One of college football’s never-ending joys is the sense that each game is fresh and new. Even in the midst of a down season, even for matchups that have been played time and time again, there’s a chance each game will give you something new, something special. That was certainly the case for the 94th contest of the Jewelled Shillelagh between Notre Dame and USC. 

I’ve seen blowouts before. I’ve seen blowouts in this series before. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a defense blow out a team more or less by itself before.

The Fighting Irish vanquished their archrivals from Los Angeles by a 28 point, four touchdown margin, accomplished mainly by sparking an all-time meltdown of Lincoln Riley’s explosive, Heisman-trophy fueled offense to the tune of five turnovers and two more on downs. The Irish defense, in racking up a 31% havoc rate, made Caleb Williams look like a bozo off the street and the Trojan offense look like the worst unit on the field. It’s the worst offensive outing of Lincoln Riley’s head coaching career. 

That’d be enough of a headline, but that’s nowhere near whole story. Notre Dame’s defense directly accounted for 7 points and set up the offense to score 24 more, which, if I’m doing my math right, meant that the defense was primarily responsible for the final margin. Yes, the offense had to convert those opportunities, but given that only one of them came outside the 20 yard line, they almost literally could not have been spoonfed better chances. The Irish defense didn’t just dominate, they turned the game of football on its head. Defenses aren’t supposed to facilitate scoring how Notre Dame’s did Saturday night. It’d be like if a pitcher threw a no-hitter but also dinged home four home runs. 

I don’t claim to have a working knowledge of every game the Fighting Irish have ever played (shocking, I know), but I’d be amazed if that defensive performance, given the opponent, the level of dominance, the imbalance between their contributions to the win and those of the offense, and the general vibes going into this game, doesn’t rank near or at the top on the list of all-time games by a unit from South Bend. They essentially pulled a Thanos and just decided to win the game on their own, collecting turnovers like they were Infinity Stones and making Williams’ repeat Heisman bid crumble to dust with a snap of their fingers. 

We cannot possibly go further without mentioning Xavier Watts, because holy hell, what a night. Both of the last two outings against Southern Cal Watts has been far and away the best defender on the field, but whereas last year he was a lone bright spot in an awful defensive outing, this time he went nuclear. Two picks, two long returns. A forced fumble and a scoop and score. A pass break up and six tackles. Watts lived everywhere on the field and will take up residence in Caleb Williams’ nightmares. And the man used to play wide receiver. A CONVERTED WIDE RECEIVER dismantled the reigning Heisman Trophy winner. “Incredible” doesn’t quite cover it. 

Unfortunately we do have to spill some ink on the offense, because this game didn’t exactly boost confidence in Gerard Parker’s operation on that side of the ball. USC’s defense is rightly panned, and it looked before the game like ND’s path to victory likely rested on being able to score on lengthy possessions while taking advantage of the myriad chances the SC defense gave to them. That… did not happen. One third quarter drive aside, Parker’s offense wasn’t able to string together a long drive or milk that much clock, which should raise some alarm bells. If you can’t move the ball on the Trojans, who exactly can you move the ball on? Sure, the offense didn’t shoot itself in the foot, but if that’s the standard we’re playing with, we’re already pretty far up the creek. The four touchdown margin arguably should have been even bigger, and if Parker’s unit had converted a few more early drives we all could’ve spent the entire second half dancing on the Trojans’ graves. 

That being said, the offense did convert the opportunities the defense gave them, and for the third straight year the Irish scored in all three phases of a big game. This game should not only be proof of concept for Freeman when it comes to the value of complementary football, but also a warning of what happens when you spend too much time investing in one phase of the game at the expense of others. That one element can be awesome — in this case, it can feature a Heisman winner and stats gaudier than a Baroque palace — but if it doesn’t click for some reason, your team could be in real big trouble. When it became clear Notre Dame was really going to shut down the Trojan offense most of the night, Lincoln Riley’s team had nothing to fall back on. Their defense wasn’t going to make a game swinging play, and USC’s lack of a special teams coach came back to bite them when nine guys on the kick coverage team overpursued and then got burned for 99 yards, snuffing out any hope of a Trojan comeback before it even really got going. Notre Dame was far from a complete team Saturday, but they were much closer to one than their rivals. 

Nights like Saturday are why we love college football — beating a hated rival in the most hilarious and immensely gratifying way imaginable in front of a home crowd in a spot where Notre Dame absolutely had to find a way to win to have any semblance of success for the season. This team was begging for someone to rise to the occasion, and Al Golden’s defense delivered in spectacular fashion. 

This is the kind of game I wanted last year, a thorough dressing-down of the Trojans so much as to make a mockery of the idea they were ever considered a playoff contender. A game where the Irish strength on defense matched the Trojan strength on offense and then some, and then a little bit more. Marcus Freeman celebrating with Notre Dame fans while his counterpart on the sideline draws the ire of a fanbase he isn’t loyal to. Lincoln Riley’s team is not the single-handed savior of West Coast football we were told they would be (in fact they might be the fourth or fifth best team in the Pacific time zone). Notre Dame’s now won 5 of 6 and 9 of the last 13 in this series — so maybe we can remember that when the urge to pencil in Southern Cal as national title contenders crops up again, huh?

And now we get to cruise into Cheeseburger Week riding some momentum and good feelings. No matter where this season goes from here, we’ll always have the lasting image of Xavier Watts waltzing into the end zone to put an exclamation mark on yet another sack of Troy. 

– EC