Excuse the mini-rant, but I just can’t help it. Look, I love stats, they are great for determining trends and trying to dive deeper into games and a season. But can we stop using ones like this?

Piggybacking on @NDatRivals stat from last night, #NotreDame has never won a game under Brian Kelly with less than 29 carries. (0-9)

— Dan Murphy (@DanMurphyESPN) November 25, 2013

I got nothing against BGI or ND Rivals or any of their reporters who do solid work, but this kind of stat is beyond worthless. No, I’m not saying this because it breaks my narrative/agenda or anything other ridiculous claim. There are several logical reasons why relying on stats like this is worthless.

Notre Dame is also undefeated when Cam loses his helmet AND when we have fun with the resulting meme in the following Roundup.

Firstly, 29 isn’t some magic “rush this many times and we will win” number. Want proof? Oklahoma: 29 rushing attempts, South Florida in 2011: 29 rushing attempts, Michigan in 2011: 33 rushing attempts, Stanford in 2011: 31 rushing attempts…and I could go on. The point is that the stat has the aura of showing a recipe for success, but this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Second, the number itself is obtained from laziness at best and cherry-picked at worst. I’m assuming someone simply looked at all the ND wins and found the lowest number of rushing attempts (or threw everything in a spreadsheet and had Excel tell them). That isn’t analysis, that’s “hey look at this number I found!”. As I’ve shown above, ND can run the ball 29 times or more and still lose. So what was accomplished in this “analysis”? Nothing.

Third, rushing attempts aren’t even clearly defined. Did they exclude sacks? Have they taken into account QB scrambles? Are they concerned with how much the QB handles the ball? Are we excluding kneel downs? Again, this is quick/lazy “analysis” as these very important questions aren’t answered. Notre Dame could call 70 passing plays and, have 30 result in a combination of  sacks and QB scrambles, win, and then this stat would still be “true”.

Finally, attempt totals are rather dumb, percentages are better. Let’s say Notre Dame runs the ball 30 times, but passes 50 times. I guarantee the “RUN THE DAMN BALL” crowd is far from happy with that imbalance in a win. Yes 80 total plays is an extreme example, but the fact is that play totals can greatly vary from game to game. The 29 rush attempt metric simply doesn’t take that into account and thus gives no real context to the balance/flow of the games that we won.

Look stats are great, but this kind of stat just needs to go away. If you give credence to stats like these, you’d also have to accept these hard truths:

Piggy backing off ND recruiting site stats: ND under Brian Kelly is currently 0-14 when outscored by the opponent

— NDPoot (@PootND) November 25, 2013

Notre Dame is undefeated in the BK era when they kneel the ball in the fourth quarter.

— Ryan Ritter (@ndtex) November 25, 2013

https://twitter.com/okerland/status/404983684480000002

In their 126 year history, Notre Dame is undefeated when their opponent loses.

— Ryan Ritter (@ndtex) November 25, 2013

https://twitter.com/oaknd1/status/404985584508092417

@kmac12380 @HLS_NDtex Few also realize that BK is undefeated when he has Gatorade dumped on him.

— Mayhem mm/ (@mrmayhem75) November 25, 2013

• Author
• Recent Posts

Ryan Ritter

Editor-in-Chief
Texan by birth, Irish by choice.

First-generation Domer and a former student manager, HLS podcast host, HLS Sim creator, Extra Life streamer, and technical problem haver. You can find more non-Notre Dame related writing on his Patreon.

Latest posts by Ryan Ritter (see all)

• Epilogue - January 3, 2022
• HLS Podcast Finale - January 2, 2022
• The Final Fiesta: Notre Dame vs Oklahoma State NCAA ’14 Sim - December 31, 2021