The road to the College Football Playoff wasn’t smooth for Notre Dame.
The Fighting Irish, led by quarterback Riley Leonard and head coach Marcus Freeman, endured a costly early-season stumble that nearly derailed their championship aspirations.
It’s still hard to believe that Northern Illinois was able to leave South Bend with a shocking victory over the Irish.
The loss cast doubt over Notre Dame’s playoff chances and left fans questioning if the team could bounce back.
But a powerful message from Freeman in the aftermath of the game proved to be the spark the Irish needed to recover.
Speaking to NBC Sports, Leonard reflected on how Freeman’s perspective transformed his mindset. Surprisingly, the star quarterback admitted he eventually became “thankful” for the heartbreaking loss – an outlook shared by his coach.
“It’s hard for me to even say I’m thankful for it, but I am,” Leonard said. “(Coach) said he was thankful for, in the previous years, similar losses, that they’ve (helped him grow) as a person. And I just sat there like, ‘Dude, there’s no way. There’s no way I’m ever going to say that.’ But here we are.”
Freeman’s words didn’t just resonate in the locker room; they fueled the Irish’s playoff push. Leonard revealed the rallying cry that Freeman instilled in the team after the loss.
“It drove us the rest of the year. (Freeman) always said to ‘keep the pain’ before every game. He said, ‘Keep that pain, because you don’t want to have that feeling again,’” Leonard said.
That mentality propelled Notre Dame to an extraordinary turnaround, culminating in a well-deserved College Football Playoff berth.
The Irish enter as the No. 7 seed and face a familiar foe in tonight’s opening round: the in-state Indiana Hoosiers.
For Leonard, the stakes of this showdown go beyond football. The matchup between Indiana’s two largest universities carries special meaning for the state.
“It’s huge for the state of Indiana – we’ve been talking about it becoming a football state,” Leonard said. “It’s notorious for basketball, for obvious reasons.”
Now, the Fighting Irish and the Hoosiers are set to clash in South Bend, each with hopes of claiming the National Championship.
Under the new playoff format, the phrase “survive and advance” takes on a whole new significance in the football realm.
The winner of Notre Dame vs. Indiana will advance to face No. 2 seed Georgia on New Year’s Day. (The Bulldogs will be without starting quarterback Carson Beck in that matchup.)
While Freeman’s message served as a motivational rallying cry for Leonard and company, Irish fans are longing for the day when shocking upset losses aren’t needed to serve as a “wakeup call.”
All due respect to Freeman, but these types of losses seem to be a yearly occurrence under his watch.
But hey, none of that matters now. Fresh off signing a well-deserved contract extension, Freeman will look to lead the Irish to victory tonight in frigid (and possibly snowy) South Bend.
What are your thoughts on tonight’s matchup? … Should the Irish be viewed as legitimate national title contenders???
