Irish 365 20251208 Notre Dame missing the College Football Playoffs

Notre Dame missing the College Football Playoffs

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
It's the moment you didn't know you're waiting for.
He is Carter, he's Chad, and this is the.
Irish 365 Podcast Welcome into the Irish 365 Podcast.
How are you doing over there? I'm doing like the Notre Dame
postseason well, not going well.Yeah, so let's talk about where

(00:23):
we're at when recording this podcast.
We're just over a day and 1/2 day, not even a day and 1/2.
It was noon yesterday, so 6. O'clock on Monday.
It's been 30 hours. Yep, that's where we're sitting
here. Our perspective.
We talked about podcasting yesterday.
Think it would have been a little, little more emotional,
right? I think we're going to be
emotional still today, yeah, Butyeah.

(00:47):
Because I, I had some text with different folks, you know, indie
fans, non indie fans leading up Saturday night.
Lots of messages, I mean, you, Jordan, myself, conversations
back and forth other people and I I ran a motion of like the
just the gamut of emotions on Saturday night.

(01:07):
Oh yeah. Are we in?
All day Saturday. Or are we going to be out?
Let's take it. Let's take it back to last
Tuesday. Let's start there, right?
Yeah, let's let's go there. That's a good.
Place beat Stanford. Stanford gets a couple late
scores, but the game's not close.
Alabama wins by 7 points on the road in the Iron Bowl against A5
and seven Auburn team. Yes, show up Tuesday and Notre

(01:30):
Dame is leaped by a ten and two Alabama team.
And the committee chairman says we were really impressed with A.
Fake. Punt a fake punt and the the you
know, they look Alabama looked good early.
It just didn't set you up to feel good.

(01:50):
Yeah, about that comparison. Yeah.
I mean, it's one of those thingswhere that I mean, that just
makes you feel bad, like, and then it just it just didn't make
sense, right? If they if they were like, you
know, what we've just seen over the course of this season, we
think Alabama's better than Notre Dame.
It probably it's not easy, but it's like you understand, OK, if

(02:11):
that's what if that's what these12 people who make decisions say
then but it to get no reasoning and.
Well, it was off this data pointof this week on what they did to
this Auburn team. Again, this is a mid Auburn team
at best. Yeah, and to say this data point
was enough for us to jump them. I was like, OK, yeah, it is.

(02:32):
But also I mean, so it was. Stanford with a trophy?
Technically, a rivalry game does.
The Iron Bowl have a trophy. I don't believe.
I don't know. I'm asking.
I don't know. I I don't know.
But I know the Stanford Notre Dame rivalry game has a trophy,
Yeah. So yeah, I mean, that's kind of
where we start Tuesday night. And you're like, Oh my goodness.
So we're going into the weekend,right?
We need Texas Tech to win. Yep.

(02:53):
And Georgia to win convincingly.Yep.
Texas Tech throttles BYUBYUS quarterback gets hurt, right?
I mean, and then the Texas Tech couldn't like just kept getting
held to field goals. That game could have been 55 to
something like BYU kept holding the field goals.
So perhaps to them still battling and and then and then

(03:16):
Georgia just dominates. I'd say dominates.
I know the score doesn't reflectas much as the BYU game, but I'd
say if you watch the game like committee says they've been
doing all year, you rush for -3 rushing yards in a football
game. Yeah -3 rushing yards.
That's inept. I mean, that's like what?

(03:36):
Yes. And when I was watching that
game, that's what I said. This Alabama team is just not
like it's not Alabama. They had chances to get back in
that, get drop touchdown passes,drop this and that.
It's like they generally had chances to probably make that a
2821 game. And it's like, OK, but they
weren't catching touchdowns. They're doing stupid penalty is
all the thing. It was like, this is not an

(03:57):
Alabama team. This is a team that.
Yeah, it's not that 2012 team that.
Oh, but I'm not even. Saying Notre Dame, I mean 20.
21/20/20 like they're not taking.
They're not that all world, Alabama.
They're. Not getting the 4th and 22 Hail
Mary, they're catching it in thecorner.
Like the guys making play. I mean, past we're getting
deflected, but hitting guys in the numbers and we're we're even
close to catching it. So I mean, that was one thing.

(04:17):
So yeah, that's we had that. And obviously you come down to
the selection committee. Yeah.
And you got to go back to Tuesday because Reese Davis
specifically asked about comparing Notre Dame to Miami
after after the Alabama jump andthe committee commissioner says
we're going to re evaluate all the teams that yes, even those

(04:38):
teams not playing could move. And and he pretty much tipped
his hand at that point. Now, whether you realized it or
not, he tipped his hand that like, something's brewing.
Yeah. In hindsight, it's like, oh, I
didn't feel good about it going into Saturday.
And so Saturday night I was, I said jokingly, like, I hope Duke

(05:00):
wins the ACC and this and that the other.
And then I'm like that could be worst case scenario for us.
Yeah, I mean. Like if one of those things.
You never know. And well, and here's where I
came at it from Had Duke won theACC or had Virginia Tech won the
AC? Virginia or Virginia won the ACC
they're in over Tulane and James.

(05:22):
Over James Madison. And James Madison, right?
They're in over James Madison. The ACC then has a seat at the
table. If the ACC had a seat at the
table, would Miami have gotten the?
It's hard to say. Like, and that's what I don't
know. And that's where it's you
struggle because what have we heard like all along for five
weeks from the conference playoff committee from the

(05:46):
committee is basically Notre Dame passes the eyeball test.
And even though they lost the head to head to Miami, they're
better now. So how did how did we?
How are we ahead of Miami? For six weeks, 5 weeks, whatever
it. Is so when they moved to Alabama
up, you and I both thought they won Alabama in.
If Alabama wins the SEC championship, they're in, so it

(06:08):
doesn't matter. But if they lose, you can move
them back, you can penalize themone spot, and now you've got the
buffer between Notre Dame and Miami to take that heat off of
you and say, well, we didn't really compare them because they
weren't side by side. Alabama's in between.
Them and Alabama, yeah. And then and then you've got
Alabama and a Notre Dame and which is what they wanted, but

(06:29):
they didn't do it that way. No, to many surprise, and I
think what gave me so much falsehope is I I checked the sports
books quite a bit. Their name was the favorite of
all three of them by quite some margin in Vegas by all sports
book to make the Collegeville Playoff over Miami and Alabama.
They were -2000 I think to make the playoff, like right before.

