The NC State football team played through a hurricane as it defeated Notre Dame 10-3 Saturday. While the weather certainly hindered the overall quality of the game, it didn’t matter to some players, who put up dominant performances against the Fighting Irish.
Matt Dayes
With the winds and torrential downpour making it difficult to pass the ball, the team needed Dayes to get the job done on the ground. He did just that, as he put the offense on his back and finished the day with 126 rushing yards. He concluded the first half almost doubling Notre Dame’s total yardage, as he put up 84 yards compared to the Irish’s 48.
“I want to be able to run the ball when I want to run it, and that was a big part of this game,” head coach Dave Doeren said. “We couldn’t throw the ball today, period. So the ability for us to say that we’re a balanced football team and the fact that we live that way and buy into that is why we won today; because we could run the football.”
Dayes also led the team in receiving with three catches for 14 yards, if that says anything else about how difficult it was to throw the ball in the hurricane. He now ranks third in the ACC in rushing yards with 563 on the season, trailing only Heisman candidates Dalvin Cook from FSU and Lamar Jackson from Louisville.
Bradley Chubb
Our player to watch from last week after a two-sack performance against Wake Forest, the junior defensive end followed that up with a three-sack outing against Notre Dame. He added two tackles in the run game, one of which was for a loss.
Chubb now has five sacks and eight tackles in two weeks since the Pack’s bye week. His presence both against the run and in the pass rush will be vital for NC State as it takes on two of the best quarterbacks in the FBS in Clemson’s Deshaun Watson and the aforementioned Jackson over the next two weeks.
Airius Moore and Jerod Fernandez
The junior linebacking duo combined for 17 tackles and helped hold the Notre Dame running game to just 59 yards rushing in a game that was decided on the ground and through the trenches. Additionally, Fernandez tallied 1.5 tackles for a loss and a forced fumble, while Moore added a TFL and a quarterback hit.
This isn’t the flashiest position group on the team, but these two are dependable and get the job done. They work well with the stellar defensive line to form a rock-solid unit against the run that can make opposing offenses one-dimensional.
Play of the Game
This one’s easy — the only touchdown of the game by either team. With the game at a 3-3 stalemate with just under 13 minutes left, redshirt junior Pharoah McKever bursts through Notre Dame’s punt unit and uses his big wingspan to get his hand on the punt, which is then returned by redshirt sophomore Dexter Wright for the touchdown.
“I looked to my left and saw Pharoah’s big behind in the air; I didn’t even have to see the block, I heard it,” Wright said. “We talk a lot about whether to get on the ball or try to scoop and score it. But at that moment, I didn’t feel anybody was behind me. I felt I had enough time to scoop it and get in, it was just instinct.”
This was clearly the difference in the game, as both offenses, Notre Dame in particular, struggled to get anything going.
Player to Watch: Jalan McClendon
As the weather conditions made it nearly impossible to effectively pass the ball, the Wolfpack started to give redshirt sophomore McClendon some reps at quarterback in the third quarter with redshirt sophomore Ryan Finley struggling to pass the ball. McClendon is more physical and athletic than Finley, and he uses that to his advantage as the superior runner of the two.
This got the offense going after it had been stagnant since the first quarter. McClendon helped get the Pack down to the 3-yard line, but a pair of miscues caused the team to come away with no points. While the drive itself was a failure, it still played a role in the field position battle, as NC State got in enemy territory for the first time of the half, causing the Irish to be backed up into their own territory.
McClendon finished the day with 14 passing yards on two attempts and 60 rushing yards on 10 carries, as he did most of his damage on that drive. If, for some reason, the Wolfpack finds itself playing in similar weather conditions or if Finley is simply struggling to pass the ball, look for McClendon to see playing time in the future, as this was the most efficiently the offense moved the ball all day.
Redshirt junior linebacker Jerod Fernandez and his teammates tackle a Notre Dame ballcarrier on Oct. 8, 2017 at Carter-Finley Stadium. In a hard fought game in the midst of Hurricane Matthew, the Wolfpack beat the Fighting Irish 10-3.
