BlueandGold.com will release a countdown article highlighting a significant Notre Dame football statistic every day until the 2024 season opener at Texas A&M at 7:30 p.m. ET on Aug. 31 in College Station, Texas. Today, there are 44 days until the Irish and Aggies kick off at Kyle Field.
Riley Leonard ‘s passing stats as Duke’s quarterback against Notre Dame weren’t pretty, but they don’t tell the full story.
Leonard finished 12-of-27 — good for a completion percentage of 44.4 — for 134 yards, along with a touchdown and an interception. He started especially slowly, as the Irish shut him and the Blue Devils out before the halftime break.
“In the first half, he just did OK,” Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said in late May. “We did a really good job.”
The memory of Notre Dame’s defensive performance stuck with Leonard as he entered the transfer portal and committed to the Irish.
“That was a huge part of my recruitment,” Leonard said. “Whenever they were recruiting me, I was like, ‘Who’s coming back on defense?’ Because I played around and they were the most high-flying, they were flying around all game. Really, really incredible players.”
Freeman re-watched that game shortly before giving those comments, and he didn’t just see a quarterback struggling against the elite Irish pass defense. He saw a quarterback who adjusted and did anything it took to get his team back into it.
Leonard finished the game with 16 carries for 121 sack-adjusted rushing yards, which averages out to 7.6 yards per carry. Sixty of those yards came on 6 carries in the fourth quarter.
“Then in the second half he said, ‘OK, I’m going to create some plays with my legs,’” Freeman said. “They started doing some things where he was running the ball which opened up some things in the pass game. He had a long run and broke some tackles.”
Leonard put Duke on the brink of upsetting Notre Dame and remaining undefeated, leading a 14-3 run in the first 29 minutes and 29 seconds of the second half. But for a miraculous fourth-and-16 scramble from Irish quarterback Sam Hartman , he would have led the Blue Devils to a signature win.
Like Leonard remembered the Notre Dame defense, his performance stuck with Freeman throughout the rest of the season and when it came time to hunt for his second transfer signal-caller in as many years.
“He’s a competitor,” Freeman said. “I don’t know what the NFL projects him as. I just know that dude is a competitor. He’s a gamer. When the game is on the line, I want to give the ball to him.”
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