(06:51):
Yeah, I seen this reposted on XIThink last night, but someone
posted a clip of like CBS talking about like the whole
Notre Dame being left out. And like the one person on the
CBS panel that was in this conversation, she's like, and I
apologize, not knowing her name,but she's like, I can't believe
Notre Dame's left out because 75% of the brackets that like

(07:12):
the experts filled out show Notre Dame in the championship
game, like. Oh, we are the 4th best odds to
win the National championship Sunday at 11:00.
But yeah, according to Vegas, according to like, sports
writers, like we're the, we're like a team that a lot of people
thought was going to the national championship.
All right, so let's start getting into my my problems.
We got. All kinds of problems.

(07:33):
I want to start with proud #1 over the last how many weeks
have we heard that if Notre Damein Miami need to be compared
head to And OK, Miami beat us. Absolutely.
And I fully Miami getting in, that's not my problem.
Like they beat us. If that's what it came down to,

(07:53):
that's what it came down to. But.
Can I can I just pause for just a?
2nd to get this out if you don'tmind.
OK go ahead. We've heard this in the media.
For how long? Go check the AP.
Poll Yeah, a lot of people. Go check the AP.
Poll. Notre Dame still finished ahead
of Miami in both of them. The media and the coaches had

(08:15):
nerd name right next to each other.
And we talked about this. We talked about this earlier in
the season prior to BC. I'm going to point the wrong
direction. I'm going to point right here.
There is a missing 1993 nationalchampionship.
I can talk about the 91 robbery where there was a phantom clip
on Rocket Ishmael. We lost the game 1993 the last

(08:38):
next to last week of the season,we beat Florida State head to
head. We lost because we lost focus to
frickin Boston College on a lastsecond field goal.
And then we turn around and we throttle our opponent in the
bowl game and the and the writers and the everybody voted
Florida State national championsbecause the head to head didn't
matter since we lost the following week by three points

(09:01):
on the last second field goal toBC.
Now you're going to tell me the head to head from the beginning
of the season matters because the team that lost got better
every week and the team that wonsucked mid season and lost the
two unranked teams. But somehow they're like, yeah,
I'm with you. So I I got a lot of angst about
that 33 years and I've been experiencing.
Yeah. And I completely understand

(09:22):
that. But my thing is I'm like, I
mean, we're hearing in the mediafrom ESPN basically is how this
is so wrong. We've Miami's being wrong and
all this. It's like if you look at the
national, actual media, everyonewho's in these individual
cities, yeah, they've still got Notre Dame ahead of Miami.
Yeah. The coaches, but which I know

(09:43):
the coaches aren't actually voted some assistant.
Are some assistant but still there are people around the
football. Program I know there's I know
there's people who don't take their a people AP vote seriously
and that's that's whatever that's.
A shame, but yeah. But a grand majority of them, I
think generally rank them right.And you can't watch 130 games

(10:04):
hundred. I mean like, right?
And I complete but the. System's got flaws.
But that's been the national story for how many weeks?
Narrative in Miami, right? Exactly.
And from the grand jury, right, All the people, we still get
Notre Dame out of Miami. Exactly.
That so that I mean, that's one of my problems is like we're
going to act like it was a country outrage that Miami's.

(10:25):
It was an ESPN Yeah and conference president.
Outraged is what it was. Exactly.
It was an SEC Outrage is what itwas.
Yeah, I think the SEC, props to them, knew that they could get
that outrage on the national story and not worry about Notre
Dame, Bama. That was the real comparison.
But again, I think it was I, in hindsight, that was more of a

(10:48):
distraction to get ACC and NotreDame focused on each other, get
the Big 12 focused on Notre Dame.
And meanwhile the SEC, they slid5 teams into the 12 team
playoff. 5. And we all know that like Ole
Miss has lost all of not the majority of their coaching

(11:10):
staff. They've lost Lane Kiffin, it's
but different reports who's actually there and who's.
Didn't Charlie Weis Junior go the offensive?
Border back at Ole Miss for the playoffs somehow.
I don't know. Yeah, Ole Miss is a mess.
Yeah, and I maybe they go on andwin it, but how many people
think Ole Miss has got a a fighting chance of winning?
That out and out people think, why was Oklahoma a lock?

(11:33):
Again. Why was Oklahoma a lock?
So they've literally done nothing on offense for how many
straight weeks? Auburn looks terrible.
Oklahoma looks terrible. I mean.
Alabama. Alabama looks terrible.
Oklahoma looks terrible. Ole Miss is suspect like A&M.
I OK they lost one game to Texasat the end.
Like I could have understood Texas being in over Alabama.

(11:57):
I sure in the heck can't, but. And.
But you're going to tell me thatgoing to the going to the
conference championship matters,but yet you're going to ignore
the fact that. Here's my fact that Miami
College Football Playoff history.
Of this committee, 16 teams havegone in the conference
championship weekend ranked and lost.
All 16 have moved down one spot.My bad. 15 of the 16 now have

(12:23):
moved down at least one spot. Alabama's the first team in the
cultural playoff history to not move down one spot.
Also, let's get into this. I just need to know which which
of the three yards on offense -3yards was the most.
Impressive, I think was the line.
Minus -3 yards, which of the -3 yards was the most impressive to
put the for the committee not tonot to punish him?

