WATCH: Notre Dame football talk with Hyde, Goolsby and Singer
In a weekly YouTube live show, Blue & Gold’s Tim Hyde and Mike Singer discuss and react to the latest news and notes in the world of Notre Dame football and recruiting.
There’s a lot to discuss this week, as Irish head coach Marcus Freeman announced that junior tight end Mitchell Evans is out for the season with a torn ACL. How will Notre Dame replace him? What does this mean for the Irish? Singer and Hyde discuss that.
Former Irish captain and linebacker Mike Goolsby joins the show to discuss what Notre Dame should do at quarterback for the 2024 season as well.
It is not a show to miss for Fighting Irish fans. Watch it in the video player above!
The show begins Wednesday at 6:00 p.m. ET. If you are unable to watch it live, you can simply watch a replay in the video player at the top of the article.
Also, make sure to subscribe to the Blue & Gold YouTube channel for more video coverage of Fighting Irish football and recruiting.
Notre Dame ties highest College Football Playoff ranking of Marcus Freeman era
When the inaugural College Football Playoff rankings of 2022 came out around this time last year, Notre Dame was not in them. The Fighting Irish were 5-3 and just a couple weeks removed from a loss to a Stanford team that went on to finish with a 3-9 record.
This year, the situation is different.
Notre Dame is 7-2, and those two defeats came to unbeaten Ohio State and one-loss Louisville. As a result, the Irish tied the highest CFP ranking of the two-year Marcus Freeman era. His team came in at No. 15 in the first set of 2023 CFP rankings when they were announced Tuesday night.
The Irish rose as high as No. 15 in the CFP rankings in 2022. That was when they were 8-3 with five consecutive wins over UNLV, No. 16 Syracuse, No. 4 Clemson, Navy and Boston College. A regular season finale loss to USC dropped the Irish to No. 21 ahead of bowl season.
This year’s Notre Dame team has a really good shot at finishing in the top 10 come postseason time. If the Irish win out against a trio of teams with a combined record of 10-14, then they’ll end the regular season with a record of 10-2. Last year, the pre-conference championship week CFP rankings featured five teams with at least two losses in the top 10. When the Coaches Poll and Associated Press Poll dropped this past Sunday, Notre Dame was highest-ranked two-loss team in both sets of rankings.
