Latest news with #GoIrish
New York Times
13 hours ago
- Sport
- New York Times
Notre Dame mailbag: Is it over with USC? Fun watching film with Marcus Freeman?
SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Welcome back to the Notre Dame mailbag. You've got questions, so let's get started. Note: Submitted questions have been edited for clarity and length. As the USC series appears to be approaching its end, how much of the blame falls on the Big Ten essentially holding USC hostage? Do you think this could be a sign of things to come as the wheel of college football 'progress' churns toward a Big Ten/SEC super league, and is there a world in which Notre Dame is blackballed from scheduling games against foes from those conferences? — Jack Z. For starters, the Big Ten didn't force USC to join, destroying the Pac-12 in the process. That was USC's decision, which all but dragged UCLA, Washington and Oregon to follow the Trojans' lead, toppling a conference and scattering it across the Big 12 and ACC. Advertisement As for the 'sign of things to come' aspect of scheduling, it's worth monitoring. It's also worth acknowledging Notre Dame has home-and-home agreements with Alabama, Florida, Texas, Texas A&M, Purdue, Michigan State, Arkansas, Indiana and Michigan on future schedules. Ohio State just came off as a home-and-home. The Shamrock Series created a neutral-and-neutral against Wisconsin. Our 2025 home game times are SET ☘️👀 📆 Mark your calendars 📆 🎟️ #GoIrish☘️ — Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) May 12, 2025 As much as both leagues feel like they're taking their scheduling ball and going home, it's hard to imagine those conferences shunning Notre Dame (and the money associated with the Irish) to prove some high-minded point. The 'join a conference!' crowd is primarily fans and a few coaches. It never seems to be from the administrators running the sport. The adults in the room know Notre Dame is good for business. None of that means the USC series is on solid ground, however. But there's a difference between playing a home-and-home with Notre Dame and being locked into a perpetual series with the Irish. I'd doubt the teams cycling through Notre Dame's schedule would jump at the chance to play Notre Dame every year on top of their SEC or Big Ten slates. As much as USC is to blame for the current stalemate in the series, Lincoln Riley's willingness to walk away from one of the great rivalries in the sport makes sense for College Football Playoff contention purposes. (Yes, this assumes Riley can build a CFP-contending roster.) USC traveled to Michigan, Maryland and Minnesota last year. This year, it's got trips to Illinois, Purdue, Nebraska and that October date at Notre Dame. The Trojans don't think they need that additional travel to South Bend. USC probably doesn't want the extra competition, either, considering it just went 7-5 and finished ninth in the conference. Advertisement Notre Dame probably needs the series more than USC does. But the Trojans need a win over the Irish to validate Riley's project, which feels tenuous at best. Too many cautious programs and coaches worry about the schedule being too hard. They should spend more time on the upside of winning signature games. Marcus Freeman has already proved himself that way, not just by beating USC but by making the CFP run. Riley is much less defined, but a potential win over Notre Dame may change the perceptions around USC. He just needs to have the constitution to take on that challenge. It's not clear that he does. What's one thing you learned breaking down film with Freeman that maybe felt different from the previous versions of the series with players? — Terence M. Thanks for checking out that story. It was a lot of fun. The biggest difference between sitting down with the head coach instead of a player was understanding all the moving parts of the play opposed to just diving deep with one player on one assignment. But what struck me most going over the plays was how much there was to critique and how Freeman jumped all over it. Like, he was still bothered by receivers missing blocks in games that happened seven months ago. Games Notre Dame won! He even told me a couple of plays to go watch on my own, plays that had stuck with him