(12:44):
Yeah. Anyway, what's your issue
number? Let's get into the ACC.
ACC Yes. I've got problems with the ACCI
don't. I feel like we need a festival.
Yeah, we did. I've got problems with you
people. And you're going to hear about.
It and I want to make this to the record straight.
Get off my lawn. Yeah.
I don't have a problem with any of the members in the ACC, but

(13:06):
the ACC. Yeah, exactly.
And I just ordered my thank you bar stool, my Catholic first
Committee shirt. Can't wait for it to be here
after Christmas. Not a sponsored ad, but it was.
Appropriate. Yeah.
And I want to make this clear, Iam not mad at Miami.
Miami beat us. I and I feel like Miami fans are
taking this the wrong way. Like I am at the ACC for what
how they handled this situation,not Miami.

(13:28):
Miami has every right to worry about themselves and push for
them to be in over us. And to say head to head Max I
that's fantastic. Miami, you beat us.
I live it. I, I'm with you, I mean the head
to head should matter and I and if they would have mattered 5
weeks ago I would not have said a word.
But for five weeks, they said itdidn't.

(13:48):
Matter. Anyway, that's not with Miami,
that's committee. But I'm back to the ACC, The ACC
coming out and lobbying for thisMiami team over Notre Dame.
OK, Think about this in a business standpoint, right?
Yeah, you've got yourself to worry about 100%, right?
You don't attack your partners the better yourself, do you?
Well, see, this gets interesting.

(14:09):
And I've heard some rumblings over the last 3-4 weeks.
Nothing that's substantial, nothing I can report.
But I've heard talks on the Notre Dame side.
There's discussion of antitrust because we have a contract and
this is antitrust. This is bad business.
Like Notre Dame may have a legitimate case in court, and it
would be awesome if they filed the case and there was discovery

(14:29):
because a lot of emails would have to be shared between the
committee, ESPN, the ACC. Anyway, go ahead.
You can't bat Like why are we bashing Notre Dame of all teams?
ACC Like why? Because Miami doesn't want to
sell out four games a year, theywant to sell out three.
Right. Because they sold out four games
this year. Bit you didn't sell out versus

(14:51):
Miami, sold out versus US. What are you doing exactly?
Like why did? You see Shane Gillis, the clip
from him on. Yeah, I forget which podcast it
was, I think. It was Treadwell, the the former
Penn State guy that does. Breakdown.
Anyway, he's like, we gift so much money to the ACCACC, Never

(15:12):
no more, right? Yeah, and I'm just like, what
are we doing? And what I don't get from Miami
fans and the ACC, like if it came down and it was just
Northern Miami like the SEC wanted to be OK, if you're
trying to lobby honest, I don't love the ACC.
And then Pete Vacqua comes out and says our this relationship
is damaged forever. Yeah.

(15:32):
And then the ACC commissioner coming out later and being like,
what? We never said anything about
negative. There's literally ACC football
post on social media like I'm. Going to say the official ACC
football not. Like burners, not barstool
accounts. Not some podcast that represents
I mean I get all the Miami fan podcasts, ex people taking shots
on us and whoever I get it. But a?

(15:52):
100% like do your thing but. Notre Dame football so didn't go
out and like say from the official Notre Dame account, you
suck Miami never would they havedone that.
And the ACC official account, let's not forget the
championship week on ESPN, on the ACC Network.
They were basic, Yeah. They were basically showing the
Notre Dame Miami game on repeat.Yeah, now it's the classic,

(16:15):
absolutely great game. But yeah, don't play it 10 times
and post about it. What's your message?
Yeah, like basketball season started.
We didn't have anything to coverthe ACC.
We needed the full time. Like, seriously, Anyway.
Yeah, me off. I was outside of track.
I lost my train of thought. There, Yeah, you were talking
about the ACCACC taking shots atNotre Dame.
Listen, and this goes back to it, who runs the ACC Network?

(16:39):
ESPNESPN had an obligation to try and to try and boost the
value of the ACC Network here. You're getting that antitrust,
right? They're colluding against Notre
Dame and NBC because they don't want to boost the NBC, right?
They want to, they want to bringdown the NBC.

(17:00):
And that's why you got Paul Feinbaum on ESPN today saying no
one watches Notre Dame on ESPN. OK, well, if it was a bad
business deal for NBC, they wouldn't be paying the money to
Notre Dame. It doesn't make sense.
They're not. They're not in the business of
being nice to Notre Dame. They're in the business of
making money. And Notre Dame is the vehicle in

(17:20):
which they do. That and after you just got this
12 team playoff, why you talkingabout the 13th team?
Exactly right. You got these 12 teams, 5 SEC
teams like you've been begging for and you're talking about the
one not then. Yeah, no one's talking about the
no. One's talking about the playoffs
today. So this is the beautiful thing
like Notre Dame is going to do. Miami a huge solid.

(17:41):
They're bitching about us. Excuse me a lot, but the ACC
fans may actually like Miami specifically may get exactly
what they want they want out of the ACC.
Here's. We're going to blow up the ACC,
potentially with antitrust lawsuits.
I don't think they sue, but likeI want to go back to this

(18:01):
because this is where my train of thought.
Well, let let me just stay the statement.
I don't know if they sue, but you heard about the memorandum
of agreement, right? And Pete Bilaca was very clear
on the Dan Patrick Show. I'm not really going to talk
about that. Going to comment on that.
Is that some sort of pre legislation, pre legality issue

(18:23):
where they're trying to negotiate a settlement so this
thing doesn't go to court? Yeah.
Anyway, finish your thought. OK so this is back to the Miami
and AC. Like why I'm mad at the ACC.
Go ahead. Alabama and Miami have a common
opponent and Florida State. No one's talking.

