Can anybody really disagree with Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua calling the spectacle leading up to the College Football Playoff announcement a “farce”?
Then, why would anybody assume Notre Dame would participate in another system orchestrated by those in charge of such a farce?
Notre Dame didn’t decline an invitation to the historic Pop-Tarts Bowl because it was left out of the College Football Playoff. No, the Irish withdrew their name from all bowl considerations because of the way the process was run.
Notre Dame was used as a pawn during the weeks leading up to the College Football Playoff Selection Show.
The Irish were included in the projected field in every week of ESPN’s College Football Playoff Rankings Show until the one that mattered and were bounced from the bracket despite nothing changing between themselves and Miami.
“There is no explanation that could possibly be given to explain the outcome,” Bevacqua told Ross Dellenger of Yahoo! Sports. “As I said to Marcus (Freeman), one thing is for sure: Any rankings or show prior to this last one is an absolute joke and a waste of time. Why put these young student-athletes through these false emotions just to pull the rug out from underneath them having not played a game in two weeks and then a group of people in a room shatter their dreams without explanation?
“We feel like The Playoff was stolen from our student-athletes.”
Still, the result didn’t sting as much as the process.
“Every step along the way since the first CFP Rankings came out, we were led to believe we were in as long as we took care of business and we certainly took care of business,” Bevacqua told Dan Patrick on Monday. “You think about that first ranking, we and Miami were both 6-2, they had obviously already beat us the first game of the year, they were 18th, we were 10th.
“The only thing we did since that point was win every game by an average of 30 points and all of a sudden, we’re 11th and on the outside looking in…We’re just really frustrated that we had the rug pulled out underneath us.”
Had the Irish known they were on the outside looking in all along, they would have surely been disappointed, but would they have felt used? Nope.
Had Miami been ranked above Notre Dame for weeks leading into the Selection Show would the Irish have bowed out of bowl consideration? Probably not.
“I get why people think it’s sour grapes,” Bevacqua said. “It’s disappointment. We take this seriously, as do other universities.
“The rankings can’t just be musical chairs at some fifth-grade birthday party. They have to mean something. And to me, what happened to us really kind of was alarming.”
The Irish were used to create maximum drama for ESPN’s season finale and simply decided they were done playing those games.
And when I say “Irish,” I mean the players.
The first words of Notre Dame’s announcement declining any bowls were “As a team...”
In reality, the 2025 Notre Dame Football Team’s season ended the moment it was left out of the College Football Playoff. We live in an era now where players are free to make the best decisions for themselves regarding their futures - be it in the NFL, the Transfer Portal or wherever - once the regular season is finished and there is no title to play for.
Who could blame Jeremiyah Love for deciding not to jeopardize his NFL future and generational wealth to play in the Pop-Tarts Bowl? I think everyone would agree Love has done more than enough for the Irish football program and the University during his time in South Bend.
Any team Notre Dame put on the field for a bowl game wasn’t going to be a version of the 2025 Irish squad. It would have been an odd merger of past, present and future that would exist solely for that one game.
“To a person, the captains and some of the underclassmen on the team said, ‘Listen, we are such a close-knit team,’” Bevacqua relayed on The Dan Patrick Show. “‘We’ve done so much this season. We overcame those two opening losses, we rallied, we dominated in the last 10 games. We can’t imagine taking the field not as that team.’”
The idea that the Irish would have a chance to prove themselves against BYU, another team that feels it was wronged by the Committee, would be laughable if it wasn’t so dumb.
The suspension of reality by some who are making that argument is astounding.
With some, it’s just plain ignorance, a sign that they have no understanding of what College Football is today and an easy cue to exit any further debate. But with others, that ignorance is obviously willful; people for whom discussing College Football is literally their livelihood pretending that a Notre Dame-BYU matchup in the Pop-Tarts Bowl would be some meaningful opportunity for the Irish to show the Committee it was wrong.
I’d make the argument that those who know that’s untrue pretending otherwise provides just as clear a cue to exit that conversation as well.
And those griping that Notre Dame’s decision is going to dismantle the entire bowl structure are the same ones who were perfectly OK with the idea of leaving Alabama in the field because keeping the Tide out would be the beginning of the end of conference championship games.
Well, if one team opting out of one game - the freaking Pop-Tarts Bowl again, by the way, - is going to bring a whole structure crumbling down, there is probably something really rotten in the foundation of said structure.
And for those Notre Dame fans who are upset about the decision because they believe the Irish would benefit from playing in the game and the bowl practices that lead up to it, I get that.
Rest assured, though, Marcus Freeman gets that as well.
Freeman has proven he has the pulse of his team and he knows what’s best for its ultimate pursuit and that lone pursuit has never been more clear than it is today.
The statement that began with “As a team…” ended by reminding everybody of that goal:
“...to bring the 12th national title to South Bend in 2026.”
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