Why Notre Dame can’t afford to miss the 12-team playoff

Notre Dame is one of those teams that should benefit the most from an expanded playoff. That makes it all the more important for them to start earning berths in it as early as this season.

Tyler Horka of Blue and Gold spoke with Kaiden Smith on the ‘On3 Roundtable’ about the urgency of a selection in the College Football Playoff for the Fighting Irish. He said it’s a major talking point for the program considering the chance that the expansion provides them.

“Oh, it’s huge,” said Horka. “You might not get it from Marcus Freeman, (Mike) Denbrock, or maybe even some of the players but the media knows, the fans know. If you’re Notre Dame, you can’t afford to miss a 12-team playoff because that’s eight more opportunities to get into this thing than there were before.”

“All you have to do if you’re Notre Dame is play up to your potential and I think you’re in this College Football Playoff,” Horka said.

It’s even more imperative because this is what Notre Dame signed on for with the new playoff agreement. A dozen spots gives them one of seven seeds to contend for as an independent but major program. That leaves it up to them to capitalize on that format.

“Notre Dame does have the unique situation of not being in a conference and not being able to earn one of those top-four seeds but you have to remember that Jack Swarbrick, the former athletic director that just gave way to Pete Bevacqua earlier this year, was in the room with the people who devised this new College Football Playoff format,” noted Horka. “The athletic director at Notre Dame knew that that would be the case and he was fine with that because, if Notre Dame goes 11-1 this season, you’re looking at a home playoff game in December, maybe a snowy South Bend for some team to walk into.”

However, this makes it to where Notre Dame has to have a double-digit win regular season, especially based on recent history, as they won’t be adding a conference title to their resumé.

“Now, there is the possibility that Notre Dame misses the playoff entirely at 10-2. That’s where not having a conference championship game might hurt you if you’re the Irish,” said Horka. “We’ve seen it as recently as 2021 – Brian Kelly’s last season in South Bend. The Irish went 11-1 and were a good team, a Top-10 team pretty much the entire season but that one loss was enough to keep them out of the College Football Playoff. They finished at number five in the final rankings.”

As for 2024, though, Horka thinks it’s going to have be a 12-0 or 11-1 finish for Notre Dame. Even a 10-2 record would leave things up for discussion in his opinion due to the schedule. That makes all of their dozen games, most notably the opener in College Station against Texas A&M, an important one.

“If you go 10-2 this season against this schedule that I just talked about, which is not very good? Maybe you lose two really hard-fought games against ranked teams – Texas A&M and Florida State or USC? Teams lose and they still get into the College Football Playoff. That’s a thing. But, if you’re Notre Dame and you don’t have those marquee victories to back up your resumé with? Then you’re talking about a Notre Dame team that might be 10-2 at sitting at No. 13, 14, 15 in the rankings and out of this thing,” admitted Horka. “I think 11-1 is the goal.”

“That’s the scary part about the Texas A&M game. If 11-1 is your goal and somehow you go down there and just can’t get the job done in a hostile environment? You’re talking about running the table thereafter. I know the schedule isn’t very difficult but you have no margin for error at that point,” Horka explained. “You have the foundation set for a 5-0, 6-0 start – whatever it is – leading into that Florida State game in November. I think they will have played seven or eight games by that point. That’s when you’re talking, okay, we have that margin for error now. It all starts with Texas A&M.”

Notre Dame made two playoff appearances in the four-team era and would have made two more in this expanded one. They would have been unable to do so in either of Freeman’s seasons with them going 9-4 and 10-3 respectively.

The path is a straightforward one for Notre Dame at this point in regards to the College Football Playoff. For them, it’s as simple as finishing with 10-plus wins if not more. You’re then at the very least in the discussion you need to be in to be able to contend.

“I do think the Irish are in a really good position to maybe go 11-1,” said Horka. “10-2 would be a little dicey in terms of making it in. But, I mean, that’s kind of what this team is looking at. They’re looking at a double-digit regular season victory total.”