What Notre Dame's upset loss to NIU means for Marcus Freeman
Notre Dame was stunned by Northern Illinois in Week 2, leading many to question how the Fighting Irish will be able to claw their way back into College Football Playoff contention this season.
The loss marks the second time that third-year head coach Marcus Freeman has lost to a Group of Five team, having fallen to Marshall during his first year guiding the program in 2022. BlueAndGold.com’s Tyler Horka joined Kaiden Smith at the On3 Roundtable to explain what this means for Freeman’s legacy in South Bend.
“It’s a tough look when you line up for a 62-yard field goal on your home field to try to beat a MAC team,” Horka told Smith. “That was obviously the culmination of a lot of different things in this game. Marcus Freeman burned a time out earlier in the third quarter. That would have been useful on defense late in the game when you’re trying to prevent NIU from kicking, ultimately, that game winning field goal. There are so many moments that you point to that you say, ‘Oh man, it’s happening all over again.’
“To your point, the Marshall game, the Stanford game … So it’s bad precedence when you look at the Marcus Freeman era, that there’s things that are happening over and over again that shouldn’t happen even one time.”
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Overall, Freeman is 20-9 as he continues his third year as head coach of Notre Dame. This began with an 0-2 start after the Irish lost to both Ohio State and the Thundering Herd, but managed to lead his squad to victory in eight of the next 10 games, finishing the season ranked No. 19.
He coached the team to his first 10-win season as a head coach, but losses to Ohio State, Louisville and Clemson held them out of playoff conversations. Heading into 2024, it appeared as though Freeman had built his best team to date but that has since come into question following the NIU loss.
“It’s an indictment on Marcus Freeman’s tenure so far,” Horka continued. “But look that’s — and he said it in his press conference. That’s football. Because a week ago at this time, they were on top of the world. They just beat Texas A&M, No. 20 team in the country, in front 107,000 people. You come home and lose in front of your own fans. That’s football.
“But you’re you’re able to avoid these things if you can help it. I look at Penn State pulling it out against Bowling Green, or Oregon, late. … So to my larger point though, you can avoid those things and Notre Dame hasn’t been able to avoid those things, and that’s going down a bad path.”
Notre Dame will look to steer itself back onto the tracks this weekend on the road against Purdue. Kickoff is set for 3:30 p.m. ET live on CBS.