(18:47):
About that, no one's talking about that.
Alabama lost by 14. And what did what did Miami do
to him? They made Florida State, which
they didn't have to travel, travel so far right I.
Was like why is this not being talked about and when did
Alabama lose to him? Yeah.
Week 1. Yeah.
So that that was my big point. They they have a common

(19:08):
opponent. But again, kudos to the kudos to
the kudos to the SEC for gettingthe deflection of not getting
the heat. Yeah.
Did you see, I think it was someone on Twitter called
exposing the SEC bias, I think is the account and the the guy
literally posted and I want to say it was like May of this year

(19:29):
saying that the SEC will have 5 teams in this year's playoff
market book it because they did this, this and this to influence
the committee and to and to stack the deck with these crazy
metrics that would be favorable to the SEC.
It's like, oh, that guy may havesome inside information or he's
just good at good at. Pretty good.
I mean Miami literally went to Florida State when force they

(19:53):
were still ranked and beat him by 6 early on in that season.
Like that is just nuts. The Alabama got whoop.
Yeah, like then not, Not your dad's Alabama team, not Bear
Bryant's Alabama team, not even Nick Saban's Alabama team.
No. So I mean, that was my main
problem. Like we've had these data points
between Miami and Alabama. It's not like Miami just beat

(20:14):
Florida State like 2 weeks ago and this is a new thing.
Yeah. Well, and you think about it,
what did Coach Freeman say the other day when they interviewed
him? This is about Notre Dame.
This is about Notre Dame becausehe knew like at his heart of
hearts, if they truly felt Miamiand Notre Dame was, was
comparable. And, and you can argue that
either way. I, I, I don't, I don't disagree
with them putting the head to head in front of us.

(20:35):
I don't, and I don't think you do either.
But he was making the argument. This is about Notre Dame,
Alabama. And he made that argument and
like, it kind of didn't make it strong enough or people just
didn't want to hear that, especially on the SEC Network of
ESPN. They didn't want to hear that.
They wanted to like, deflect andsay, oh, because ESPN as much as

(20:57):
anybody has been pushing the narrative on all their shows,
it's Notre Dame. It's, you know what I think's
interesting? No one's talking about BYBYU has
a good as case, if not better tobe in over Notre Dame and Miami.
And no one's wanting to listen to that Big 12 argument like.
They lost to the I mean, Texas Tech lost one game, but their

(21:18):
starting quarterback hurt. Yeah.
So an Arizona State team that's not great, but you had your
starting quarterback gone? Yeah, it you had a now Texas
Tech. Dominated them twice, but I
mean, you've lost to a top four team that, I mean, could have
been #1 like, could have been #2yeah, like without your
quarterback going down. For a couple games and everybody
knows had BYU won that Big 12 championship, both teams were

(21:39):
in. Yeah, the Texas Tech wasn't
falling out. So again, like, kudos to the
whole SEC for positioning themselves and being able to
stay under the radar enough thatno one's talking about the SEC
virus bias. And this is the next thing that
they'll get me started. You got what's next on your list
of things that up irritate you? Do you have 1/3?

(22:00):
Not yeah, but you can go. So you've got this whole SEC
irritation and complaint, an ESPN complaint that Notre Dame
decided we're not playing in a bowl game, and the people I hear
complaining about the most are SEC people.
ESPN people. And ESPN people.

(22:22):
ESPN people, yeah. Paul Finebaum carries water for
the SEC, and he was lambasting Notre Dame over not playing in a
bowl. Sarkeesian's playing in a bowl,
and he took his shots at Notre Dame when he agreed to play in
the bowl. Whenever you want to talk about
how the top two or three teams in the SEC are good and the rest

(22:43):
are trash, the first thing you point to every year is the
record in the postseason. And what does the SEC fanbase,
media say? Well, those games don't matter.
We don't really care. We don't put our best effort.
Opt outs. I've been hearing that BS from
the SEC media, SEC fanbase for 30 plus years and now when Notre

(23:06):
Dame says we came to Notre Dame,we're here to play for national
championships, We're not here toplay for subsequent Reliquist
Bowl, Pop Tart Bowl. Like no disrespect to the Pop
Tart. It's a delicious treat and I
like the bowl. Game I want to go to the Pop
Tart bowl. I, I, I, I'm not like, I'm not
against the Pop Tarts or the PopTart Bowl, but I understand

(23:30):
Notre Dame saying, and especially when you understand
the context of this decision, itwasn't made as we'll take our
ball and go home. It was taken as there was guys
like team captains, guys like Jeremiah Love, Jerry and Price
who said we're going to opt out of not playing for the national
championship. And it's my understanding from
from across the board, the captains represent the team.

(23:52):
The conversations were had. They're like, we're not going to
be the same team that that's the2025.
There's no upside. We don't want to tarnish what
the 2025 Notre Dame football team did because if we go out
and we win and we beat by BYU by100, no one cares.
But if we lose to BYU by one point, because that's what
Marcus Freeman experienced his first game, he took over when

(24:16):
Brian Kelly bounced and said, Deuces, I'm going to LSU.
He was up and then lost to Oklahoma State and everybody's
like, oh, Notre Dame lost to Oklahoma.
Like first year head coach, first time on job.
Everybody wanted to bury Marcus Freeman.
And that's that's kind of where I'm like, you can't have it both
ways, SEC. You can't tell me that you don't
care about your record in the postseason if it's not the TFP,

(24:39):
because it doesn't matter, right?
No, it does matter or it doesn't, right?
Which way do you want it? And if it doesn't matter, then
too bad we walked away and now you've got upset and you're
taking your shots because we're going to cost ESPN a whole bunch
of viewership for the Pop Tart Bowl because a big giant toaster
and a dancing mascot can only goso far when you got 2 lackluster

(25:02):
teams. I mean, it's it's two days after
Christmas. Who wants to travel down two
days after Christmas? And I like what Pete Bovacqua
said. We're going to let our student
athletes focus on their final exams and spend time with their
family. We'll reset after the first of
the year and they'll get back into conditioning.
Why are we playing preseason games after the season?
Exactly. The Bulls are meaningless.

