Notre Dame vs. Purdue Analytics Preview
Playoff elimination games from here on out
Following the upset loss to Northern Illinois, Notre Dame starts their attempt to run the table and still make the playoff on the road at Purdue tomorrow.
My model still gives the Irish about a 46% chance to make the CFP, which is something I think we’ll all take after the embarrassing performance last week. With Notre Dame's schedule, that probably means every game from here on out is a likely elimination game barring more chaos with other teams in the race. On the flip side, after tomorrow the Irish have one true road game remaining so things are set up favorably to at least get the job done.
None of that matters if the passing game doesn’t improve, and you can read my breakdown of the Riley Leonard situation here.
With that being said, here’s what I’ll be watching for tomorrow.
1. Are they willing to use Riley Leonard on the ground?
In my Leonard analysis, I looked at his offenses' dependence on his rushing ability. While the passing efficiency doesn’t change much, the rushing offense takes a huge hit when he doesn’t run the ball as often.
Not only does the team lose its most dynamic rusher in Leonard, but defenses can play a more traditional run-defense like they would when facing a pocket passer. They don’t have to dedicate an extra defender in the run game to the quarterback because he is no longer a dual threat.
If Notre Dame isn’t willing to use Leonard on the ground it puts a lot of pressure on his passing ability which everyone can tell is still being developed. If he’s unable to run the ball, I think questions about replacing him for Angeli, at least in the short term, are valid.
But the offense can take a lot of pressure off of whichever quarterback is under center with a couple of schematic changes.
2. Does Mike Denbrock make life easier for whoever is under center?
Notre Dame currently ranks 133rd out of 134 FBS teams in play action rate at 6.9%. The FBS average is around 30%. With a quarterback who is not ready to handle a heavy straight dropback workload, Denbrock has asked Leonard to do just that.
The Irish also don’t use snap motion at a high rate on passing plays, doing so 16% of the time compared to the NFL average of 22%.
Hopefully, Tua Tagovailoa can make a full recovery from the concussion he suffered last night. But Mike McDaniel and the Dolphins are a great example of using play action, motions, and shifts to make the quarterback’s life easier and one who has some limitations the Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allens of the NFL don’t.
How often Denbrock pushes the easy buttons is something to watch tomorrow.
3. Can the defense get pressure on Hudson Card and contain him on the ground?
Notre Dame really struggled to get pressure on Northern Illinois last week, doing so on only 4 of 22 of the Huskies’ dropbacks.
They did a great job of keeping the Irish front from attacking with their use of snap motion, utilizing it 38% of the time with a lot of their run and pass plays starting from the same end-around motion.
Purdue’s offense does not appear to be as motion-oriented, with their game against Indiana State looking similar to Texas A&M’s offensive approach. The difference is Hudson Card is much more of a proven runner than Conner Weigman.
Card had 75 total rushing attempts last year with 30 scrambles. And for his career, he has a 16.1% pressure-to-sack rate. Not as elusive as Leonard but he is tough to bring down. With how often Al Golden plays man coverage (61.2% of the time in 2024, 11th highest rate), the defense can leave themselves vulnerable to a scrambling quarterback.
Does Golden adjust and play more zone? Can the front 7 get pressure and keep him from escaping the pocket? This is one of the biggest keys to keeping Purdue from extending drives and ruining an otherwise good defensive effort.