Where Notre Dame would be ranked in the latest Top 25 poll was a wild debate on Twitter overnight, with Texas A&M fans and media making the case for the Aggies to jump the Irish after their win over LSU. When the rankings were released this afternoon, though, the Irish vaulted back into the top-10 all the way to #8, while the Aggies checked in two spots below the team that beat them by 10 on their own field to start the season.
Notre Dame has stayed relatively steady in the rankings the last few weeks after stacking blowout wins over Stanford and Georgia Tech. The Irish blew out another team on Saturday, except this time it was #24 Navy, which had previously been unbeaten. Notre Dame’s latest blowout was enough for voters to realize that maybe the Irish are just good and that their week 2 loss to NIU was more of a fluke than anything else.
Notre Dame’s 51-14 win over Navy gives the Irish a six-game winning streak, during which they win by an average score of 44-11. The only victory that has been remotely contested was their 24-17 win over Louisville.
The Irish moved from 12th last week, when they were left entirely off of one voter’s ballot “by mistake” – up four spots, jumping over Iowa State, BYU, and Clemson in addition to LSU after “Big Game Brian”‘s latest meltdown on the big stage for LSU.
Texas A&M, meanwhile, moved from 14th last week to #10 with their win over the Tigers. Many media folks spent a lot of their 144 characters on Twitter making the case for Texas A&M to jump Notre Dame as well, even though the Irish walked into Kyle Field in week 1 and won by 10. Apparently, all their win did was validate to some that the Irish are a good team.
The only future Notre Dame opponent ranked at the moment is Army at #21. The Irish face the Black Knights in Yankee Stadium next month. Navy still collected a few votes and likely can sneak back into the top 25 if they win out. Louisville is on the cusp of the top 25 again, too, at #30.
With the Irish idle next week, they should stay in the top 10 in the AP Poll heading into the first release of the college football playoff rankings a week from Tuesday. Notre Dame is back in action in two weeks when they host Florida State, who fell to a shocking 1-7 record on the season following a loss to Miami on Saturday.
Notre Dame should win out and if they do they will more than likely get a home playoff game. If they can’t run the table then they don’t get shit.
FSU is toughest opponent left on schedule. They will come out w/ hair on fire when we face them on 11/9. Plenty of great athletes, hungry to salvage a horrible season and a very decent defense. ND better be prepared for an ambush.
ND 28 FSU 27
The toughest game left BY FAR is USC to end the season, so many seasons & dreams have been lost there.
Sure seems like an upgrade in coaching. Not to the promised land yet.
But Top 10 Freeman sure looks better than Top 20 Kelly.
Plus Freeman respects Notre Dame. Kelly ran a business with Notre Dame merely as his brand.
Notre Dame is not a football team. Notre Dame is an institution with values not often shared among the schools of the FBS.
Indeed.
You can get a great college education even at the football factories.
The difference is ND demands it; many of the others leave it as an option for their athletes – which does limit NDs recruiting pool, making Freeman’s top ten classes the last two years even more impressive.