SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Notre Dame heads to USC this weekend to close out the regular season and potentially clinch a home game in the College Football Playoff.
And that’s why you’re curious about an all-Notre Dame CFP field, future transfer plans, recruiting lulls and how ticketing might work for the postseason. Not that you’re just assuming Notre Dame will beat USC in the Los Angeles Coliseum, where the Irish are 3-7 in their past 10 games. Nope, not at all.
As for the mailbag, let’s get to the questions.
You’ve been on the Notre Dame beat since 2001. That means you’ve covered 24 different Irish squads. Of those teams, who would make your 12-team bracket, and who would win it all? — Michael M.
To be honest, I completely misread this question at first. I thought Michael was asking how many times Notre Dame would have made the 12-team College Football Playoff during the past 24 years, not what I think an all-Notre Dame bracket would look like from those 24 teams.
For the record, Notre Dame would have missed the field 16 times since the final year of Bob Davie through today. Yes, the standards around Notre Dame football have been raised remarkably since the back half of Brian Kelly’s tenure, but it’s still surprising to know the Irish would have missed the 12-team CFP twice as much as making it.
OK, so the actual question. Which Notre Dame teams would get automatic bids? How would the entire field be filled out with Irish teams?
The four “conference champion” Notre Dame teams that earned byes:
- No. 1 2005
- No. 2 2024
- No. 3 2015
- No. 4 2012
And here are the first-round, on-campus matchups, using my secret scientific metrics. Hey, Notre Dame is hosting!
- No. 5 2018 vs. No. 12 2002
- No. 6 2020 vs. No. 11 2023
- No. 7 2006 vs. No. 10 2017
- No. 8 2019 vs. No. 9 2021
Of the 12 teams in the field, I’d consider only three Notre Dame squads as potential champions. Basically, there’s a big gap between the No. 3 seed (2015) and the No. 4 seed (2012), which actually did play for a national title.
I’d give the edge to Brady Quinn’s junior year as the No. 1 seed because of the quarterback, depth at wide receiver, the ability to play up in big moments and having just enough defensive talent to keep up. This year’s team has the best defense among these three by a wide margin, but it also lost to Northern Illinois and it’s not clear Riley Leonard could throw Notre Dame back into a game if it trailed. The 2015 team had the best offense from this group with a first-round pick at wide receiver and three top-10 picks along the offensive line, plus a second-round pick at center. It’s just that the defense couldn’t hold up its end of the bargain.
Because it’s my No. 1 seed, I’ll crown Charlie Weis’ first team as my “national champion” in this all-Notre Dame field. The best quarterback with the best wide receivers wins out. Debate that if you’d like. But the bigger takeaway should be the current Notre Dame team rates as the program’s best shot at winning it all in a decade. Maybe longer.
Notre Dame finished ranked No. 9 in 2005. (Jonathan Daniel / Getty Images)
Will Notre Dame’s administration allow football to take on undergraduate transfers? The COVID-19 exceptions are running out, and Notre Dame needs to have as big of a pool of candidates to hopefully hit on for immediate contributors. This seems to be the biggest issue for Notre Dame football long-term. — Stephen O.
You’re right that expiring pandemic exemptions will remove one of Notre Dame’s greatest roster building tools without an obvious replacement. For how well the Irish recruit high school talent, their ability to retain their own veterans and add graduate transfers from other schools has been the biggest key in turning the program into a consistent winner under Freeman. What does this team look like without Rylie Mills, Jack Kiser, Howard Cross and Xavier Watts? That doesn’t get to Jordan Clark, Beaux Collins, Kris Mitchell, Jayden Harrison and Rod Heard II in supporting roles. Notre Dame has a top coaching staff, but Al Golden doesn’t make interceptions and Mike Denbrock doesn’t hurdle linebackers.
My understanding is Notre Dame has begun the process of adjusting its policy to allow for more undergraduate football transfers, specifically from Big Ten and ACC schools. This won’t be blowing the doors open to all comers — i.e. the SEC other than Vanderbilt — but the Irish intend to do business beyond Northwestern, Duke and Navy.
Notre Dame’s cleanest path in the transfer portal will remain graduate students, but there may be fewer of those to go around as those COVID-19 exemptions fade out. But if Notre Dame can win on the margins with a few undergraduate transfers to supplement the traditional roster, it’s worth the effort … for both the football program and the university at large.
GO DEEPER
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Does the athletic department have a plan in place to try to keep tickets in the hands of Notre Dame fans for a home Playoff game? Past efforts, including recent Georgia and Ohio State games, didn’t work out so well. How do you think ticket demand for a home Playoff game in December will compare to other recent big games? – John K.
For the record, Notre Dame’s efforts around the Ohio State game worked. After suffering the visuals of a 50-50 crowd for the Georgia game (or maybe 60-40 in favor of Notre Dame), the Ohio State game looked more like 80-20 at worst.
Notre Dame has already sent out ordering information for a home College Football Playoff game, with tickets ranging from $100 in the upper end zone to $250 for prime sideline seats. The cost for students should be closer to $35 (with fees).
As for keeping the red (or any other color) out of the stadium: Don’t sell your tickets. That’s a “you” solution.
The ticketing office and athletic department had almost a year to plan for the Ohio State sale. It limited the quantity of tickets fans could by. The tickets never went on sale to the public. They were able to move Ohio State fans around the stadium to help with optics.