that much. Freeman talks a lot in news conferences about not being outcome-driven and chasing perfection, but after watching just eight plays with him, I wonder if there are more than a dozen 'perfect plays' in a 150-play game. Maybe this shouldn't be a surprise, but getting 11 college kids to do the exact right thing at the exact right time seems really, really difficult. Is the lack of a 2027 quarterback offer a sign of maturity and incorporating lessons learned after being burned by longtime QB decommits, or a sign of the downside of having a season that stretches so deep into January? — Andrew B. It's the downside of having a season stretch until Jan. 20. Notre Dame couldn't use the winter contact period to evaluate quarterbacks in person, which is how the staff would have played it under normal circumstances. Whether it was offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock or quarterbacks coach Gino Guidugli, they'd have crisscrossed the country to see quarterbacks throw in person. Instead, they were preparing for the national championship game. And yeah, that's a trade Notre Dame would be willing to make every year, even if it means being behind in quarterback recruiting. Advertisement For the sake of context, it's worth remembering that Notre Dame landed four-star quarterback Noah Grubbs about this time last summer, just before Irish Invasion. But he'd camped at Notre Dame a year earlier and the Irish staff had been targeting him for months. The Deuce Knight situation was similar, with the Mississippi product targeted during the summer and committing before the Ohio State game two years ago. CJ Carr committed the summer before his junior year, same with Tyler Buchner and Steve Angeli. It's not like Notre Dame can't pivot late when forced to adjust, landing Kenny Minchey in November of his senior year or grabbing Blake Hebert in October of his senior year. The Minchey/Hebert timelines are not ideal because they delay putting a face on your recruiting class while also making it harder to pursue wideouts. Minchey was a late flip from Pitt after the Irish struggled to attract quarterbacks after landing Carr and missing on Dante Moore. Hebert was a reaction to Knight flipping to Auburn. I'm not entirely sure there's a 'lessons learned' element to quarterback recruiting this cycle as Notre Dame would chase Knight just the same this cycle as last. Would that be a smart move considering the 'fit' that's so important at Notre Dame? Debatable. Bottom line, quarterback recruiting is a crapshoot of the highest order. And that's true for everybody, not just Notre Dame. The most successful quarterback of the modern era was a three-star flip from Washington State, Ian Book. The highest-rated quarterbacks the Irish did sign haven't panned out: Brandon Wimbush, Tyler Buchner and Phil Jurkovec. And with the transfer portal available to Notre Dame, the penalty for missing at the position is simply a matter of money. There's always a Riley Leonard, Sam Hartman or Jack Coan available. So yes, Notre Dame needs to make a decision at quarterback for the Class of 2027 soon. I'd expect that to happen in the coming weeks. But with the uncertainty of the position combined with ability to get out of jail free (even if 'free' means a seven-figure investment), the Irish don't need to panic in making that quarterback call. Brian Kelly and Marcus Freeman capped their third years at Notre Dame with a run to the national title game. Which coach had the more impressive first three seasons — Kelly with his ground-up reinvention or Freeman's seemingly sustainable build (plus his overwhelming buy-in from the fan base)? — Ryan M. There aren't many places where Kelly should get the nod over Freeman with Notre Dame's fan base. This remains one. Kelly took a broken program and put it in the national championship game in three years. Freeman took a College Football Playoff regular and did the same. Notre Dame lost to Navy and UConn in the season before Kelly took over. Notre Dame went 11-1 and won its final six games by an average of 27.3 points in the season before Freeman took over as head coach. Advertisement As much as Year 3 under Freeman had a soul that Kelly's third season did not, thanks to the wins over Georgia and Penn State, it's