NOTRE DAME INSIDE LOOK: HOW'D THEY GET HERE? NOTRE DAME'S OFFENSE LOOKS COMPLETELY INEPT.

Byline: Vincent Bonsignore Staff Writer

Tyrone Willingham must be a pretty good coach after all.

For the first-year Notre Dame coach to bleed 10 wins out of the Irish this season with an offense as incompetent as the one that bumbled around the Coliseum Saturday in USC's 44-13 victory is truly a remarkable feat.

Credit should obviously go to the USC defense; the Trojans had a decisive answer to everything the Fighting Irish tried to do.

But the fact is, offense, or the lack thereof, has been a constant problem all season for Notre Dame, which got by before Saturday with a dominant defense and terrific special teams play.

That was enough against Michigan and Maryland and Rutger, but against a team with an offense as potent as Carson Palmer and the Trojans', it wasn't even close to sufficient.

How bad was it?

Notre Dame finished with 109 total yards, 70 passing and 39 rushing. The Fighting Irish had just four first downs, and none in the second and third quarters when they managed just 20 yards total.

Consider USC had 610 yards.

``We have no excuses, we just didn't get the job done,'' Notre Dame All-American center Jeff Faine said. ``I give them credit because they had a great game plan and the executed it perfectly. But we just didn't come to play.''

The Fighting Irish offense never crossed the USC goal line - Notre Dame's only touchdown was on a blocked punt. It's two other scores came on field goals.

Most of the blame goes to Notre Dame quarterback Carlyle Holiday, who was 10 of 29 for 70 yards and three interceptions. He was sacked three times and pressured throughout.

``Today just didn't go our way,'' Holiday said ``They had a really good pass rush and they did an excellent job executing their scheme.''

Holiday refused to use an injured thumb on his throwing hand as an excuse.

``I don't concentrate on those type of things,'' Holiday said. ``For some reason I wasn't able to get into any rhythm. That was the main problem.''

Not that this was a surprise. Notre Dame has had a difficult time making the transition from its traditional smash-mouth style to Willingham and offensive coordinator Bill Diedrick's West Coast offense.

Much like the struggles USC and Palmer had last year getting acclimated to Norm Chow's sophisticated offense, Notre Dame's attack remains a work in progress.

``It's been hard for us but it's time for us, it's the end of the season, we've gone through a whole season in this offense so that's not an excuse at all,'' Faine said. ``We should have come ready to play tonight.''

USC's defensive objective was to load up on the run and take away the deep ball. It worked. Holiday's longest completion went for 18 yards.

``Notre Dame does a really good job of sucking you up with the run, and just one deep throw and the game is wide open for them,'' USC defensive back Darrell Rideaux. ``So our whole objective was to control the running game and take care of the deep ball.''

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