Notre Dame Football moves to 9 in AP Top 25, Freeman reflects on win over NC State

 

ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, Ind. - The Fighting Irish moved up to #9 on the AP Top 25 poll after a 45-24 win on the road against NC State.

During a press conference Monday, Head Coach Marcus Freeman told us the exact same thing he told us during the postgame press conference after that win: that he is proud of his guys for coming out stronger than they did in the first quarter and how they responded to a nearly two-hour weather delay.

But, he added that they need to fix the mistakes if they want to protect their house against Central Michigan in week 4 and Ohio State in week 5.

“You have three penalties, you can't have that, you know, and that's something I challenge the defensive staff and our players, like, if we want would be a great defense and we can't have three penalties,” said Freeman.

The Irish racked up 10 penalties for 82 yards but eventually settled down, earning three interceptions including defensive player of the game, DJ Brown.

Add in 456 yards of total offense, helping the Irish pull away in the second half thanks to 115 passing yards and two touchdowns to just one guy, tight end Holden Staes.

“Player of the game on offense was Holden Staes, you know, he got his first touchdown two weeks ago and this week's got two, you know, I said, just keep doubling it up. He's doing a great job,” said Freeman.

And the last piece of the puzzle, transfer kicker from the University of South Florida, Spencer Shrader.

“Spencer hit a new school record, 54-yard field goal. He barely missed the 56-yarder, Freeman said. “And if you watch it, I mean, he hit it almost above half of the goalposts. So, plenty of leg. I don't know how far that equates out to somebody that can do the geometry and stuff and measured angles can tell you how far that ball would have went. But it was really good to see him and he's got a huge leg.”

And as for injuries, 5th year linebacker JD Bertrand suffered a concussion at NC State. He’s in concussion protocol until further notice. Same goes for running back Devyn Ford, and defensive lineman Gabe Rubio remains out with no timetable for his return.