Rice Football (1-1) could not keep pace with a Top 5 Notre Dame squad, falling in one-sided fashion to the Irish on the road.
A shocking upset was not in the cards for Rice football in South Bend on Saturday. Whether it was the big stage, bad luck, or some other culprit, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish handed the Owls a hefty defeat. Now 1-1 on the season, Rice will take a look at the film, salvage what they can, and move on. But first, a few immediate reactions from the game:
14 Seconds of Hope
The game wasn’t over after the first Rice football offensive possession, but the dreams of an epic upset took an immediate punch to the gut when slot Davis Lane was decleated on the Owls’ second play from scrimmage. Lane had yet to hit the turf before the ball was scooped up by Irish defensive lineman Boubacar Traore, who completed the play with a short scamper to the end zone.
Trailing 7-0 after two plays and 14 seconds of game time, quarterback Jacurri Brown put the ball on the ground again moments later. He was fortunate to fall on the pigskin. That wasn’t the case on an ensuing exchange between him and slot Jordan Clark, who fell to the ground and was recovered by Notre Dame. Triggerman CJ Carr hit Jordan Faison to double the score moments later.
“When you turn the ball over in the first half the way we did it’s like throwing the chum in the water and then jumping in,” head coach Scott Abell said. “It’s just a poor recipe to start a game. I truly believe all that starts with me and how can we prepare for that moment better.”
Rice fumbled the ball three times in its first seven snaps. Add in a chop block penalty that pushed the Owls backward into an eventual third-and-28 in the shadow of their own end zone and you get pretty close to whatever Abell could have imagined whenever the words “worst case scenario” might have been mentioned in preparations this week.
In 12 regular-season games last season, Rice football lost five fumbles. They lost four on Saturday against Notre Dame. Until proven otherwise, a sloppy showing against the No. 3 team in the country should be viewed as the exception, not the rule, when it comes to the Owls’ ball security prowess, or lack thereof.
Strong on the Ground
A 21-point deficit after the first quarter had all but vanquished their pregame aspirations, but Rice was determined to prove they weren’t going to be pushed around for 60 minutes. Even considering the unfortunate field position they were handed by their own offense early on, the Owls did not look overmanned in the trenches — far from it.
Rice held Notre Dame to 118 rushing yards (3.7 yards per carry) and just three explosive runs of 10 yards or more, only one of which came before halftime. The unheralded Rice defensive line did their part and kept the stable of Notre Dame running backs in check throughout this game.
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The same was not true for CJ Carr and the Notre Dame passing attack. They were able to find space in the Rice secondary and exploit it. Ultimately, the athleticism of Jordan Faison and his cohort was too much to overcome. After watching what that Heisman Trophy frontrunner was able to do against Wisconsin, the aerial success was understandable.
“I’ve been in games here at Rice where things start going downhill and guys lose all hope,” defensive end Chibby Nwajuaku said. “I think coming into the locker room we had good energy. Guys were ready to fight no matter what the score was.”
While the defense wasn’t perfect, short fields were just as much a storyline in this game as was Carr’s success. The run defense wasn’t a weak link, though, far from it. And that bodes well for what the Owls will see in conference.
Special Teams Impress
Cards on the table: finding translatable applications from a 49-0 game is tough. But as much as Rice football struggled on offense and defense, the Owls’ special teams performed quite well. Notre Dame generated one explosive on a punt return while being otherwise held in check.
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Rice punter Charlie Durkin punted six times for 275 yards, an average of 45.8 yards with a long of 58 yards. Had he taken just a hair off of one of those kicks, he could have pinned Notre Dame at the one-yard line. Even without it, though, he performed well, as did his punt coverage team.
Truthfully, Notre Dame’s athleticism didn’t seem to make as big a difference in this phase of the game. That’s a testament to the Owls.
Onto the Next
While no person inside the Brian Patterson Center would (or probably should) have vocalized such things before the season, a 1-1 start was always par for expectations. The 2026 Rice Football season was never going to be declared a victory or a success based on that presumed start — although if given the choice, many of the Owls’ faithful might have stomached a loss to Houston Christian if it meant a world-stopping win over the Irish.
Given the season played out as it did, all that Rice can do from this point is move forward and turn their attention, as cheesy as it sounds, to Western Michigan. A 1-1 start seems far less acceptable when followed by a loss than it would with a win.
“I love this team. I think there’s a lot of good football in us. I’m disappointed that we didn’t display that a whole lot today,” Abell said.
Digging Deeper
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