Riley Leonard defends Notre Dame's decision to run him nine times on opening drive

Going into the National Championship Game, there was an expectation that Notre Dame would look to take advantage of quarterback Riley Leonard being a dual threat and run him. Immediately, in the opening drive of the game, the Irish leaned into the quarterback-run game having Leonard carry the ball nine times.

Following the game, Leonard defended that play calling and explained that he has no problem doing whatever he’s asked to do to win, even if it means becoming a rusher in tough situations.

“Yeah, it’s always about reload and worry about the next play,” Riley Leonard said. “So, I didn’t even know it was nine. If you asked me, I probably would have said it was like three or four. If Coach wants to call my number and have me run the ball every single play, I’ve got no problem with it. You’ve seen me kind of put my body on the line for this team over and over again. So, whether I’m running the ball, passing the ball, it doesn’t matter. I’m gonna do everything I can do to help the team win. Hit a little lull there in the first half, but like I said, I’ve got to live with it.”

On the opening drive of the game, Leonard had nine carries for 34 yards. He capped the drive off with a touchdown run too. In a game where the Irish struggled to run the ball, finishing the game with just 53 yards rushing despite being one of the best in the country on the ground, Leonard ultimately led the team in rushing with 40 yards. That includes sack yardage being taken off his total.

The performance came in a season where Riley Leonard often relied on his legs and finished with 906 rushing yards and 17 touchdowns.

After capping the drive off with a touchdown run, Leonard went to the Notre Dame sideline and reportedly threw up. However, he explained that this wasn’t due to exhaustion but how he landed on the football.

“Uh, nah, I just landed on the ball funny a couple of times,” Leonard said. “Wasn’t feeling sick. Felt fine. Just landed on the ball, felt a little awkward. No problem at all for me.”

Clearly, part of the gameplan for Notre Dame was to run the ball with Riley Leonard. However, as head coach Marcus Freeman explained, it wasn’t possible to run him like they did on the first drive throughout the game. Instead, as the offense struggled, they needed to find production from elsewhere.

“We couldn’t run Riley every play. It’s not right for Riley and it’s not going to sustain the success we needed offensively. We can’t run Riley every single play. That’s not what the formula for success is. You know, we ran him a whole bunch that first series,” Freeman said.

“And, you know, you look at the second series and you have two penalties, which ended up forcing us to punt. And then, the third series, you know, we had the miscommunication with the muffed snap and that’s the end of the half. So I think, more than anything, it was the two series after the first one. We didn’t execute and we had some self-inflicted wounds that we have to clean up. Second half, we drove the ball. I thought we did a good job, you know, with some, some tough situations.”

In the end, the good second-half effort for the Notre Dame offense was too little, too late and the Irish comeback fell short. Instead, it was Ohio State that won the national championship by a score of 34-23.