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Andy Staples, Ari Wasserman: Notre Dame is a top 10 job in college football

IMG_9992by:Tyler Horka•05/07/25•

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NCAA Football: Orange Bowl-Notre Dame at Penn State
Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman celebrates defeating Penn State in the Orange bowl at Hard Rock Stadium. (Sam Navarro-Imagn Images)

On3’s Andy Staples and Ari Wasserman ranked the top 10 jobs in college football. They both had Notre Dame on their lists, but neither of them included the Fighting Irish in the top five.

Staples has ND at No. 6, and Wasserman slotted the Irish in at No. 9.

Staples and Wasserman concocted their lists based on the following guidelines:

  • Total support from the school in terms of resources and alignment between the athletic department and the president’s office.
  • A passionate (and preferably wealthy) fan/donor base.
  • A history of success plus a repeatable model of recent success. 
  • Proximity to excellent recruits.

Andy Staples’ top 10 jobs in college football

  1. Georgia
  2. Ohio State
  3. Texas
  4. Oregon
  5. LSU
  6. ND
  7. Alabama
  8. Michigan
  9. Clemson
  10. Penn State

Staples on ND: “This is a case where the flattening at the top of the sport has made a job better. In the superteam era, it would have been difficult to build a deep enough roster at Notre Dame to compete with the Alabamas and Ohio States. Notre Dame fishes from a smaller pool of academically qualified recruits, and while there has been a shift in recent years, an athlete who chooses Notre Dame still has to want a more traditional college experience as opposed to a football-factory lifestyle.

“But with talent spreading out more thanks to the Invisible Hand — a concept plenty of Notre Dame players probably studied in recent semesters — coach Marcus Freeman has been able to stock the roster to a point that the Fighting Irish can once again be a perennial national title contender. That is, of course, if the program is willing to spend on talent. And it is clear so far in the NIL era that Notre Dame is quite serious about that.”

Ari Wasserman’s top 10 jobs in college football

  1. Texas
  2. Georgia
  3. Ohio State
  4. Oregon
  5. Texas A&M
  6. LSU
  7. Alabama
  8. Michigan
  9. ND
  10. Oklahoma

Wasserman on ND: “Notre Dame would have been lower on this list in year’s past, but the Irish just proved last season that it can burst through the previous perceived ceiling. Though Notre Dame ultimately fell short in the national title game, the legendary program showed the world it could build a roster good enough to win postseason games. There is no question the culture of being a Notre Dame student is unique and not for everyone, but Notre Dame will pay NIL and cultivate an environment in the new world of college football that could produce a winner.

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