Our strength is our middle. We want to force teams to challenge us inside, so we can start pushing to the outside. We want to get them out of their comfort zone.

I know we're better than what we've shown. We haven't hit our stride. It's all about confidence for us right now.

We're just trying to hold teams under a certain percentage. It's a challenge for us and we take it out there every game. We study film, we have goals we set before every game and we try to reach those goals. We do reach those goals. As a team, we go out there and play hard every night on the defensive end.

The thing that Notre Dame does well is it confuses teams with the attack it runs. They move a lot of hitters around. We have to adapt to that.

What we've tried to explain to them this year is you can't measure last year. We're a measuring stick for opponents. We can make someone's season.

I don't think it's too early to call this a big game. No one on this side is taking them lightly.