WR Jaden Greathouse Confident Notre Dame Will Bounce Back vs. Texas A&M

The old saying goes that teams make their biggest jump from week one to week two.

No. 8 Notre Dame will need that to be true on Saturday night as No. 16 Texas A&M comes to South Bend. After a bye week, the Irish are still searching for their first win.

Junior receiver Jaden Greathouse believes the Irish made positive strides over the last two weeks of practice and will be ready to go on Saturday evening. 

“I think our urgency,” Greathouse said of where the team is better. “Top-10 matchup week one, it can go either way. Obviously, it didn’t go in our favor, but that doesn’t mean that we’re not the team that we don’t think we are, and that doesn’t mean that we can’t get to where we still want to be. All that starts with coming off the bye week and getting straight to it.”

The bye week served as an opportunity for Notre Dame to take its anger out on each other on the practice field, but also the offense made sure to clean up a few details. 

“We’re putting in a ton of work during the bye week and getting some of that frustration out,” stated Greathouse. “This year, making sure that we’re really fine-tuned in all of our details and making sure that we’re urgent and trying to be efficient and moving fast and things like that. That way, on Saturday, we can really get revenge.” 

Yes, it’s safe to say there is pressure on Notre Dame entering the Texas A&M game, as a 0-2 start would be far from ideal. 

The good news is there is always pressure on Notre Dame, so this week hasn’t felt too different as the Irish have focused on themselves. 

“We’re not worried about what the other team has, what they’re doing,” stated Greathouse. “It’s always been about us. We know that when we reach our full potential as a team, we’re the best team in the country and there’s nobody that can stop us. So just being focused on trying to get to that point and continually improve every single day across the board, across the position groups, across the coaches, all those kinds of things.

“It’s gonna take all of us to get back to where we wanted to be last year, so we just gotta continue to get better each and every single day.” 

Notre Dame quarterback CJ Carr didn’t magically gain a ton of experience since the Miami game, but it’s a safe bet the Irish offense will look to open up the playbook a little more. 

“Moving a lot faster, moving a lot more efficiently and having much more of an attack mindset from out the gate,” Greathouse said of what to expect from the offense. “Starting fast and making sure that we put our foot on their throats from the beginning.” 

Greathouse has an extreme amount of confidence in Carr and that’s due to the body of work the Michigan native has put in since he arrived on campus last year. 

“He’s been a great leader ever since he got here,” explained Greathouse. “He definitely has the arm talent and all the football traits and everything like that, but he’s just as good a guy off the field and really works hard and tries to push everybody every single day. That’s what you want out of your quarterback, and those are usually the guys that succeed the most.” 

The Texas native will also look to get back on the stat sheet this weekend. Greathouse was held without a catch against Miami, but he and the offense have moved past it. 

“Sometimes you also need to sit with that pain and kind of understand it and really feel it to make sure that you come back even stronger and have even more of an edge than we already have and push ourselves,” said Greathouse. “We’ve had that time off, we’ve worked really hard throughout the bye week and really pushed ourselves and got to have a nice long weekend and now we’re right back to it.

“We’ve been on the other side of losing a big game that you thought you should’ve won and then having to go back and play the next week. But it’s been nice to have a little time off and I'm ready to get back to it.” 

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