hard to overstate the magic of 2012 when Notre Dame was the story of college football. Put another way, there was never a question last season if Notre Dame was relevant or capable of climbing the sport's mountain. Before Kelly's third season, it was an existential question if Notre Dame had been relegated to the has-been era of the sport. If Freeman proved people right about Notre Dame, Kelly had to first prove people wrong. Now the question is about sustaining success, which Freeman seems much more capable of doing. The university is more invested in football's success. The depth of recruiting is better. And as Ryan noted, the fan base is behind the head coach more now than then. I remember walking into the first practice before the 2013 season and telling another reporter it felt like we were going to cover three months of air coming out of the balloon. And that's what happened. Very little about Notre Dame football felt sturdy after Kelly's flirtation with the Eagles and the Manti Te'o nonsense. That's not the case today. Who ends up with more passing yards: CJ Carr/Kenny Minchey in 12 games in 2025 or Riley Leonard in 16 games in 2024? — Tommy R. To put Leonard's 178.8 passing yards per game in perspective, that ranked No. 89 nationally last season. If Carr/Minchey produce the same total of 2,861 yards during the regular season, it would amount to 238.4 yards per game, which would have ranked No. 36 nationally, between quarterbacks from Western Kentucky and Hawaii. Point being, we're not talking about some transcendental passing performance if Carr or Minchey do in the regular season what Leonard did in the entire season. So, give me Carr and/or Minchey to better Leonard's passing statistics. They both have more arm talent and a better receiver room, plus a better offensive line in front of them. Advertisement As for Leonard's 184 carries for 906 yards and 17 rushing touchdowns … that might be harder to replicate. Is there a new rivalry for Notre Dame that would interest you? — Peter B. This sounds like a great question for next week's fan survey. Not that I'm chasing USC off the schedule, but the Clemson series somewhat fills this slot if it comes to that. Creating new rivalries rarely seems to work … yet Irish versus Tigers somehow does. If USC dropped off the schedule as an every-season opponent, I'd run the slot into a higher-end Power 2 rotating series. Step back from rivalry and lean into novelty. Yes, I'd rather see USC every season, but what if Notre Dame swapped that over 10 years of home-and-homes with Oregon, LSU, Iowa, Auburn and Washington? (Top photo of Kenny Minchey: Justin Casterline / Getty Images)
USA Today
29-05-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Notre Dame football single-game home tickets go on sale Thursday, May 29
Notre Dame football single-game home tickets go on sale Thursday, May 29 Single-game tickets to Notre Dame home football games in 2025 will be going on sale. Almost time for us to be back inside Notre Dame Stadium ☘️ Single game tickets go on sale this Thursday, May 29 at 6 PM ET 🔗 #GoIrish☘️ — Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) May 27, 2025 It's getting closer and closer to kickoff of the 2025 college football season, as single-game tickets for Notre Dame home football games go on sale Thursday, May 29 at 6:00 p.m. ET. The Fighting Irish are coming off a 14-2 season, which featured a 13-game winning streak and an appearance in the College Football Playoff national championship game, where the Irish fell to Ohio State 34-23. Notre Dame has six home games during the 2025 season: Texas A&M (September 13), Purdue (September 20), Boise State (October 4), NC State (October 11), USC (October 18), and Syracuse (November 22). Last season Marcus Freeman and the Irish failed to end the program's championship drought, which has lasted since 1988, but the Irish seem well-positioned to remain in the College Football Playoff mix for the foreseeable future. This fall the Irish will have the luxury of a backfield featuring Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price to lead the offense, while new coordinator Chris Ash will look to retool the defense to keep the Irish a national contender. All the information to buy tickets later today is below.
