DUBLIN, Ireland--Sixth-year quarterback Sam Hartman completed 19 of his 23 pass attempts for 251 yards and 4 touchdowns to lead #13 Notre Dame (1-0) to a 42-3 victory over Navy (0-1) in the season-opener for both teams. The game was played in front of a sold-out crowd of 49,000 at Aviva Stadium.
Hartman threw touchdown passes of 19 and 14 yards to Jayden Thomas and 35 and 20 yards to Jaden Greathouse as he showed why he is one of the Heisman Trophy favorites this year. Audric Estime added 95 yards rushing and a touchdown on 16 carries as the Irish piled up 444 yards of total offense.
"When you play a team like Notre Dame, you've got to be dang near perfect," Navy head coach
Brian Newberry said. "They controlled the line of scrimmage, the running backs ran hard, we didn't tackle well — that's a bad combination. When they did throw it, they were deadly efficient."
Navy was able to move the ball at times on Notre Dame, but struggled to finish drives and was hurt by 49 yards of negative plays thanks to a bad snap and a sack that reduced their rushing yards from 175 yards to 126 yards. Junior fullback
Daba Fofana led Navy in rushing with 58 yards on 15 carries (the box score incorrectly credited the bad snap by
Brent Self to Fofana's rushing yards instead of team rushing), while sophomore fullback
Alex Tecza rushed for 38 yards on 8 carries. Senoir quarterback
Tai Lavatai completed 3 of his 6 pass attempts for 43 yards, while sophomore slot back
Brandon Chatman caught 2 passes for 41 yards.
Senior
Evan Warren provided Navy with its only points of the game, making a 31-yard field goal in the fourth quarter.
The Navy defense was led by senior linebacker
Will Harbour with 8 tackles, while junior linebacker
Kyle Jacob finished with 7 and junior safety Rayuan Lane and junior linebacker
Colin Ramos finished with 5 stops each. Lane also had a forced fumble and broke up 2 passes.
After a bye week, Navy will host Wagner in the home opener on Sept. 9 at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium.
