Observations from Notre Dame football practice No. 9: Defense and special teams

Notre Dame practiced Saturday morning, and reporters saw several pass rush vs. pass protection one-on-ones. Here are Blue & Gold’s observations.

• The linebackers and running backs went at it during the third period of practice this morning. The drill was one-on-one, blitz vs. blitz pickup; the linebackers had three seconds to reach the signal-caller. There were a few exceptions, but in general, the running backs did really well here.

• But first, here’s a depth chart note. The linebackers and safeties came together toward the end of the media-viewing portion to walk through coverages in base (4-3) personnel. Notably, every first-team rep next to graduate student safety Xavier Watts during this session went to sophomore Adon Shuler. Graduate student Rod Heard II ran with the twos.

• It looked like the Irish were working on their 4-3 “under” front, with the Rover (Sneed with the first team, Ausberry with the second) lining up on the edge. Shuler would often do the same on the other side, which is not the first time we’ve seen him there in various sub packages. Notre Dame seems to really like him near the line of scrimmage.

• Back to the linebackers and running backs, the biggest standout was freshman RB Aneyas Williams. He is so, so strong and I don’t think he lost a rep. Notre Dame believes he’s going to be a really good player, and I concur.

• Junior running back Jadarian Price also stood out with a couple wins against graduate student linebacker Jack Kiser.

• On the defensive side, sophomore linebacker Drayk Bowen won a rep against running back Devyn Ford. Junior LB Jaylen Sneed beat sophomore running back Jeremiyah Love with a dip-and-rip, but Love called him out for a rematch and stonewalled him.

• I was also impressed with freshman linebacker Bodie Kahoun, who won his reps against walk-on RBs.

More details on RB-LB one-on-ones will be available later Saturday afternoon.

• Practice started with a pads-popping, short-area ball carrier vs. tackler drill. The set-up here heavily favored the offense, but there was one major defensive win: Graduate student nickel back Jordan Clark stonewalled graduate student wide receiver Jayden Harrison.

• Freshman nickel back Karson Hobbs stood up sophomore wide receiver KK Smith as well.

• The defensive line worked on block-shedding during individual drills, and it seemed like half the reps went to sophomore defensive tackle Armel Mukam. If you were standing close enough, you could hear graduate student DT Rylie Mills giving Mukam pointers after every rep. This did not go unnoticed, as defensive line coach Al Washington said, “Rylie is coaching. Where’s everyone else?”

• Injury updates, all of which come from the defensive tackle room:

Senior DT Jason Onye suffered a “minor injury,” per a Notre Dame spokesperson. He dressed for practice, but was held out due to an abundance of caution. There doesn’t seem to be much concern here.

Likewise with graduate student DT Howard Cross III, who continues to nurse a “tweaked” hamstring. He didn’t do much Saturday morning, but he’s expected to be full-go for Texas A&M.

After defensive line individual drills, sophomore DT Devan Houstan walked away from the group with a trainer. He was limping slightly on his way to the sideline.

• During special teams drills, the punt returners were working on something interesting. While sophomore wide receivers Jaden Greathouse and Jordan Faison (I did not catch the beginning of the drill, so I can’t say who went first) caught punts normally, Price and freshman wide receiver Logan Saldate started about 20 yards in front of where the ball would end up. They ran back to make the catch.

• For my theory on what Notre Dame was working on, click here.

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