New York Times
02-05-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
Notre Dame incoming freshman Dallas Golden maximizes his time and effort to play both ways
Dallas Golden arrives at Flex & Flow Fitness every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 5 a.m. For an athlete used to routines, the kind that helped grow him into a national prospect who signed with Notre Dame over offers from Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State and Georgia, this is simply the next one. The gym, located just south of the Tampa, Fla., airport, offers a stage for the former four-star prospect to play the part of an incoming freshman while still a senior at Berkeley Preparatory School. Golden may wish he could have done mid-year enrollment, but working out as the sun comes up in Florida will suffice for now. Golden will report to Notre Dame during the first full week of June, along with the 10 other incoming freshmen on the traditional summer schedule. 'Can't wait,' Golden said. 'So excited.' Notre Dame should be too, as it onboards an athlete with legitimate aspirations to play both ways. Golden has a stronger preference for jersey numbers — 'I want a single digit, hopefully No. 1 or No. 2' — than he does for positions. It's just not what you'd think. It's common for incoming freshmen to deflect when asked about their preferred position, basically falling in line with whatever gets them on the field fastest. And Golden does hope to play sooner rather than later. But instead of picking cornerback or receiver, he chooses and. Advertisement Basically, he wants to play both until someone tells him he can't. As a junior during Berkeley Prep's state championship season, Golden carried 205 times for 1,467 yards and 19 touchdowns to go with 32 catches for 394 yards and another five scores. On defense, he posted five picks. On special teams, he returned kicks and punts. A nagging foot injury limited Golden as a senior, to the point there was conversation about him shutting it down as Berkeley Prep struggled to defend its championship, stumbling to a 6-5 record. Golden kept playing. There were lessons there, too. 'We came into the season, we're gonna do it again, it's gonna be so easy. We found out real quick that it wasn't,' Golden said. 'You learn that being a leader plays a big role in how the team plays. You can't always be secluded. Sometimes you have to talk. Sometimes you have to make sure everyone is doing the right thing. 'I'm not gonna lie, I don't know if that's my natural personality. I'm more laid back. But sometimes you gotta be uncomfortable for the better.' Which is why Golden keeps showing up at Flex & Flow Fitness with his headlights on. Irish fans we on the way!☘️ Can't thank God enough!! @rasharddavis6 #GoIrish ☘️ — Dallas Golden (@DallasGolden8) March 18, 2025 When Golden arrives, he works with Jeremy Franklin, a trainer, former Florida State linebacker and longtime family friend. Golden and Franklin go back to youth football around Tampa, and Franklin has followed his career ever since. Golden already has a defensive backs trainer and sometimes gets wide receiver work via former Berkeley Prep star Nelson Agholor, who played at USC before a 10-year NFL career. And when it comes to old-fashioned conditioning, there's dad Pelham, who takes Dallas to run hills around Tampa on the weekends. Advertisement Franklin is here to help Golden get ready for the weight room more than the field, although mastering one probably gets him on the other. When Notre Dame sent its offseason workout program to Golden, he shared it with Franklin, whose goal is as much to get Golden stronger as make him more confident moving weight. Franklin went from walk-on to scholarship at Florida State. He understands there's only so much time the head strength coach can devote to a freshman. And there are only so many assistants, which can leave a freshman to follow the herd, ready or not. Does a freshman know how to do a three-position hang clean on Day 1? Some might try, just to keep up. 'You don't want to get in there and jerk it around because my teammates are doing it,' Franklin said. 'That's putting a band-aid on a bullet hole and you're gonna be hurt eventually.' Weight room technique is hardly the most interesting part of Golden's game, but it's something these morning sessions help get right. Considering he wants to be in Notre Dame's defensive back and wide receiver rooms at the same time, maximizing time makes sense. For Golden, it can get as technical as refining his squat, changing how he balances his feet in the rack. After doing an assessment, Franklin identified that Golden was putting too much weight on his heels, then adjusted his balance forward. Golden started to squat with more weight. 'It's watching the light go on. Do something foreign to him and then it clicks,' Franklin said. 'We did everything Notre Dame wanted him to do, plus more. He always asks for more.' That was Golden's reputation around Berkeley Prep, too. As a freshman, he tackled Arch Manning (Texas) and covered Jeremiah Smith (Ohio State). As a sophomore, he played wildcat quarterback when needed. The state championship came as a junior, including 183 yards rushing in the title win. And senior year turned into a test of leadership when the season started to go sideways. Advertisement 'As tremendously great as any young man I've coached,' said Berkeley Prep head coach Dominick Ciao, whose career included coaching Notre Dame's new general manager, Mike Martin, and former Irish tight end Gary Godsey. 'His humbleness, through all this, the power of him leading people, that's hard to do.' In barely one month, Golden will head to Notre Dame, not as the prospect who attended the 2024 home College Football Playoff game against Indiana or the one who returned for the spring game last month. He'll be taking the next step in his career, hoping everything leading to this point will have prepared him for it. From those 5 a.m. workouts to playing four years of varsity at Berkeley Prep, there's a good chance Golden will be as ready as any freshman could be. And with Notre Dame coming off a run to the national championship game with its growing reputation for developing top defensive backs, it's probably a good time for Golden to join, too. Unless he plays receiver, instead. But Notre Dame would welcome that just the same. 'They told me I could try both sides,' Golden said. 'Not just one. Do both, for sure. They want to get me on the field any way possible. Special teams, too.'