(25:22):
Let's just face it. And anyone that wants to argue
that and wants to, I love bowl games when I was a kid.
Oh yeah. I mean, I remember sitting out
like, but they mean nothing likeafter the how are you the 14
playoff team mean they they meant nothing.
Yeah. Like new year six.
OK, like you're playing on New Year's Day.
Sweet. But I mean, they mean nothing

(25:44):
like expanding the 12 team playoff makes them mean
absolutely even less. Yeah, and opt outs and all this
stuff. Like who?
Yeah, who's watching most of these games?
Like I I used to watch a bunch of them but now it's just like.
You you watch if you're sitting around the sports bar and
there's nothing to do right? You watch if you're you're down
between and work or you're off. Those days you got nothing to do

(26:05):
right? Like if you got extended time
off maybe? You go watch your team.
Or you watch your team. Yeah, but most people check the
app and say, oh, Gee, my team for my conference is playing.
Yeah. And they want to brag about
their conference win. Or they want to just ignore it
and say, well, it doesn't mattermatter that Auburn lost because
it's a it's the Reliquist Bowl and they don't care.
It's it's the Gator tax layer Bowl and they don't care.

(26:27):
Like, so they just want to brag.But I mean, here's where I
stand. They hate Notre Dame because
they see where we're at. Everybody for years was saying
Notre Dame can't win the big games because we couldn't.
Marcus Freeman has turned a corner and we beat, we beat the
SEC champion last year. We competed very close with the

(26:52):
national championship. Yeah, Ohio State Buckeyes.
We just brought in one of the top recruiting classes in the
country, which Notre Dame hasn'tdone in a long time.
In the country or #3 depending on your source, Yeah.
We don't talk about recruiting alot on this show, but #2 or #3
depending on where you do. They signed 27 guys.

(27:12):
How many commits did they have? 27.
No decommits. Who's talking about that?
4-5 stars. There are only 32 five stars in
the entire country. We signed four of them. 28
people in this class came to a visit over the summer.
Yeah. 27 signed 27 out of 28 official visits this summer, 27

(27:34):
I don't know how much more clearI can make this, and here's what
I'll say. Notre Dame was not I I've said
Notre Dame is either loved or hated for so long.
Yeah. Marcus Freeman's kind of kind of
changed that. He's made us cool.
He's kind of changed that. And even the ESPN, well, that
that just changed that. What?
We're the villain. I don't hate it.

(27:56):
You know what, I'm OK with that role because everybody likes the
underdog and we've not been the underdog for a long time.
We are now the underdog. We are now the you know what
Notre Dame's had a struggle doing?
Getting good defensive tackles. You know what good defensive
tackles are? They're guys with chips on their

(28:16):
shoulders that that everybody counts out.
They've got attitude that that will you know, they'll bring it.
They got like we don't have we we don't have that kind of
attitude across the line. We've got we got the yes, Sir,
no sirs, like I'm guaranteeing you Bryce Young is 1 heck of a

(28:37):
respectable young man when he's not on the football field.
Some of your best defense of tackles.
And I'll just pick on Vince Wiltwork.
I don't think he's a polite guy outside of football.
He's mean on the field, but he'salso mean off the field just
because he's an NFL, you know, like legend.
We want a little bit more of that and a little bit less of
the yes ma'am, no ma'am politeness, at least on the

(28:57):
football field. And I don't know, bright Bryce
Young, like some of those guys have a little bit of nastiness,
but Isaiah Fosky had that ability and that nastiness, but
he was still a yes, Sir, no, Sir, proper, proper, you know,
like young man. So maybe, just maybe we could
get a little more attractive to that that that tough mentality

(29:20):
of defensive tackle I'd love to have.
Yeah, you know, and not that, not that we've had bad defensive
tackles, just we haven't had elite defensive tackles.
And you give us some elite defensive tackles with our
secondary. Yeah.
You're going to end up with -3 yards rushing every game.
And maybe -5 passing. Yeah, and you don't want to, you
don't want to be in a we can't run, we have to pass with the

(29:41):
current Notre Dame. And incoming guy.
Defense and, and we're just, we're just getting better,
right? I wouldn't even say reloaded.
We're getting better. Yeah, like like we were good
last year, Yeah. And we, we're getting better.
And I just, and again, if you'resitting here and you're saying
we can't let Notre Dame become adynasty, that's a lot of what
this is. This is anti Notre Dame.

(30:02):
They hate us 'cause they ain't us to coach Mccullen, I would
like to say, or coach Holtz, I think has quoted that as well.
So anyway, yeah, I, I think there's a lot of that Notre Dame
anti Notre Dame bias. And it's like, but we knew going
in right when the when the 12 team playoff was created, we
knew the margin of error for us was lesser than others.

(30:24):
We've known that it's not. Yeah, and let's talk about this.
Notre Dame should have absolutely won, I'd say both of
those games earlier in the season or one or the other.
We're not sitting in this situation, right?
Yes, you have to take self accountability.
I'm not going to. Had we just won one?
Of them, we're in this we. Controlled our own destiny.
Yeah, and it's no debate, so I Ido want to make that clear.
Like we got to win those games. But yeah, I mean that that's

(30:46):
that's that's thing #1 and I think Notre Dame is started slow
in seasons. Yeah, I'll be interested and I I
hope I'm getting fired up. Marcus Freeman for 272 more
days. And when I I'm September 6th,
2026 at Lambeau Field against Wisconsin, I hope I see revenge
tour O and 2 Notre Dame. Marcus Freeman Post NIU Marcus

(31:11):
Freeman's come out on a week 1 and not not just week one, week
two, week three-week 4 and we. I want to see Notre Dame.
I think Notre Dame's capable. I, I want to see Notre Dame do
what we saw the 2012 Alabama team team do.
Dominate everybody from beginning to end like.

