VIEW FROM THE MIDWEST: OCTOBER 19, 2007

Boston College 7-0 For the First Time Since 1942

By Paul Smith / smith@collegeblitz.com

In Saturday's 27-14 Boston College victory over Notre Dame, the final result produced at least a few answers to a nagging season-long shopping list of questions.

For a change.

For the Fighting Irish, one major plus was they showed they can be at least somewhat competitive with top teams. This being the ultimate year of reduced expectations, Irish fans take their little triumphs where they can find them.

Some of the young talent -- particularly freshman linebacker Brian Smith, receiver Robby Parris -- will make some major impact before this season is over and certainly next fall.

But for Boston College, it's all about now.

For the more over-the-top B.C. fan, even with the Eagles' flat performance, after both L.S.U. and Cal lost, there was the intoxicating euphoria of being 7-0 for the first time since 1942, and being ranked No. 3 in this week's Associated Press rankings, the highest ever for the Eagles. The college of coaches who put together the other primary poll rewarded the Eagles even more, rating B.C. #2.

"We break the season in quarters," said first-year Boston College coach Jeff Jagodzinski, who replaced Tom O'Brien, now at North Carolina State, to The Boston Globe's Bob Ryan. "This was the first game of the third quarter.

"I told our players we can't get where we want to go if we don't take care of business every week."

With Jagodzinski as a very effective C.E.O., the Eagles have been a regular gridiron corporation this fall.

So Saturday was a tale of two teams headed in vastly different 2007 directions.

As painful as a 1-6 season can be for Irish fans used to making bowl plans at this point, it's instructive to recall Notre Dame hasn't encountered as dismal a run since future Pittsburgh Steelers all-pro linebacker Myron Pottios of Charleroi, Pa. was team captain and Michael Keller Ditka wore a Pitt uniform.

The Bill Mazeroski homer over the dynastic Yankees was just 23 days old. The year: 1960, the coach: Joe Kuharich, one of two losing coaches in Notre Dame history.

With that as a backdrop, it may be hard to believe, there were a few nuggets to pull out of the growing compost pile this season has become.

Honest.

"The game boiled down to six plays," Irish coach Charlie Weis told South Bend TV station WNDU-TV.

"The 52-yard run (by Andre Callender, which began with a litany of missed tackles around the line of scrimmage), that (eventually) resulted in a touchdown," Weis added.

The other five involved a couple of poorly-thrown Jimmy Clausen passes and penalties.

Killer penalties -- all but one legit -- wiped out one Irish T.D., but the one that hurt most came after Brian Smith intercepted a Matt Ryan pass and ran it down the left sideline to cut what had been a 20-0 B.C. lead to 20-14...as the usual stadium sellout of 80,795 howled like banshees.

The resultant N.D. players' end zone exuberance apparently rubbed the dour Atlantic Coast Conference referees the wrong way and they slapped an excessive celebration penalty on the Irish, forcing them to kick off from their own 15.

This was another one of Weis' Big Six. And it resulted in the biggest six for B.C. -- a 13-yard Ryan-to-Challenger pass that put the Eagles up 27-14 after gaining a major field position advantage.

It wasn't the greatest of days for Clausen, the highly-touted quarterback/wunderkind, as the Westlake Village, Calif. freshman found himself holding a clipboard for nearly all the second half, having
accounted for a total of 79 yards' total offense, going 7-for-19 passing. Evan Sharpley sharpened up the Irish air game and breathed new life into Notre Dame's offense.

B.C. had drip-drip-dripped its way to its lead, as Weis' defense forced Ryan into a discomfort zone that forced him to, in Weis' words, "Dink and dunk (short passing game) his way down the field," and in effect, taking away any of Ryan's Heisman photo ops.

It required extreme patience and, from a Boston College perspective, thankfully, Ryan displayed just enough to keep the 7-0 Eagles from getting trapped in yet another Notre Dame wake-up-the-echoes nostalgia trip.

As a matter of fact, some smug B.C. folks were trying to subdue a feeling that beating Notre Dame for the third straight time in Notre Dame Stadium was no big deal.

"We can celebrate a little here, but come Tuesday, we have to get back to work," Callender told Boston Globe columnist Bob Ryan, a '68 Boston College graduate and apparently one such proud alum. "We have to keep our heads down and grind."

In his Sunday column, Ryan wrote of the Eagles' fifth straight win over the Irish: "The Notre Dame game once was Armageddon for B.C. and it probably still is for the Eagles' fans. But the Notre Dame of the 20th century national myth is no more and the glory days may never return."

When Jagodzinski called Saturday's victory "a big one," Ryan cynically observed, "Fine, perpetuate that myth. But beating Notre Dame is not a big deal."

Now this might be future blow-up material for the Irish, particularly when they travel to Chestnut Hill, Mass., next fall to face what no doubt will be an as-cocky-as-ever bunch of Eagles.

In the first five losses this fall, there were very few opportunities for what-ifs, but even if B.C. was guilty of playing more not to lose than to go full throttle, Weis, not an your basic half-full guy, saw some positive changes.

"You're seeing a lot of inexperienced players that are starting not to play like inxperienced players," Weis told Eric Hansen of the South Bend Tribune. "I would think that you would hope they would come along fast. But it doesn't always come along fast.

"...Now (with the acquired experience), all of a sudden you could see more guys starting to get it. As that happens, it becomes kind of a groundswell."

Even two or three weeks back, the U.S.C. game looked like an exclamation point to this eight-game suicide run that had more than a few Irish fans wondering what Athletic Director Kevin White was thinking when he crafted the schedule several years back.

Perhaps the unexpected road win over highly-favored U.C.L.A. and a decent showing against B.C. may lend themselves to a more significant third step toward salvaging something from this godawful season.

"I think I'll probably regroup at the bye," Weis concluded to Hansen, referring to Notre Dame's Oct. 27 open date. "We've been fighting so hard dealing with aspects that you normally don't spend as much time with (in-season) -- psyche, emotion and teaching -- that you really don't have time to look back."

That blue sky on the distant horizon is unmistakable, though. That would be a recruiting class that is almost unanimously viewed as one of the nation's top three.

What he does with that and the following year's class will begin to form the definition of Charlie Weis' years at Notre Dame.

Notes -- Sophomore offensive lineman Matt Carufel, a product of Cretin-Derham Hall High School in St. Paul, Minn., has left Notre Dame, the third player to leave the squad this fall...Boston College now trails N.D. in the all-time series 9-8, with the last game on the current rivalry slated for Nov. 8, 2008 in Chestnut Hill, Mass. ... Irish pick up Syracuse next fall.