Insider: DeShone Kizer lights up Broadway, but defense still a work in progress

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Simply put, Saturday was wild.

Where to begin? Notre Dame 50, Syracuse 33 had everything: a blocked extra point returned for a score, a kickoff returned for a touchdown, a goal-line stand, a touchdown called back, five offside calls, a targeting ejection — and that was just the first half.

In the end, there were 156 plays for 1,079 yards of total offense. It was a much-needed win for the Fighting Irish (2-3), their first in three weeks.

Quarterback DeShone Kizer threw for 471 yards – flirting with Joe Theismann's 46-year-old Notre Dame's single-game passing record (526) — as the Irish ultimately found breathing room with two touchdowns opening the third quarter.

To fully comprehend the craziness, begin with the first quarter, which saw five touchdowns scored in a 5-minute period. Kizer found receiver Equanimeous St. Brown for a 79-yard bomb on the first play of the game, and again for a 67-yard score on the second Irish drive.

In between Notre Dame’s first two scores, which took a total of 1:31, Syracuse scored, too. Except Irish defensive end Jarron Jones blocked the extra point — his sixth career block at Notre Dame — and cornerback Cole Luke ran it back for two points.

Notre Dame and Syracuse (2-3) would alternate scoring in various ways for the next few minutes — an Orange receiver Amba Etta-Tawo 72-yard touchdown here, a C.J. Sanders 93-yard kickoff return there. Not 5 minutes into the game, Notre Dame led 23-13.

No one came to watch Notre Dame play Syracuse

Both offenses cooled, with the next Syracuse drive ending in a punt and the Irish not converting on fourth down inside the 1.

Kizer, who was critical of himself earlier this week for being “substandard,” was much improved. He completed 23-of-35 passes,including three touchdowns, and added a rushing score.

He did have a couple of stalls in the red zone, though — being held up on a goal-line stand in the first quarter and having to settle for a field goal late in the second.

Brian Kelly's evaluation of his quarterback was better than last week's, but the Irish coach said there's still room for improvement. For example, when Kizer was sacked for an 11-yard loss in opposing territory late in the second quarter, forcing Notre Dame to punt. On the ensuing Syracuse drive, quarterback Eric Dungey found Ervin Phillips for a 14-yard touchdown to make the score 33-27.

"He took us out of field goal range and that to me, that was the conversation I had with him was, 'DeShone, we need to get three points there, you’re trying to do too much,' " Kelly said. "And he has a tendency to want to do too much, put too much pressure on himself. And he’s gotta stop doing that. I told him, 'You do enough.'

"What I liked about him in the second half was that he dropped the ball down, took the easy completions, made the smart decisions and I think he needs to continue to do that."

Insider report card: Under-fire Notre Dame defense gets passing grade

There’s still work to do defensively; firing coordinator Brian VanGorder did not fix all of the issues nagging the unit for the past four weeks. Notre Dame gave up 489 yards, 223 in the first quarter. But the Irish did hold Syracuse to 2-of-13 on third down.

This was the unit’s first game under newly appointed Greg Hudson, although Kelly looked more in charge, leading most defensive huddles. Kelly, who has a defensive background, had been more involved with that side of the ball this week in order to help ease Hudson into the new role since he’s only been on the Irish staff since June as an analyst. Hudson’s job Saturday was more about firing up team morale, anyway. He frequently could be seen doing that, as he was giving players chest bumps, high-fives and pump-up speeches.

Kelly felt the players responded well to Hudson in his new role through the week in practice and during the game.

"I told the team in our mental-edge meeting that I was certain we were going to win and that they would pick who led them in the fight song and to a man, they all yelled out, 'coach Hudson is going to lead us,' " Kelly said. "It was pretty cool. He led them. Just a lot of positive energy."

Kelly said one of the main issues with the defense through four games was poor rotation. Not enough guys were playing and those on the field were exhausted from too many reps. Saturday, the defense gave different looks, which kept players fresh against Syracuse’s fast-paced offense that often had about 10-12 seconds between each snap. Twenty-six players got on the field for the defense, six more than in last week’s loss to Duke. Kelly inserted more underclassmen into roles.

"We have a lot of really good players that deserve to get on the field," Kelly said. "That’s the kind of defense this is going to be. There’s going to be a lot of players playing in this defense."

At times three to four freshman – there was Devin Studstill, Troy Pride Jr., Julian Love, Donte Vaughn and also sophomore Nicco Fertitta – could be seen in the secondary.

"(On the first play) I turned around and I have three freshmen starting next to me in the secondary," junior safety Drue Tranquill said. "We looked at it and Syracuse had scored about 80 percent of their points in the first quarter, so once we were able to adjust, get our feet in the ground and get settled, we were able to play good defense the rest of the game."

One of the brightest spots was Vaughn, who was matched up against Etta-Tawo. At 6-2, he's Notre Dame's longest corner. Etta-Tawo was most effective in the first half, earning 97 yards receiving plus a touchdown while the Irish were still figuring out coverage plans. He only gained 37 yards in the second half.

Notre Dame broke away with a more comfortable lead in the third quarter when sophomore running back Dexter Williams charged through the middle of the Syracuse defense for a 59-yard touchdown. The Orange never came within 17 points the rest of the game.

Ultimately, the Irish were able to have a short-term memory when it came to the distracting week regarding staff changes. But Kelly said he knew his players would be able to respond to the adversity early.

"After the second practice I felt that we were going to be going in the right direction," he said. "I wasn’t crazy about playing this offense. I’d much rather have been going against something different because of their tempo and how they spread you out. With all the freshmen DBs that you play — that’s not always the greatest matchup.

"But I felt like the morale was really good and that’s what I was looking to get back."