USA Today
26-04-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Notre Dame defensive lineman goes in fifth round of 2025 NFL Draft
Notre Dame defensive lineman goes in fifth round of 2025 NFL Draft Rylie Mills is headed to the Seattle Seahawks. Rylie Mills, a defensive lineman for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, is heading to the NFL. Mills has been picked by the Seattle Seahawks in the 2025 NFL draft. Mills is the fourth player chosen in the fifth round, and 142nd pick overall. The Lake Bluff, IL native had 7.5 sacks in 2024, and he had 37 tackles, 19 of which were solo. His five seasons in South Bend came to an end in the first round of the College Football Playoff against Indiana, when he suffered a knee injury. He likely fell a bit in the draft due to the injury, but Mills still has the chance to be a force in the NFL, especially if he's recovered fully. Congrats to Rylie Mills! Rylie Mills is a Seahawk With the 142nd overall pick in the 5th round, the @Seahawks select @ryliemills99 , defensive tackle, Notre Dame.#NFLDraft | #GoIrish☘️ — Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) April 26, 2025 Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on X (Formerly Twitter), and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions. Follow Tim on X: @tehealey
New York Times
12-04-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
CJ Carr shines in Notre Dame spring game, rising to the top of the QB competition
SOUTH BEND, Ind. – Marcus Freeman won't rush his quarterback decision. There's no point in microwaving the biggest decision Notre Dame's head coach will make before kickoff at Miami on Labor Day weekend. There's no upside in rushing judgment, potentially upending the quarterback room before the transfer portal opens next week, not when the competition among Steve Angeli, Kenny Minchey and CJ Carr can extend into training camp. Advertisement As the Blue-Gold Game showed on Saturday afternoon, Notre Dame has three quarterbacks who could start this season, the follow-up to that run to the national championship game. And all three could be good enough to keep the Irish in contention for a return to the College Football Playoff, considering the roster talent assembled. The Irish may have one of the nation's best offensive lines and top defensive backfields. It might have the nation's top running back. The linebacker and defensive-end rooms are CFP-level. It's just the quarterback position that has to get settled. 'It's crazy to think that you've got three guys that all can lead the program to a victory and be your starting quarterback,' Freeman said. 'So we'll evaluate it. We'll talk about it and have a discussion moving forward.' But the point of Notre Dame football these days is no longer 'lead the program to a victory' after last season's back-to-back wins over Georgia and Penn State before running aground against Ohio State. The point is to win the game Notre Dame lost on Jan. 20. And for one afternoon, at least, it was hard to look at Notre Dame's three quarterbacks and not see the one with potential that rises above the other two. Angeli and Minchey were good. Carr was better. Not so much better than Freeman can't keep a straight face while talking up a quarterback competition that will follow Notre Dame out of spring practice. But Carr is better enough that he suddenly feels a bit inevitable, if not on opening night against the Hurricanes, then at some point during what could be a return to the CFP. 1️⃣3️⃣ ➡️8️⃣5️⃣@13Cjcarr | @jacklarsen35 #GoIrish☘️ | @meijer — Notre Dame Football (@NDFootball) April 12, 2025 If spring game statistics mean anything, Carr went 14-of-19 for 170 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. Minchey went 6-of-14 for 106 yards and a rushing touchdown followed by a backflip. Angeli finished 8-of-11 for 108 yards and a touchdown while hitting his final six throws. All three quarterbacks looked like college starters. That doesn't mean they all looked the same. Advertisement 'I don't know where it's headed, but they're all doing really good things, and whoever it is, is going to do a good job,' said tight end Eli Raridon. 