Marcus Freeman gives Notre Dame's mindset for Army: 'This is the Super Bowl'

Notre Dame has run some interesting special teams fakes this season, including last week against Virginia when a Jordan Faison 73-yard scoring run was called back due to an illegal formation penalty.

Some might wonder about Marcus Freeman emptying the bag of tricks right before the biggest game of the year, a showdown with unbeaten Army. Not Freeman.

He wants his players ready to empty the clip at every turn.

“I want our players to have that mindset, man,” Freeman said. “If I told our players, ‘Hey, this is a great fake, we’re going to hold it for the last game of the year, we’re going to hold it for playoffs,’ what would I expect them to be as we get ready to play this game?

“Like this is the Super Bowl. This is the Super Bowl. This week versus Army — Yankee Stadium — is the Super Bowl. So if that means we’ve got to come up with a new fake then we will come up with a new fake. But I don’t ever, ever want to hold something back. It’s just a great challenge and guess what, we’ve got to come up with something better. And we have the coaches and the players to do that.”

In addition to last week’s fake against Virginia, Notre Dame also had a pair of fakes against Georgia Tech earlier this season. Both were successful.

Freeman praised special teams coordinator Marty Biagi for his special teams acumen.

“Yeah, Marty’s a creative mind. Sometimes I’ve got to reel him back and say, ‘Hold on Marty, we can’t do that,'” Freeman said. “But when Marty has conviction on something and is able to make me have conviction, let’s do it. And just like he has been with these last couple fakes.”

As for Saturday’s game itself, there are no illusions about what it means for the program. Notre Dame probably can’t sustain a second loss and make the College Football Playoff field. At the very least, it would be sweating it out all the way until Selection Sunday.

That’s why there’s no point in keeping anything in reserve for Freeman.

“I don’t ever want to be a program that holds back,” he said. “Like, all in. Every play, every game. And that’s a great challenge, because guess what? Now we’ve got to come up with another one. We’ve got to come up with another fake.”

Tune in on Saturday at 7 p.m. ET on NBC to see what Freeman, Biagi and Notre Dame come up with.