(31:34):
Period, boss. But I mean, like they took their
foot off. But I just want to see us come
out and dominate from like beginning to end, like just
throttle people and easy for me to do. 15 weeks of domination.
I, I am Marcus Freeman. I'm going to, I'm going to say
I'm all in. We're going to, we're going to
destroy everybody. I'm not taking my foot off the

(31:54):
gas. No, I may put my second string
guys in, but we're not taking our.
Foot off, they better know the expectation.
We're not getting scored on. We're.
Going to be like we're scoring the only the only let down is
we're going to go from first first team to second team, but
we're going to keep our foot on the gas.
We're not going to play conservative.
We're going to put our foot on the gas and we're going to make
you wished you didn't come. I mean, that's the way I would
approach it. Leave no doubt, which we did

(32:18):
this the last 10 games this season.
We left very little doubt. The Boston College game could
have been more impressive, but overall, ten wins, 10 plus
points every game. Now we'll see what happens.
Like can they can they have thatfuel?
Can they let it fire them up? Because this is the whole team.
This is just Marcus from the whole team feels disrespected

(32:39):
and those incoming guys are going to come in and say and
they're all early enrollees, like all but like.
Most of them, yeah. Are like are early enrollees, so
they're going to be on campus inJanuary and they're already
like, we got snubbed. And so they're they mapped out
this bowl game incoming guys could not practice for bowl
prep. Yeah, this year, new rule now

(33:02):
not being bowl prep, start conditioning.
Yep, that's right. So I feel like that's a very
under under the table thing. But yeah, that was a new thing
this year. You could not have early and
early freshman's, which you remember last year we had guys.
Premo and different guys were, yeah.
Practicing with the team. So that's a very interesting one
for early enrollees. I don't think there's any rules

(33:23):
for offseason conditioning. They can't start practicing.
No, they start right. We're in the weight room and you
know, yeah, you're going to you're going to be able to
participate in all that. So it it should be, it should be
good. It'll be able to see what we do
and how we respond and how the team responds and does it suck?
We're not going to bowl. Does it suck?
We have 200. And 72.
Days, 72 days until we can see Notre Dame football.

(33:45):
Yeah, not counting the spring game.
Yeah. I mean, and you know what we're
going to see there that's generic, that's vanilla.
There's going to be a whole bunch of we're the best team in
the world. You'll you'll won't know until.
So my next question is, and I want to talk about this in the
ACC ramp, but I want to go on mybig, my big SEC ramp first.
Miami two years ago backed out on us.

(34:07):
Didn't didn't want to come to South Bend.
We turn around, went to Miami. We're supposed to play Miami at
home next year. Do you think Miami ducks us, or
do you think Miami comes to South Bend and proves that we're
not as good as we think we are? Ask me after noon tomorrow of
Pete. Pete, the back was press
conference. Yeah, right.
Well, what's your what's your gut take now?

(34:28):
If Miami doesn't come, that tells you everything you need to
know. I don't know what they're going
to do. Yeah, well, I mean, but what's
assuming nothing happens from Pete other than we're just not
happy with the ACC? Yeah, I mean, if Miami ducks us
again, it tells we got it. It just tells you every reason
we got to leave the ACC. This this is my biggest problem
with the ACC. We get crap opponents every

(34:48):
year. We get we don't get a Clemson.
Miami's not been great. We've played them a few times.
Florida State's been terrible every time we played them.
I mean, yeah. And then people are going to dog
us. Well, why don't you just join
the ACC? The ACC is not good.
Yeah. And then you're like, you're
going to dog us that we're playing ACC teams and we're
playing Boston College and Pitt and Stanford, but then you're

(35:11):
going to dog us that we won't join it.
Like why would we want to fully join?
That and the Big 10s got 16 teams and they never have 18.
They never have more than three good teams.
Like I used come up and what happened?
Penn State's falling off. You know, it's like you, whether
it's Ohio State, Michigan, Iowa,like they never have more than
three good teams. And so what's the purpose of a

(35:34):
conference to begin with? I yeah, I obviously I've never
won notes during a conference. It makes the least amount of
sense for it to happen now. These bigger conferences are
terrible. We've literally got ACC champion
that didn't play the team that made the playoff, both of them.
Yeah, Virginia and Duke didn't play Miami this year.
But what you're telling me is you don't have to make your
conference championship to make the playoff, unless you're Notre

(35:58):
Dame and then not making the conference championships held
against you. It's it's the critical BS like I
that's what drives me nuts for anything else like you you'll
talk out of your mouth whicheverway you need to mental
gymnastics to trash Notre Dame, but you won't be consistent.
You want to tell me head to Like where's all the?

(36:26):
Same team within a couple weeks.Yeah, yeah.
And Miami won. Same location it was.
They're both at Florida State. I I don't think Bama's at home.
I think Bama's on the road. For you, I think they were yeah.
And so it was Miami and you talkyeah, you just so you can just.
I don't want to make the argument about us in Miami
because it's not. No, it never should have been.
But again, like. Why not Miami over Bama?
Why is Yeah. Yeah, And why is Notre Dame in

(36:49):
over Bama? Why aren't we talking that like,
yeah, like there's so many different.
Like, why in Do you really thinkOle Miss without Lane Kiff, even
with Lane Kiffin, does anybody really think Ole Miss would beat
Notre Dame? Like you look at the Vegas odds
and I think Ohio State was the only team in a neutral site.

