Notre Dame football has No. 1 strength of schedule per Sports Reference
This isn’t one of those seasons in which people can confidently say, “Notre Dame doesn’t play a tough schedule.” Far from it. Through Week 5, Notre Dame had the No. 1 strength of schedule among all 131 FBS teams per Sports Reference.
There were five opponents on the 2022 Notre Dame football schedule appearing in the most recent Associated Press Top 25 Poll. The last time Notre Dame played five teams that were ranked at the time of the Irish matching up with them was 2017. Notre Dame played six ranked teams that year, including No. 16 LSU in the Citrus Bowl.
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It’s going to be tough for Notre Dame to reach half a dozen ranked opponents in 2022. The Irish already played then-No. 2 Ohio State (5-0) in the season opener. They play No. 16 BYU (4-1) this weekend in the Shamrock Series game in Las Vegas. But the next ranked team on the schedule is No. 22 Syracuse (5-0), and the Orange have to play No. 14 NC State (4-1) and No. 5 Clemson (5-0) before hosting the Irish on Oct. 29.
On the topic of Clemson — it’d be disastrous for the Tigers if they somehow fell out of the polls by the time they trek to South Bend for a game at Notre Dame Stadium on Nov. 5. At this rate, the same goes for No. 6 USC (5-0) for when the Trojans host the Irish on Nov. 26.
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So, even if BYU falls out of the polls by the end of the season and Syracuse is not ranked at the end of the month, Notre Dame will have almost assuredly played at least four ranked teams at the time of kickoff. That’s one more than all of 2022 including the Fiesta Bowl against No. 9 Oklahoma State.
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Notre Dame last played four ranked teams at the time of kickoff in 2020, and two of those games were against Clemson — once in a regular season ACC game and once more in the ACC Championship Game. There was a game against No. 25 North Carolina sandwiched in there too. Then Notre Dame played No. 1 Alabama in a College Football Playoff semifinal matchup.
All of that to say this: Notre Dame has a tough schedule in 2022. Adjust your judgements of first-year head coach Marcus Freeman accordingly.
Toughest 2022 Sports Reference strength of schedule metrics through Week 5
| Rank | Team | SOS* | Record |
| 1 | Notre Dame | 9.87 | 2-2 |
| 2 | Colorado | 9.08 | 0-5 |
| 3 | Houston | 8.77 | 2-3 |
| 4 | Texas | 8.04 | 3-2 |
| 5 | Texas Tech | 7.05 | 3-2 |
| 6 | Stanford | 6.73 | 1-3 |
| 7 | Georgia Tech | 6.49 | 2-3 |
| 8 | Mississippi State | 5.53 | 4-1 |
| 9 | Auburn | 5.27 | 3-2 |
| 10 | Louisiana-Monroe | 5.25 | 2-3 |
• The last time the Irish finished with a SOS rating as high as its current figure of 9.87 was in 1985 with a mark of 10.38. The current number will fluctuate depending on how the Irish’s opponents fare week to week.
• The highest SOS during the Brian Kelly era (2010-21) was 8.94 in 2017. The Irish went 10-3 that year with losses to No. 15 Georgia, No. 7 Miami and No. 20 Stanford.
