It's not too soon to start asking questions about Marcus Freeman at Notre Dame

Notre Dame entered the 2022 season as a Top 5 team with effervescent excitement around a fresh, new, chic head coach. 

Only, six games into the Marcus Freeman era, the furor has totally fizzled, as Year 1 looks a lot like a Year 0. And that’s not the way this was supposed to play out.

The debut season for the first-year Fighting Irish head coach is already in crisis mode after Notre Dame was upset at home by a pitiful Stanford team Saturday. Its three-game winning streak looks like nothing more than a mirage.

The Irish looked listless against a hapless Cardinal squad that had lost 11 straight FBS games and was without four starting offensive linemen and its best playmaker. The Irish lost the turnover battle to the nation’s worst team in turnover margin. They gained just 300 yards against a Stanford defense that had hemorrhaged chunk gains all season. 

It was really bad, even worse than losing to a Sun Belt team in Notre Dame Stadium that has no other FBS wins this season. 

But since the loss to Marshall and Saturday’s no-show versus Stanford both happened in the same season, it’s not too soon to ask some real questions about Marcus Freeman at Notre Dame. 

“So we’ve got to swallow this pill and get our heads back up, which we will. I might be the worst one, but you know what, I’m going to the competitive side of things,” Freeman said after Notre Dame moved to 3-3 in his first season as head coach. 

“We’re going to watch it. We’re going to get it fixed with this group of guys. And we’ll be all right. We’re going to figure it out.”

Are we sure about that?

It’s not a surprise that Marcus Freeman has looked over his head as a first-time head coach. Most do. A Year 1 learning curve was baked into the expectations, especially after what we saw from Freeman looking uncomfortable on the sidelines in the Fiesta Bowl.

But Freeman wasn’t supposed to be drowning six games into his official tenure. He wasnt supposed to look constantly bewildered.

THE MARCUS FREEMAN ERA IS OFF TO AN INAUSPICIOUS START

When Brian Kelly bolted for LSU, Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick moved swiftly to promote Freeman, then the Irish’s popular defensive coordinator, to the big chair. 

Suddenly, Notre Dame was cool.

The Irish released a raucous hype video when Freeman announced the news to his players. Freeman convinced former Notre Dame quarterback Tommy Rees to remain as OC rather than follow Kelly to Baton Rouge. He connected with former Irish players and immediately delivered on his reputation as a top-flight recruiter, building an impressive 2023 class over the summer. 

Notre Dame landed another stud on Saturday, too, as 4-star tailback Jeremiyah Love committed to the Irish over Texas A&M. 

But the best thing happening around Notre Dame football on fall Saturdays against Stanford shouldn’t be about a future prospect. 

This was not supposed to be a hopeless season. The Irish entered the season with far too much momentum for that.

Brian Kelly did not leave Marcus Freeman with a quarterback, but the rest of the program’s infrastructure and roster was in place to win now. 

Freeman was billed as the guy who could elevate Notre Dame to even greater heights. He wasn’t expected to compete for a national title right away, but a standard had been established in South Bend.

Kelly may be an ornery SOB, but he didn’t lose to bad teams. Even mediocre ones.

In Kelly’s final five seasons at Notre Dame, the Irish made the College Football Playoffs two times and lost just nine games total — all to Top 25 teams. 

Since 2017, they lost in Notre Dame Stadium twice. 

Now Freeman, 3-4 as a head coach, is looking at a Year 1 where the Irish are complete afterthoughts in the national picture. Likely underdogs against Syracuse, Clemson and USC, they’ll need to sweep the rest of their schedule just to make a bowl game. That’s not a disappointment. It’s a disaster.

After losing to Stanford, Freeman lamented a lack of “execution” some 20-odd times. He defended Rees, whose offense has failed to score a first quarter touchdown all season, and his players, who he said “practiced their tails off all week.”

“Guys, it’s not a call,” Freeman said, backing Rees. 

“It’s not, ‘He should have called this.’ They have a call sheet and they call the plays that are on there.

“We have to say, ‘What are we executing? What aren’t we executing?’ That’s on me. My challenge is to make sure we’re calling the things we’re executing. If we’re calling things we’re not executing, we’ve got to figure out why.”

Well, thus far, Freeman has had no answers to the very questions he’s asking. In fact, far too often this season, NBC’s cameras flash to Freeman on the sidelines with a blank, deer-in-the-headlights stare.

Outside of a strong showing against a pitiful North Carolina, Notre Dame’s offense doesn’t seem to have any identity or plan. They look slow and poorly coached, too. 

Defensively, Freeman plucked Al Golden away from the NFL to be his DC, but the Irish can’t force a turnover (just one all season) or get stops in the red zone (129th nationally, as dead-last). 

Add it all up, and you’d think Freeman took over a program with a cracked foundation and asbestos in the walls. 

Only, he didn’t. And that’s what’s so alarming. 

If Notre Dame’s practices are so good, why isn’t the effort translating to gamedays? If the plays and plans are there, why can’t the players execute?

Marcus Freeman isn’t in danger of being a one-and-done head coach, but he’s definitely facing a real crossroads way sooner than any anticipated. Freeman can’t “stay the course.” Staff changes look inevitable. 

“It’s frustrating. We’ve got to be better. We just got to be better. We’ll find a way. Trust me,” Freeman said.

“I can’t come up with a magic answer,” he also added. 

Well, he’d be best to find some soon.