram finished with 91 yards and a TD in 19 carries in Notre Dame‘s 26-9 victory on Friday, and I’m sure there’s a couple ND defenders staying up late like me nursing their bruises. I just hope his bum ankle won’t keep him out against Crespi next week.
Wrecking crew: Barr wasn’t the only heavy-hitter on the field. ND’s Hayden Hunter had three sacks and teammate Wayne Swinson (he’s only a sophomore!) recorded two sacks to keep Loyola QB Stephen Rokus from making a ruckus. But there’s no pleasing Hunter: ‘We struggled a lot, especially first half. It wasn’t a great effort from us. We didn’t tackle great.’
What a show: The folks over at LucasArts either would have been proud of or seen a bunch of copyright infringements with ND’s homecoming halftime show. Tall portraits of Yoda and all the other intergalatic puppets were put on display on the sideline during the homecoming queen announcement ceremony. And, to top it all off, there was a fireworks display. Nice.
Play of the night: WR Jeff Dickmann‘s 34-yard TD catch on the first play of the fourth quarter annihilated the Cubs’ comeback attempt. Following Barr’s third quarter TD, Dickmann caught a 10-yarder from Crist before busting off a spin move to avoid a defender and winning the end-zone foot race down the sideline.
Final thought: I’ll cut ND a break for not playing one of its better games with all the stuff going on this week. But the Knights need to turn it up a notch against Bishop Amat next week in the final tuneup before playing giant-slayer Crespi.
And here’s Yoda showing how to step it up when it’s all on the line:
-- Austin Knoblauch
-- Image from www.the-planets.com