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EA Sports ranks Notre Dame, Notre Dame Stadium as No. 21 in Toughest Places to Play rankings

On3 imageby:Sam Gillenwater06/25/24

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Where EA Sports' Toughest Home Environments gets it WRONG

Notre Dame is home to some of the richest history in all of college football. That includes their venue that now has one of the better field advantages in the entire sport.

EA College Football 25 ranked Notre Dame Stadium at No. 21 in their Toughest Places to Play. That’s due to how they factored in historical stats such as home winning percentage, home game attendance, active home winning streaks, team prestige, and more.

Notre Dame Stadium was built in 1930. That has this fall being its 94th being in use for the Fighting Irish. Since then, they’ve played 449 games there with the teams posting a record of 335-109-5 (.752)

The space underwent development in 1997 and then again two decades later in 2017.

With those efforts, the program’s games can now hold a capacity crowd nearly 81,000. Beforehand, they could only hold around 59,000 but the $50 million expansion added over 21,000 seats.

Notre Dame Stadium came to be in the penulimate season under Knute Rockne. He got to coach for one season there after working his first dozen years there at Cartier Field. However, many of his touches on the initial designs, including those of the original engineers, remain today.

The field also has a certain divine feel imbued in it with the sight of Touchdown Jesus. An on-campus library has a mural, which it titled ‘Word of Life’, that reflects Christ himself in the company of some of the greatest minds of his time. However, it eventually caught on as a symbol for football games in 1964 with just Jesus being visible from the south half of the stadium and the western press box. It’s less noticeable now following the renovations but remains a memorable part of a game day at Notre Dame.

Notre Dame remains as independent as ever entering this new era of the sport. They’re just fine with that too inside the confines of a home field that now ranks among the best in the nation at EA.

EA Sports College Football 25 releases breakdown of gameplay

College football fans are getting an in-depth gameplay breakdown of the heavily anticipated EA Sports College Football 25 video game on Friday.

The breakdown focused on the new in-game feature called “CampusIQ” including the “Wear & Tear System”. ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit narrated the breakdown.

Per EA, “As the hits add up, players wear down with the Wear & Tear System. Manage your players’ health, limit fatigue, assess the risk of injury and avoid on-field mistakes by using strategic substitutions to ensure your players are at their best with it counts the most.”

Mental and player abilities will also be included in the game, specifically made for veterans in the game. Players can have up to eight abilities with different levels to achieve. The breakdown also included a revamped passing game.

Home-field advantage is also back. Players can test their squad’s road game composure and confidence levels with distractions like screen shaking, missing pre-play icons and moving play art.

The franchise has been dormant for more than a decade and is slated to be released on July 19. Available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, EA announced gamers will have three editions. The standard base game costs $69.99. The deluxe edition allows three-day early access and a slew of perks, priced at $99.99. The MVP bundle is priced at $149.99 and includes an early release for EA Sports College Football 25 and Madden. The video game will not be offered on PC.