I’ve read many times that the key to great music is the creation and release of tension. When I was 17, I dated a French exchange student, and her idea of “fun,” was, um, metaphorically equivalent. She drove me and probably plenty of other American boys absolutely, exuberantly bonkers. I went through a “rebellious” phase where I found life too boring so I’d purposely make things more difficult just so success felt like some sort of accomplishment and the road to that success felt like some sort of an adventure. That’s what the 2009 Irish are doing to us, you know? They’re creating tension for tension’s sake and for the sake of the release at the end, wittingly or not. They’re cutting things as close to failure as possible. And they’re doing it in a way such that, even when they do fail, we all marvel at the gutsy play of all involved. There were many ways to get to a 4-1 record at this point in the season, particularly considering all the talent on the roster for ND and all the lack of talent on the opponents’ rosters. The game against Nevada seemed to foreshadow a rather mundane compilation of wins over bland competition as a prelude to the SC game. That’s too boring. Too pragmatic. Too unremarkable. You don’t go to play football at Notre Dame just so you can be forgotten, and the 2009 Irish are a team that may not be a championship caliber squad but will be damned if they don’t make you love them. And you will love them. And they will break your heart.
Don’t get me wrong. That win Saturday night against a 2-2 Washington with the byproduct of Ty Willingham’s recruiting on the field was thrilling. So were the ones against a now 1-4 Purdue and 2-3 MSU. It’s the sort of thrill that will not only cause us to tune back in, but become almost addicted to it and set ourselves up for a massive crash. Perhaps this is a phase in the growth of a team. Charlie Weis has talked about how this team is finally learning how to win games. Maybe the next step is for a team to learn how to thoroughly enjoy absolutely walloping the competition. And perhaps we’ll get to see that this year. Perhaps Notre Dame and Weis will finally defeat Southern Cal (in another nail biter, no doubt) and then sweep through the remainder of the schedule to a 11-1 finish. Perhaps, but it seems rather improbable. Then again, the very improbability of such an outcome seems to fit right in with this story.
Even among all the creation and release of tension over the last 4 weeks, a lingering tension has been building up and up and up within the undercurrents and subplots of the season. As overjoyed as most sane Notre Dame fans are with the last 3 wins, nearly every ND fan also takes a moment to pause and wonder to themselves, “how much longer can the boys in Blue and Gold keep this up?” And under that manifests the inevitable tension created as people seek to divine what the answer to the first question might mean to answers to questions regarding Weis’ career. The ends of these games might feel like an opportunity to breath, but they’re really just opportunities to gasp.
This team is not perfect with respect to the game of football, but they’ve perfected the push and pull of high drama. At the macro level, they’ve twisted everything around on our expectations, managing to run an offense that, even without the (probably) best wide receiver in college, can score on anyone, particularly if anyone gives them 2 minutes. They took our big worries about the run game and handed them off to Allen and Hughes for big gains (including the biggest rushing gain for an Irish player since the 2007 Stanford game). And at the same time, they’ve taken all our hopes for the defensive backfield and tossed them aside, instead, apparently, forcing themselves and us to count on the front 7 to make the big plays (McCarthy’s big play excepted).
Due to the last 15 years, I can’t help but believe that whatever comes after this crescendo will feel a lot less like relief and joy and a lost more like let-down and misery. But what I’m guessing will be the final outcome of the season isn’t why I know we’ll be heartbroken. Yes, if my gut is right, and the oncoming games show us all that Notre Dame really is only a very mediocre but gritty team, we’ll be heartbroken. That’s no way to end this season. That’s no way to do justice to all the sweat and emotions that have been left on the field by the players. That’s no way for some of the most dazzling talent to take the field for Notre Dame in decades to perform for their fans. Weis and Company have 2 weeks now to regroup (queue the music-driven montage of guys practicing really hard), learn to tackle, find a #2 receiver, and figure out a way to take themselves to real heights of achievement. Weis has gone and created all of this drama, and he’s painted himself in a corner by putting so much talent on the Irish’s side. We can only hope that he knows how to end this story after all the twists and turns and doesn’t leave us feeling flat. But even if the Irish do stand tall, even if they beat SC and clean up the rest of the schedule with relative ease, we’ll be heartbroken. No matter how well Notre Dame might do from here on out, they’ll be 11 seconds and 4 points short of being even better.
- Friday Roundup: That Was Fast Edition - December 14, 2018
- Ian Book Is Smokey and the Bandit - December 12, 2018
- Don’t Call It A Comeback - December 10, 2018
trey
Maybe Weis is doing this on purpose to teach Clausen and Tate how to deal with pressure and overcoming the butterflies?