The CFP is a two-week turnaround with a TBD opponent. Notre Dame has much bigger problems to solve than suppressing demand from opposing fans that want to come to the game. They just need to get the game kicked off and make sure everybody gets into the stadium (apparently not an automatic thing!). If Notre Dame hosts SMU in December, it’s a good bet the stadium will be overwhelmingly pro-Irish like a regular home game. But if Notre Dame hosts Indiana? That might be a crimson and cream problem.
GO DEEPER
Inside Notre Dame’s strategy to keep Ohio State red out of the stadium
Do you put any chance on Benjamin Morrison coming back next year? In The Athletic’s top 50 players for the draft next year, he wasn’t mentioned. Is there a competitive NIL packet could get him to come back? Also, what was the status on his surgery and what the actual injury was? — Matt B.
My sources close to the program indicated Morrison suffered a labrum injury in his hip, which is what required surgery. He suffered a hip injury in high school, too, plus that shoulder surgery last offseason. The medical part of the draft process for Morrison figures to be an issue for plenty of NFL teams and durability may be a concern. And yes, I expect Morrison to absolutely be in the NFL next year, even if he slides down draft boards into the second or third round. If his rehab drags into next summer, better to be getting paid to do it than returning to college and risking another injury, a la Jaylon Smith. Morrison has enough great tape that there’s no guesswork about his potential when healthy.
This might sound sacrilegious considering Morrison’s talent, but would it even make sense to bring him back on a big NIL deal? Christian Gray and Leonard Moore return next season. There are holes at defensive tackle, wide receiver, safety and defensive end. Even if Morrison were completely healthy, there’s an easy argument to make that those funds would be better allocated elsewhere.
GO DEEPER
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The situation at Yankee Stadium in terms of getting into the stadium was disgraceful and the worst I’ve ever experienced at any sporting event (or live performance). How much responsibility has Notre Dame administration taken and what are their explanations/excuses? – Kevin F.
It’s a fair question, although I don’t have an answer for exactly what happened or why Yankee Stadium seemed so woefully understaffed for the game. It was a shame the venue didn’t deliver on a night that should have been a layup, considering the event. Simply staffing all the gates for entry would have probably sufficed. Most fans can deal with waiting a half-hour for a beer, even if it’s obnoxious. Missing the entire first quarter? Less so.
Notre Dame is well aware of what happened for this year’s Shamrock Series. This isn’t just something that affected a few fans in cheap seats at a road venue. This was supposed to be a home game for Notre Dame and the school brought a massive traveling party, including the development team for fundraising purposes.
I would be surprised if Yankee Stadium got a return game after Saturday night. There’s something to be said for playing football games in football venues staffed by football personnel. No offense to baseball, but restarting a baseball stadium cold a month after the season ended probably isn’t as automatic as it seems.
GO DEEPER
Sampson: Notre Dame showing no signs of letting up on ruthless march to the Playoff
Why is 2025 recruiting struggling to close? – Stephen O.
It’s a combination of factors, some outside of Notre Dame’s control and some not.
For the record, it’s not like Notre Dame’s recruiting has fallen off a cliff in the past month; it’s just felt like it’s run out of gas. The Irish rank No. 12 on 247Sports and On3. They’re No. 16 at Rivals.
There was a shot at receiver Derek Meadows and linebacker Madden Faraimo, with the latter still in play and visiting USC this weekend. The state of play at USC and Notre Dame couldn’t be more different, a point the Irish staff can make. Meadows has always been a harder read, but he’s expected to follow quarterback Bryce Underwood in making the flip from LSU to Michigan.
But is all this that big of a difference from finishing No. 9 (247Sports and On3) or No. 11 (Rivals) last cycle? If Notre Dame had ordered its quarterback board differently, focusing more on fit, this class might not feel that different from the previous ones.
NIL continues to be a moving target for Notre Dame, same as it is for every program. With the House settlement coming, this might be the last unregulated NIL recruiting cycle until we enter the new world of revenue sharing. Four-star safety Jadon Blair tweeted that he’d signed with Notre Dame’s collective Rally in October, which will soon become commonplace. Will the Irish be in better recruiting position when the impact of NIL changes, perhaps paired with a run in the College Football Playoff and Marcus Freeman signing an extension? That feels like good bet.
I realize people cringe at “fit” talk because it conjures up memories of “shopping down a different aisle” from the Kelly era, but hunting prospects who match Notre Dame’s profile does matter, especially at quarterback. And yet, finding off-profile talent that wants the challenge of Notre Dame, which Freeman calls “choose hard,” also matters. Did Notre Dame get that balance right this cycle? That’s a question the recruiting department has been asking for 30 years.
Is there any early indication Notre Dame would push for the Friday Playoff game instead of one of the ones on Saturday? – Jake D.
I’ve heard Notre Dame prefers the Friday, Dec. 20, time slot, although the athletic department has been tightlipped about it all … for now. The Friday night slot would be on ESPN, draw a huge audience as the first game in the new format and let Notre Dame close down campus a day earlier.
I’m not entirely surely which factor matters most, but I look forward to asking about this next week.
(Top photo of Jeremiyah Love and Riley Leonard: Quinn Harris / Getty Images)
