Football Falls to #14/11 Notre Dame, 28-6

Saturday, August 31

South Bend, Ind.

3:30 p.m. ET

Temple University

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Notre Dame

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TEMPLE

#14 Notre Dame

Photo by: Joseph V. Labolito/Temple University

Football Falls to #14/11 Notre Dame, 28-6

8.31.13 | Football

Box Score

BOXSCORE | POSTGAME QUOTES l PHOTO GALLERY

SOUTH BEND, IN – There were no miracles to be had at Notre Dame Stadium for Temple Saturday. The Owls, opening the Matt Rhule Era in one of the most storied college football venues, showed signs of promise, but too many big plays from the highly-favored #11/14 Irish proved to be too much for the young team to overcome in a 28-6 defeat in front of 80,795 fans and a national television audience.

Notre Dame struck quickly, with QB Tommy Rees hitting DaVaris Daniels for two 32-yard touchdowns on the Irish's first two possessions to give the hosts a 14-0 lead five minutes into the contest.

The Owls then played even with the Irish over the remainder of the first half, compiling 230 yards of offense to the Irish 209, and cut the deficit to 14-6 with just over a minute remaining in the half on a Kenny Harper one-yard run.

"I told our team, I was proud of the fact that they didn't quit at the end," said Rhule. "I thought for long portions of the game, they proved that they can play with that team. Those first two drives were obviously not the way we wanted to play. The offense, I thought, at times went up and down the field.

The message to our guys is playing a good team, you can't miss calls and you can't give things away. You can't play 65 great plays and five bad ones."

It could have been even closer, but freshman kicker Jim Cooper, Jr., was wide right on two field goals (32 & 43), and his extra point attempt was blocked.

The Irish used another big play to close out the half as TE Troy Niklas caught a ball over the middle on the first play of the ensuing possession, broke two tackles, and took it in for a 66-yard touchdown.

That made it 21-6 at halftime.

The Irish added a two-yard TD run by George Atkinson with 5:37 remaining in the third quarter to account for the remaining points.

Junior QB Connor Reilly had a solid first start, completing 23 of 46 passes for 228 yards, while rushing for a team-best 65 yards on 12 carries. Ryan Alderman and Chris Coyer each had four receptions to top the Owls, while redshirt freshman Zaire Williams rushed seven times for 33 yards.

Reilly looked more like a veteran signal-caller than one taking his first collegiate snap behind center. The Fairfax, VA native directed the Owls offense to 362 yards of total offense and 25 first downs against the highly-touted Irish defense that returned seven starters from a unit that ranked second nationally in points per game (12.77 ppg.) last season.

"Connor proved to everybody in my mind he's a competitor," said Rhule. "He's out there, running around, getting first downs. He doesn't take it to the ground. He gets hit. He's probably a little banged up and he keeps playing."

Sophomore LB Tyler Matakevich led the Owls defense with a game-high nine tackles, including seven solo and two for a loss. Sophomore NT Matt Ioannidis had the Owls only sack while
senior Blaze Caponegro (4.5 tackles) had 1.5 tackles for loss.

For Notre Dame, Rees had 346 yards (16-23) through the air to go along with his three touchdown tosses. T.J. Jones led all receivers with 138 yards on six receptions while Amir Carlisle (7 rushes, 68 yards) and Cam McDaniel (12-67) shared the load on the ground.

Temple returns home to host Houston Saturday (Noon, 6ABC, 1210 AM WPHT) at Lincoln Financial. That will be the first-ever game in the American Athletic Conference.