'They're all playing at a very high level. If I were to make a decision, I wouldn't know who to pick either. It's definitely a hard decision for (the coaches), and whoever it is will do a good job.' This is all new territory for Freeman, who didn't pretend to stage a quarterback competition last season when Riley Leonard arrived from Duke and then missed virtually all of spring practice. That competition was over before it started. It's different from two years ago, too, when Freeman insisted Wake Forest transfer Sam Hartman and Tyler Buchner were engaged in a quarterback competition exiting spring practice, which convinced no one, especially Buchner, who entered the portal roughly 72 hours after being out-classed by Hartman. The evidence for Carr is neither overwhelming nor complete. Notre Dame had just two open practices during spring ball. Carr was good in the first, including a walk-off touchdown to Elijah Burress. But the other two quarterbacks were good too. Carr was great Saturday, including a walk-off touchdown to Xavier Southall. Combined with Carr's practice showings last spring, when he flashed in both an open practice and the Blue-Gold Game, rising above the competition is now a habit. On Saturday, the sophomore feathered passes to tight ends Kevin Bauman and Jack Larsen, throwing both open when coverage said otherwise. Carr's accuracy means he doesn't have to take what the defense gives him as much as he can create space with his arm. If Angeli and Minchey can operate a passing game, it feels like Carr can conduct one. 'You would like to be able to kind of go into the fall with a two-quarterback battle. It's really hard with truly having a three-quarterback battle,' Freeman said. 'But we got to sit down and have conversations about what's best for our program, what's best for our quarterbacks, and we'll make those decisions in the future.' Advertisement There's little point in searching for verbal tells about how Freeman describes the competition, but that might as well be one. If Notre Dame were to cut the competition to two quarterbacks exiting spring practice, there is no world in which Carr is not part of the conversation. It's a harder call with Minchey and Angeli. 'We'll go back and watch, but it was a reflection of how the first 11 practices have been,' Freeman said. 'Those guys have been battling, they've all improved. They're all doing some really good things.' One just happens to be doing potentially great things, which changes the calculus on how Freeman wants to make this quarterback call. There's a world where Angeli is the safe pick, considering his experience against Penn State and his spot start in the Sun Bowl. That prior knowledge would never win the job on its own, but it could make him the comfortable pick on opening night. Little from Freeman's breakthrough season suggests he'll play it safe. Notre Dame marched to the national title game on the strength of fourth-down conversions, fake punts and lots of man-to-man defense that left the secondary without a safety net. Freeman wanted to build an aggressive mindset, demanding it in practice and calling it on game day. This is the same coach who wasn't scared to take an offensive line with six career starts and run it out at Kyle Field, benching two returning starters in camp because he believed in the younger talent despite its inexperience. Now Freeman might have to make a similar call, but it's got a lot more weight behind it than choosing an offensive guard. Angeli or Minchey could start the year, and the Irish would probably be just fine. But if Carr's performance on Saturday is any clue, he could turn Notre Dame's season into something bigger. No, Freeman doesn't need to rush this call. Even with the portal about to open, time appears to be on Notre Dame's side with Carr, Angeli and Minchey. But after Saturday's performance by Carr, it's difficult to look at the former national prospect and not see the flickers of a quarterback this program has been waiting on. Would it be a difficult decision to start a quarterback with four career snaps and zero career pass attempts at Miami? Of course. But choosing hard isn't just a catchphrase for Freeman. It's standard operating procedure. And after Saturday, a quarterback competition he's in no rush to decide took a step toward the kind of conclusion Freeman always knew could be possible.