(37:09):
Yeah, I'd be interested to see how it updated with Indiana
beating Ohio State. OK, so you.
May you may get Ohio State and Indiana may be the only two
teams in the CFP on a neutral site that Vegas would give the
advantage to the other team, notNotre Dame.
Yep. Like how do you not in the
playoffs, Like, what's the decision there?
And I'm not knocking the Tulane or the James Madison because

(37:32):
like there's the rules. They followed what they got in.
Not their fault. But the at large bids like so,
yeah, I just, the system's broken.
And I think Notre Dame's going to do what Notre Dame always
does. We're going to save college
football. Once again.
Remember, everybody hates Notre Dame, but if it wasn't for us,
the 2020 college football seasonwouldn't have happened.

(37:53):
People were saying the ACC savedus for that.
I don't want. To We sucked up our pride.
We went to the ACC and said we'll join the conference if you
guys will play football. Because everybody else,
including the mighty SEC, was walking away.
The Big 10 was cancelling their season until Notre Dame saved.
And that's the reason you join aconference in the beginning is
you said scheduling can be hard,it can be difficult.

(38:15):
The athletic directors don't want to do it.
You join a conference of nine teams or 10 teams, and you play
every team every year. And then you got one or two at
large bids. That's what the conference was.
Now you've got conferences or these super conferences.
You don't even play everybody inthe conference you don't have.
It's ridiculous. Anymore why we don't have

(38:35):
divisions in these conferences like it's in the best team of
your division, Your mini conference makes the conference
championship. Like, it's ridiculous.
It's just ridiculous. So why?
What's the purpose of a conference?
It's so that fans whose teams suck can get money off the teams
that do. It's charity cases.
I am Purdue. I make a whole lot more money

(38:57):
off of the IU and Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State victories,
and I do offer Purdue victories.If you happen to be the Arkansas
AD, you make a little bit more money when the 5th SEC team gets
in. Huh.
That's right. There's there's a little bit of
cash incentive to that committeechairman.
Wow, coincidence, huh? I mean that it could have
nothing to do with. It I'm sure it has nothing to do
with it. And if you're the Arkansas AD,

(39:18):
talk about how great, how great the SEC is.
Why don't you compare all those SEC teams that played Arkansas
to Notre Dame and compare records?
Notre Dame beat Arkansas way worse than any other team that
played Arkansas did. Anybody and also how's your head
coach search going? And you still don't have one.
So you've been looking the wholetime you've been a commit

(39:40):
committee member or the chair ofthe committee.
So are you. Which job are you not doing?
Big Game Brian's available. What job is he not doing?
Go get big game, Brian. Is he watching the games or is
he looking for a head coach? Yeah, which ones he get paid
for? Yeah, Well, I say go get big
game, Brian. That's that's the big.
Game Brian's I think figured it out.
He's going to disappear and goodfor him.
Hey, I think he'll take another 10 year, $10 million a year

(40:03):
guaranteed deal from Arkansas ifhe can get it.
Yeah, I I think disappear, take his money and run.
And I do not blame him. Smart man if he doesn't.
Good for Brian. Yeah, You know what and he can
do? He can take a year or two off
and slide into an ESPN analyst role.
He can trash Notre Dame with thebest of them and everybody will
be happy. Yeah, that'd be a good time.
Yeah, so where do you think we go from here?

(40:24):
I mean, we we could rant and rave and the reality is Notre
Dame didn't do what Notre Dame needed to do.
Let's talk about this then. Yeah.
What is this season a success? Yes, OK, I think so.
Disappointing. Did did we?
Did we win the national championship?
No. Should we?
Could we? Yes.

(40:44):
Like, and we talked about this before the season, like what is
the success? Look, like we said you got to
make the College Football Playoff and you got to make like
the Final Four. I will say this is a team that
that didn't do what it needed todo as far as winning those first

(41:04):
two games to guarantee themselves.
But this is also a team I feel that put themselves in a
position that it's crazy that Notre Dame did not get in.
I think, I think. I'm a counter already.
BYU had an argument that they should have been in the playoffs
and I think you got you got to look at it and say why Ole Miss?
Why Oklahoma, Oklahoma, why, youknow, or Alabama?

(41:27):
I still want to go on Auburn forthat.
Like you got to look at that andsay, OK, I think from a from did
the team, did the team perform at their best for the last 10
weeks? And we're one of the most
dominant teams in the country? Absolutely.
I would have said a year ago, ifyou just said nine months ago,

(41:48):
if you just said Notre Dame doesn't make the playoffs, I
just said it's not a success. But I say under the
circumstances it was. You say it's not I'm.
Gonna go No, it was not a successful season.
I think great things came from this season, but when I think
about my nerd name fandom. Yeah.
Do you think this is the best nerd aim team in my life?

(42:11):
Could be. And we finished 11th of the
nation. Yeah, I mean, generally since
2001. Is this the best Nerd AIM team?
Has to be. We've had some great defenses
and I I won't say this defense is better than some of the other
ones, but this is the best offense.

(42:35):
See, I don't know that I'd even say best offense.
The Brady Quinn years. We had some great offense, but
we just didn't have the defense to support it.
Right. That's what I'm saying though,
this OK, this is a top three offense.
You'd say then in a top three defense we have team, haven't
had that combination on a team. Yes, yes.
We haven't had a top three offense and top three defense
since 2001 on the same team. Easy you.

(42:57):
Know what I mean Like. We haven't had that since 94,
yeah. So, and that's where my my stake
goes on. This is a disappointing season
because I was hoping that thing right over your left shoulder
got a 2026 on it right. Yeah, needs an update.
I mean, so that's where I go on a disappointing season.

