Notre Dame Fighting Irish release 2022 football schedule

Notre Dame hasn’t played its bowl game and its new coach hasn’t coached his first game yet. But the Fighting Irish released their 2022 schedule Tuesday morning.

The season opener will be full of storylines. Notre Dame is traveling to Ohio State — which happens to be where new Fighting Irish coach Marcus Freeman played — on Sept 3. As if Notre Dame at Ohio State wasn’t a big enough game already.

Other marquee games include the Shamrock Series against BYU in Las Vegas, home showdowns with Clemson and Boston College and the season finale against USC.

Here’s the Fighting Irish’s full 2022 schedule:

Sept. 3 at Ohio State

Sept. 10 vs. Marshall

Sept. 17 vs. Cal

Sept. 24 at North Carolina

Oct. 8 vs. BYU (Shamrock Series — game played in Las Vegas)

Oct. 15 vs. Stanford

Oct. 22 vs. UNLV

Oct. 29 at Syracuse

Nov. 5 vs. Clemson

Nov. 12 at Navy (game played in Baltimore)

Nov. 19 at Boston College

Nov. 26 at USC

That’s quite a first schedule for Freeman, who officially took over as Notre Dame coach this week. Starting out against his alma mater should make for quite the story.

Freeman will coach his first game on New Year’s Day when the Fighting Irish take on Oklahoma State in the Fiesta Bowl.

Marcus Freeman shares why he picked Ohio State over Notre Dame in recruitment

According to On3’s recruiting database, Marcus Freeman had a scholarship offer from Notre Dame out of high school. But the new Notre Dame head coach decided to go to Ohio State — and told Dan Patrick the Fighting Irish were a serious option.

Freeman was named Notre Dame’s new head coach last week and was introduced on Monday. It’s his first head coaching job after working his way up from Ohio State graduate assistant under Jim Tressel to Notre Dame defensive coordinator under Brian Kelly.

He was a two-time second team All-Big Ten nominee as a linebacker at Ohio State and went in the fifth round of the 2005 NFL Draft. But, as it turns out, he almost didn’t end up in Columbus.

In fact, he came really close to playing in South Bend.

“It came down to, actually, Ohio State and Notre Dame,” Freeman told Patrick. “I really liked Tyrone Willingham, who was the head coach at that time. Ultimately, I chose Ohio State and I told our AD, “I don’t want to make the same mistake twice.'”

Just imagine how different things would be if he chose the Fighting Irish back then.