Quick-hitters: Marcus Freeman on Notre Dame WRs, Garrett Shrader, Tyler Buchner recovery

Marcus Freeman met with reporters Thursday for the final time before Notre Dame plays at No. 16 Syracuse Saturday (noon ET, ABC). Here are some highlights from his Zoom press conference.

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On the Notre Dame wide receivers’ week of practice

“They’ve had a good week. I challenged them Monday and Tuesday that we have to continue to gain confidence in practice in terms of how to expand our passing game. That’s the wideouts, the quarterback, the O-Line everybody. They’ve had a really good week.

“I spent a good amount of time with them this week. You realize it’s such an unselfish – you have to be unselfish. You can do everything right, you can be wide open and you don’t always get rewarded for it. They’re continuing to battle, continuing to get better.”

On defending Syracuse leading receiver Oronde Gadsden II

“I know they list him as a [wide receiver], but he can be a tight end, he can be a wideout. He can be a mismatch at times. We have to be physical with him. You have to win some jump balls. He has great body control and the ability to go get the ball out of the air. He’s a tough, tough guy to defend.”

On defending Syracuse quarterback Garrett Shrader

“You have to try to limit their big plays. That’s what you’ve see studying that Clemson game. He is going to get yardage running the ball and he is going to make some throws. But to eliminate the big plays and truly make sure you have a hat for him, you have to be physical with him and make physical tackles on him.

“He’s a talented football player and you can just say we’re going to stop him from running. He can throw the ball well. You can’t just play eight-man drops, because he has the ability to run the ball and they have the ability to run the ball with Tucker. It’s a really good offense that is going to present a really big challenge for our defense.”

On Notre Dame quarterback Tyler Buchner’s shoulder surgery recovery

“He’s not able to do many physical drills right now with his throwing shoulder. It wasn’t surgically repaired, but it still affects the other shoulder. He hasn’t been released to run as of today. Here soon, he’s going to start progressing. It was a four to five-month recovery, which puts us somewhere in January, and right now I’ve been told nothing otherwise.”

On the status of safety Brandon Joseph, linebacker Jack Kiser (ankle) and cornerback Jaden Mickey (abductor strain)

“All of them are expected to play, all three of them. They’ve all been practicing.”

How Freeman described Joseph’s previously undisclosed injury: “It was a lower-leg injury, more of a contusion. Nothing structural or that had to do with ligaments. It was more of a contusion that he or [safeties coach Chris] O’Leary didn’t feel great with him being in there defensively. He was still fine with doing punt return and kick return duties. That’s what it was, the lack of confidence he felt in the ability to cut and do his job as a safety with the lower-leg injury.”

On Notre Dame’s punt block proficiency

“It’s the ability to be aggressive. You can’t block punts without rushing the punter and rushing the punt team. [Special teams coordinator Brian Mason] is an aggressive person. He finds different ways to attack punt protection. But also with that comes times you can be vulnerable to a fake, and he does a good job of finding different ways we’re protected against a fake.

“That’s my only thing as a head coach, let’s be aggressive. I want to be aggressive but also don’t want to get the ball faked against us.

“Some people might say you can’t do them both, but I believe you can. What we’ve seen is an aggressive punt block unit, but also the ability to deter some teams of faking against us.

“It’s a mentality. They really work on the technique to blocking punts. Coach Mason spends a lot of time talking about how there’s a technique to it. It’s not just rushing back there, coming free and finding a way to get your hand on the ball. There are techniques to where you’re placing your hand. He’s a heck of a coach, and the buy-in from that punt block unit has been really good.”