(43:18):
I mean, and I think we talked about this last year it college
football, it's it takes luck. You go, we had great.
And not Andrew Luck, Stanford style.
Luck. Luck.
So it takes a lot of stuff and luck is one of those.
You need the ball to bounce yourway and all these different
things. And it didn't bounce our way
this year. And that's unfortunate because
let's be honest, Penn State, like that Penn State game,

(43:41):
Georgia game last year, we were a great team, but we also had
some luck. Things that happened in those
games, right? Like, and that's what it takes
to win a national championship. You got to play off.
It happens in the NFL every year.
So yeah, that's why it's disappointing to me that because
I feel like this team could havegone on to win the national
championship. This yeah, again, we talked
about it, there's a lot of people who predicted Vegas

(44:01):
sports writers this Notre Dame team would be in the national
championship game and it's disappointing we're not but I
will take a step back if it means long term and and what
I've. Step back, 2 steps forward.
What I've seen from Coach Freeman is he learns lessons in
in defeat and, you know, and it,and it, it resonates with his
team because what does he tell these kids when he's recruiting

(44:23):
them? Come to Notre Dame, choose hard
right, the world's going to be against you.
And, and this is what we as Notre Dame fans often forget
because there's a lot of us there.
There are a lot of Notre Dame fans, but we're only one of 131
teams and there's a lot of people that don't like you and
they're not going to like you even if you don't play their
team because they're they're blind allegiance to the Big 10

(44:46):
or the SEC or whatever conference, right?
So even though you get in your Notre Dame ecosphere with all
your Notre Dame friends and family and everything else and
you feel like it's 5050, it's not, it's, it's not 5050.
Even if it, it's, if I'm generous and I exaggerate at
best, 10% of the world loves Notre Dame, 90% hates you.

(45:10):
Now you pick any other school out there and like finding
people have that strong an opinion, one or the other gets
harder. So if you're Ohio State, maybe
9% likes you, you know, or 8% likes you.
The other 5060% don't even care about you.
Like they just OK, Ohio State's good.
I don't have it. Like, sure, there's a lot of
Michigan fans that hate Ohio State, but at the end of the

(45:32):
day, those Michigan fans are going to say, well, we're in the
best conference in the country because I, you and Ohio State
are in the national championshipor whatever it works out to be.
So you got to understand that that blind allegiance to the
conference, which I don't get, never have.
Nope. I didn't choose the independence
life. The independence life chose me.
But it's just what it is. Right.
We were in for UConn in their endeavors this independent

(45:52):
season. Or yeah.
So, yeah, I, I think it's going to be interesting and I think
this Pete Bovacqua like press conference, press conference.
Marcus Sherman extension rumoredaround 13 to $14 million a year.
Every penny of it, he's worth every penny.
So yeah, now the question is where does college football play
go forward And and we all we cando is speculate.

(46:14):
I was going to say I don't want to do that.
I need some time. I don't want to speculate right
now, love, just what if. I think it's interesting when
you talk about the potential of antitrust laws and legislation
coming into play. I, I think we saw this where
Marco Rubio brought in politics to football and was saying, you
know, the college Football committee should be investigated

(46:35):
or Trump should act. If you know.
And listen, if there's a president that would be dumb
enough to get get out of politics and get into the sports
media, it would be, it'd be Donald Trump, right?
Love him or hate him, he doesn'tbelong in it.
And he was probably the one guy that would, but you have to
remember he had a golf game earlier this year in the spring
with Pete Bivaqua. And it was all about what's

(46:57):
wrong with NIL. So do not do not discredit that
Pete Bivaqua might have the phone number to Donald Trump.
And, and I would love to see like college football get blown
up. And maybe it's just me being
bitter. Take my ball and go home.
I'll take everybody's ball and go home.
But but yeah, I we could speculate a lot and it it'll be

(47:19):
interesting. I think you just got to set back
as a Notre Dame fan and you justgot to laugh at some of the
hypocrisy of the things we see and the things we deal with.
And then you just kind of kind of like run and say, OK, now
where, where does it go from here?
So sit back. If, if you want to be anti ESPN,
fine. Don't watch any bowl games,
cancel your ESPN plus subscription.

(47:41):
You know, do whatever you got todo take.
It to the man. Take it to the man, right?
But at the end of the day, I think I think the college
football committee done more harm keeping Notre Dame out than
they realize. They set precedents about bowl
games don't matter as they didn't anticipate that
championship. Even if you're in a conference,

(48:01):
you don't have to be in the conference game, conference
championship, the conference championship game to get in.
Like Miami didn't make the conference.
All we heard is how important conference champions are.
And I get like, you can only have two teams in the conference
championship. So you could argue that the 3rd,
4th and 5th best team in the SECbelong in cause only two could
get the conference champion. But when you start saying you
don't make the ACC conference championship but you can get in,

(48:23):
but you can get in even though the ACC conference champion
can't. You've just told me that the
conference championship is worthless because exactly what
we've talked about. You're not even playing the best
teams, you're not playing all the teams alone, the best teams
at your conference. So I think they've done more
harm than good with that decision.
And that's not anti Miami. That's just the reality that the
ACC sucks, the ACC sucks, right?So end of the day, here we go.

(48:48):
I think they've done more harm and more damage.
But Notre Dame may be in the NAINAIA next year.
We may be FCSII don't know we because that's that's just, I
don't know what we'll do, but we're going to go somewhere and
we're going to figure it out. We're either going to save
college football yet again, we're going to destroy it for
everybody. We'll take it down, all right?

(49:09):
And maybe we're wrong. Maybe our brand's not that big,
but like you said, 12 teams are in and everybody's talking about
the 13th team that didn't get in.
Yep. So, all right, anything else?
I've got so much, but nothing right now.
All right, we'll have to come back another.
It's therapeutic. It's good we talked.
Yep. All right, go Irish.
Go Irish.