Notre Dame is rolling into Chapel Hill with a 4-0 record, a 39-point win over Purdue still fresh, and the same steady formula that has carried the Irish through every game so far: no drop-off, no excuses, and plenty of depth doing the heavy lifting.
That was the message after practice as offensive line coach Joe Rudolph, linebackers Jaylen Sneed and Drayk Bowen, running back Aneyas Williams and offensive lineman Sullivan Absher spoke about the stretch ahead. Notre Dame has won each of its games this season by double digits, and that has been the pattern since September of last season.
Rudolph’s update on Absher centered on how the lineman has handled his development and preparation.
"He's doing good," Rudolph said. " I think one of the biggest things he's done is he's really put an emphasis on trying to take care of his body.
Early in the year, we try to be conservative with the total number of reps that were on him. But I do like his maturity, how he's really embraced the idea of, man, I can take care of myself and I can dive into these resources.
And he's done a great job with it, but he's in a good place."
Absher, meanwhile, pointed to the confidence inside the offensive line room, where the expectation is that the standard stays the same no matter who is on the field.
"I think from the beginning, just any person that's in the offensive line room, I'm going to have great trust in," Absher explained. "And that goes for, I hope I speak for everybody when I say that.
We've always believed in the 'next guy up' mentality and that there should be no drop off between our ones, twos, third group, fourth group. And that's just kind of the culture that [ Marcus ] Freeman and Rudolph have done a great job of creating and kind of just raising our floor week by week, year by year."
On the other side of the ball, Bowen said the defensive tackle rotation has been a major reason things have stayed so clean for Notre Dame.
"Yeah, I mean, to have all those guys and then have as many as we do that can rotate and stay fresh, it just makes this place so much cleaner," Bowen shared. "They take on double teams and then as soon as a guy comes off, they're making a play.
So the O-line really has to honor them, which just makes our job so much easier. Having those guys has been phenomenal this year.
I say the world of them because they make my job a ton easier."
Williams also walked through the weekly film work that goes into preparing for North Carolina, starting up front and working his way back through the defense.
"Obviously it starts with the front and then the stunts that they like to do and what they're good at," Williams stated. "UNC likes to two gap, which clogs up the hole.
So [we] got to be quicker on our reads, got to press them and got to make them play their gaps. Then you obviously go down the line and then move up to the backers see how they play downhill and how they like to blitz.
Are they blitzing team? Then how they cover and where we can attack them at."
Notre Dame heads to North Carolina this week with its unbeaten start intact and a clear sense of what has kept it there: depth, discipline and a “next man up” approach that has shown up everywhere from the trenches to the back end.
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Aneyas Williams May Have Just Seized Back Notre Dames Backfield
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Since then, the backfield has shifted again, and Williams has reclaimed the starting job after the previous starter struggled. For Notre Dame, it is a reminder that the rotation is still very much in flux, but also that Williams has the kind of resilience to turn an awkward moment into an opportunity. The situation never seemed likely to define the season, and now it looks more like a detour than a turning point. [Read more 🡒]
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The slot receiver work and the play at offensive guard stand out as the areas worth watching, especially against a defense with enough strength to test both. If Notre Dame wants to keep its unbeaten run intact, those matchups could go a long way toward determining whether the offense looks smooth or spends the night fighting for every advantage. [Read more 🡒]
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Through three games this season, Watts already has 16 tackles and an interception, a steady continuation of the rookie year he put together with 96 tackles and five picks. He has led all NFL defensive backs in interceptions since entering the league, which is the kind of early return that makes teams revisit draft-day decisions and wonder how he kept slipping past them. [Read more 🡒]