I genuinely get uncomfortable predicting the outcome of games that won’t be played any time soon because I have no idea about the health of certain players and haven’t dived as deep into opponents as I will when Notre Dame is set to play them that week. I’m not exactly flying blind, but it can feel a bit like that compared to how well I know the teams later on.
With all that being said, it is fun to do the old “Mike and the Mad Dog” look at the schedule and say win or loss each week for Notre Dame to determine how good they’ll be this season.
Spoiler alert: I’m predicting the Irish are going to continue to be very good.
They might not make the College Football Playoff this season, but I believe they’ll be in the conversation in November.
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See my longer explanation in our game picks, but I think it will ultimately come down to Ohio State having more playmakers despite Notre Dame being the more physical team. It’s a close game where OSU pulls away at the end with an explosive play.
Ohio State 38 Notre Dame 24
Bad news for Marshall who not only is expected to not have their top returning player, RB Rasheen Ali, who is currently away from the team indefinitely, but they’ll face the wrath of an angry Notre Dame team coming off a season opening loss.
Notre Dame 41 Marshall 6
Cal has been frisky at times with Justin Wilcox as their head coach. They’ve played pretty good defense and that has been their identity. They’ve been pretty lost on offense, though, and they haven’t recruited well enough on that side of the ball for that to change.
This game feels like one where fans should take the under.
Notre Dame 28 Cal 13
North Carolina showed some promise on offense with Drake Maye at quarterback in their week zero matchup, but offense hasn’t been their issue. They’ll rack up yards and points this season like they have with Phil Longo as their offensive coordinator.
It’s the defense that remains a question mark and I’m not buying Gene Chizik bringing any magic to an underachieving group. It feels like a BVG type of hire and one never wants to go full BVG.
Notre Dame 38 North Carolina 24
I think BYU is the third best team the Irish will play this fall. The offense has weapons and the defense, despite being bad last year, should be improved. If the game was in Provo, I might have even picked them to beat the Irish.
It’s not, though. It’s in Las Vegas and there are plenty of Notre Dame fans making that trip to the desert. Talent wins out with this one and Notre Dame wins a one score game.
Notre Dame 31 BYU 24
Until they prove otherwise, I’m going to assume Stanford is going to suck until they can prove they can play defense at a competent level and run block significantly better than they have in recent years. Tanner McKee is a good quarterback, but the talent around him isn’t going to scare anyone.
Notre Dame is going to win BIG.
Notre Dame 45 Stanford 17
UNLV might be one of the weaker teams in the country this year. This should be a game with a lot of freshmen seeing action.
Notre Dame 55 UNLV 10
This game being at Syracuse gives me a little bit of pause because they have pulled off some wild stuff there in the past, but they project to be one-dimensional on offense. Even if that one-dimension should be pretty good, RB Sean Tucker is a stud, that’s not going to fly against a good Notre Dame defense.
Cuse’s defense could present some issues as they should have NFL caliber talent at the second and third level. It won’t be enough for them to beat the Irish, though.
Notre Dame 34 Syracuse 16
Here’s the one that will get people talking. I know Notre Dame fans are going to be unhappy all year if they lose to Ohio State and this is the “prove it” game they’ll be waiting for. Marcus Freeman gets a break with this matchup being at home and in November.
There’s a lot of question marks about the Clemson offense going into the season and I think we may be seeing a freshman at quarterback by the time they visit South Bend. The defense is going to be nasty, but when hasn’t it been for Clemson? There will be a little less magic than that win in 2020, but having a full stadium will make it seem even better than that night.
Notre Dame 27 Clemson 20
Navy isn’t trending in the right direction and they have to replace too much experience this season for them to be as good as they have been during the Ken Niumatalolo era. Notre Dame will be too good and I wonder if this will be the end of an era at Navy.
Notre Dame 42 Navy 14
Phil Jurkovec is going to talk a lot before this game. He’s not going to be able to say much after it. He’s said too much already. Hopefully this game provides some closure for him.
Notre Dame 34 Boston College 17
This USC game is easily the most unpredictable on the schedule. They have 19 transfers in their two-deep and who knows how that experiment will work out for them or if they won’t be in a terrible spot by the time they get to the end of the regular season because of lack of depth.
The offense will be good no matter what happens during the year. The defense? My guess is they will be average to below average. That will ultimately make them a fringe top-25 team rather than a top-15 team.
Notre Dame 37 USC 31
Final record: 11-1 with wins over the ACC champ Clemson and a loss at Big Ten Champ Ohio State
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