This is my long awaited and heavily anticipated debut on Charlie’s nasties. After many months of trying to come up with a topic (engineering tends to destroy all of your creative writing skills using fancy vectors and eigenvalues and the such). But as I am tearing into the new edition of NCAA Football on my Xbox 360, it occurred to me that nothing would be more apt then to start my sure to be illustrious career with this:


The Notre Dame 2008 Season Preview through NCAA 09 pt. I


Now as pops and Brugg (yea matt, you used to write on this) can attest, I have tunnel vision when I play and tend to throw game crushing interceptions inexplicably. But besides that, I am an above average player against the computer with dozens of seasons under my belt, so I am just entering my prime. These games were played on heisman with the current 2008 rosters without any significant injuries in 4 minute quarters.

The game this year is flawless. It is such an improvement over previous years as well as the Madden franchise. The gameplay especially the running is fluid. The penalties are real, and there is actually pass interference, so you just cant have your safety plow the WR into the sideline when the pass goes up. But above all, the computer AI is perfect, which makes the pursuit angles real, so that you just cant run to the corner and get an easy touchdown on a kickoff, option pitch, or handoff. Unfortunately, ncaa hasnt taken a hint from madden and changed how easy it is for a scrambling quarterback to pick apart a defense by running back and to the sideline before a pass. Onto the season…

San Diego State- this team is terrible; their defense is comparable to the french army, on the field but not really doing anything and just running towards their endzone. This team really had no offense, so it was no surprise that Notre Dame had the ball most of the game. Screen passes to both Armando and Aldridge proved to be the best way to get big chunks of yards. Easy easy win.

Michigan- I was all excited to see the digitalized Dick Rod, but sadly they got rid of the terrible shots of the coaches on the sidelines (which I am also sorry to say, was the most flattering picture of Charlie on a sideline ever taken). But Michigan pales in comparison to even last year’s team and struggles to move the ball. But as sluggish as their offense is, ours did not fair well either with some untimely fumbling after an game clinching end zone reception, which led to a last second field goal for a Michigan win. ( every sports game has the eff-u game when there is nothing you can do to prevent it, the computer will win in the end and ur left with only a puzzled look on your face, skynet gets its kicks off your misery)

Michigan State- this game was interesting in that they could run all over our usually stout run defense, and the ND running backs could not make it past the back of our center's jearsey. But this proved to be Clausen’s breakout game, netting over 400 yards total in the Irish win. In another funny note, once scoring a touchdown, you can run over to the leprechaun and dance with him, which is both awkward and hilarious at the same time since the mascot only comes up to Duval Kamara’s waist, and his hand is 5x bigger.

Purdue- in this game, both our offensive line and defensive line smothered Purdue leading to a very lopsided and easy win. Now I missed the game last year due to complications of a late nite and an early bus, and was not able to see the loss there. But if the video game Irish are anything like their counterparts, the game this year will be very satisfying for all Notre Dame fans with an out and out popping of "the big drum".

I’ll be back in a few with the second half of the season including coverage of how good this years team can be as exemplified during the USC game as well as this weeks "Movie of the Week" for our boys….