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Notre Dame football ranks No. 1 among P5 teams in this statistic

IMG_9992by:Tyler Horka•12/27/22•

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Notre Dame defensive linemen Isaiah Foskey and Rylie Mills (Chad Weaver/Blue & Gold).

There are 64 teams in the Power 5 conferences. None of them were better than Notre Dame at converting pressures into sacks during the 2022 season according to Sports Info Solutions (SIS).

Notre Dame had 115 pressures in 12 regular season games per the advanced analytics website. The Fighting Irish had 35 team sacks for a conversion rate of 30.4 percent. Florida State was the top team in the Power Five with a rate of 29.2 percent.

Pressures converted to sacks among Power Five teams (according to Sports Info Solutions)

TeamSacksPressuresConversion Rate
1. Notre Dame3511530.4%
2. Florida State3411729.2%
3. Louisville4716828.0%
4. Miami3714527.8%
5. Virginia3011227.7%
6. Arkansas3913126.5%

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Notre Dame benefitted by boasting one of the best pass-rushers in the country. Senior Isaiah Foskey had 11.0 sacks in 12 games. He ranked tied for sixth nationally at the time of announcing he’d opt out of the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl to focus on the 2023 NFL Draft.

No other Notre Dame player had more than 3.0 sacks. Graduate student twins Justin Ademilola and Jayson Ademilola ranked second on the roster with that many. Several Irish players chipped in with a few here and a few there. Including Foskey and the Ademilola brothers, Notre Dame had nine players register at least 2.0 sacks.

Notre Dame’s 35 sacks put the Irish tied for 21st among the 131 teams in the FBS. They had 41 quarterback takedowns in 13 games during the 2021 season. Notre Dame did not hit 35 in the first 11 years of the Brian Kelly era. The program has reached that mark in each of the first two seasons defensive coordinator-turned-head coach has been on the sideline in South Bend.

The only thing missing from Notre Dame’s pass-rushing in 2022 was volume. The 115 pressures according to SIS was tied with Texas A&M for 53rd in among Power Five teams. Had the Irish tied Texas for ninth in the Power Five in pressures (166), meanwhile, and retained the same pressure rate of 30.4 percent, the Irish would have had 50 team sacks. Louisville reached that nation-leading number in its bowl game.

More pressures lead to more sacks. Even though the Irish did not have an astounding number of the former, they did better than any other Power Five team at converting them into the latter.

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