Notre Dame VS Louisville Depth Chart: Paul Moala OUT for the season

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish are quickly moving on from last week’s win over Florida State Seminoles and begin to prepare for the next ACC opponent — the Louisville Cardinals.

On Monday Notre Dame released their depth chart for the week, and missing at the 2-deep at ROVER is Paul Moala who suffered an injury against the Noles. Kelly addressed this in his press conference:

“As it relates to Paul Moala, unfortunately I have to report he tore his Achilles tendon and is scheduled for surgery. Isaiah Pryor is going to be backing up Jeremiah at that position. He’ll be getting a lot of the work there and as he’s learning the position, we’ll also employ kind of what we did last year, a nickel situation there as well as we can also play with a third linebacker. So we have some options there as well.”

Here’s how the depth charts look...

OFFENSE

There are no changes to the offensive depth chart this week. Against FSU we saw a vast majority of the carries go to Kyren Williams and Chris Tyree with a few leftover for C’Bo Flemister. I expect more of the same this week. It’s also important to keep in mind that the tight end depth chart is a little misleading — and basically useless. We’ve seen the roles Tommy Tremble, Michael Mayer, and Brock Wright have played this year and we should only expect more of the same. After a solid performance off of the bench, Dillan Gibbons should no longer be looked at as just a name on the depth chart in place of Josh Lugg.

DEFENSE

The only major change here is that of Isaiah Pryor replacing the injured Paul Moala at ROVER as Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah’s backup. Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa was not available last week and might be ready to go this week — but is not listed on the depth chart. Rylie Mills is still listed at NG in place of Jamion Franklin. Kelly was hopeful that both MTA and Jack Kiser would be available this week (but he is always eternally optimistic). Notre Dame’s secondary should be back in order after dealing with the after effects of COVID (we assume) last week.

SPECIAL TEAMS

Kevin Austin, who should be about 100% this week, replaces Lawrence Keys III as the punt returner — although Kelly said they will look at both him and Matt Salerno this week. For those looking for more of a gamebreaker returning punts... this is your time to shine.