Patient, methodical offensive football is about as scarce a reality in 2018 football as, say, the single wing. The Notre Dame Fighting Irish incorporated both aspects of football's Golden Age to perfection Friday night.
While their state-of-the-art defense yielded virtually nothing, the Irish likely drove their Knoxville Grace Christian opponents to distraction with their huddles, long counts and antique offense. The Irish attack was so relaxed, in fact, they were flagged for delay of the game on back-to-back plays at the start of a possession.
Not surprisingly, that possession ultimately resulted in an Irish touchdown - as did four more in their 35-7 senior night victory. Now a healthy 7-1 for the season, the Irish hit the road for Chattanooga Christian, and the bad news is that coach Charles Fant has the Irish right where he wants them.
"Absolutely," he exclaimed amid a field covered with well-wishers. "We made a lot of major changes early in the season because we weren't defensively what we were needing to do."
"We're a team of reps," he added. "We rep so much, we feel we don't even have to do any conditioning after practice. The kids know we're going to run the same plays over and over and over again. On offense, we do some neat things, but it all comes down to we're only running five plays."
The, uh, method to the methodical approach this night was designed to keep the football out of the hands of talented Grace Christian quarterback Luke Kirby. His was an uphill battle all night, and with only an occasional exception was he able to get a pass downfield. His 17 completions netted barely 100 yards.
"We played a lot more man-to-man coverage than we normally do," Fant explained. "Plus, we were able to put pressure on their quarterback."
Kirby was sacked three times and threw a pair of interceptions, to Jordan Ford and Julian Bonds. Grace Christian's lone scoring drive came later, against a running clock after it had become a 35-0 romp.
Cameron Wynn, who returned the opening kickoff 55 yards, got the night's scoring going on a 5-yard run that made his big special-teams play count. Wynn also caught a 25-yard touchdown pass from James Watkins in the third quarter after Notre Dame went the entire first half attempting only a quick Utah pass.
Wynn closed out the night's scoring with a 12-yard run in the third period.
Ford also scored on a 15-yard runk, while the night's unofficial leading rusher, Monroe Beard (99 yards) also had a pair of two-point-conversion runs.
Contact David Jenkins at sports@timesfreepress.com.