[Music] Welcome, welcome, welcome to the kickoff edition of the 2024 Notre Dame football season post-game show. I am Vince DiDario, that guy over there, that's Trevor O'Bridge, that guy down there, we are doing this like a Brady Bunch style, that guy down there is Sean Davis, that guy down there is Ryan Roberts, and the gang is all here, the boss man will be here a little bit later. Boys, I, look, these late night shows are a little bit easier to digest when we have a final drive the way Notre Dame had a final drive, okay. So, the only thing I've ever seen in this game, I've seen in this game is when Notre Dame wins this game, 23 to 13, they get the double digit win. I've been telling people for weeks, Notre Dame is going to win this thing by double digits. Not exactly how I saw it going down though, not going to lie to you, but I mean, look, there were mistakes, there were good things, there were bad things, most of the mistakes are correctable, you know, and we'll get into the details and all of those things, but a huge first win for Notre Dame is the, everything everybody's been saying, right, they were the road dog, you know, coming into this game, right? They were not favored to win this game. It was a plus three, pretty much all the way around once the ball was finally put in the air, and they went down there, won by double digits. I mean, no matter, you know, Notre Dame is seven, Texas A&M 20, you know, all of these different things, we all thought that Notre Dame should win this game, no doubt about it, but it was looking hairy there for quite a while, but they ended up doing their thing. The way we're going to do the post game show this year, boys, is we're going to kind of, when we kick this thing off, everybody's going to kind of get a chance to just air it out. And so that's what we're going to start this thing off with. And I'm going to, I'm going to let the rook start it off Trevor, because, you know, we're going to have a long show because that's what we do on post game shows because I know he's got nothing going on tomorrow, right, Trevor? You got nothing going on big, right? No, I'm free. Yeah. I hope it's an evening wedding at this point, but, you know, you can get away with not a lot of sleep after a win like today, but I'll let you do your thing here. First thoughts, gut feelings on how this thing went down. Prize picks is America's number one daily fantasy sports app with over five million active members. Prize picks is the easiest and most exciting way to play daily fantasy sports. Unlike other apps on prize picks, it's just you against the numbers. 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So it was they got to see me in my bowl element. Yeah, I have to watch myself. But go ahead. I sent around disclaimers. People signed off. They said I was good. So we're okay. But one of the biggest things that I saw is multiple points throughout the game. I was at a spot where we have to convert here. We have to get a stop here. We got to push the ball down the field here. And for the most part, that happened. Which in previous years, that doesn't happen in this kind of game. So I don't want to fall into the category and people and say, Notre Dame doesn't win these type of games. I will say they struggle more in these kind of games. I'm not going to take the opponent specifically or factor in their ranking. But in games where Notre Dame has to drive down the field or get that stop or not miss that open field tackle or put together an 89 yard scoring drive. Most of the time that hasn't happened in previous years, that's me is one of the biggest differences that I saw today. And it's a lot to build on for the other guaranteed 11 games that we have the rest of this year. Sean Davis, good to have you on my friend. Thanks for hanging out with us in the week. That's good to see you, buddy. Same here. What do you think, man? What are your first thoughts coming out of this thing? Immediately, I went to episode one of the documentary when he was sitting there with coach Holtz. And he said, look, you got to be the more physical team and more fundamental team, the closer team and don't flinch. They checked about three of those boxes because the fundamentals. Kind of went out of the window the first three quarters, right? Then it kind of came together the last quarter. Fair. But don't flinch. And I think it goes to what Trevor said that. Undermarket streaming when they had bad games, but they still had opportunities to win. I think they played all four against Duke. They won it. They turned around and played all four against Louisville. He flinched as a head coach, right? Going forward unnecessarily. His players follow suit. And then, you know, you go to tonight and it's just not going well, right? And I think all of us once texting them tied it up or saying, yeah, here we go again. We're preparing for a post game show that's going to be possibly apocalyptic. And. Oh, this team showed who they are. Vince, Vince, we saw a lot of things in camp that we felt like, okay, they're different. They're different. The way they're moving, the way they're operating, the way they're coaching. Sure. And I think ultimately we saw in that fourth quarter where you really see what teams are made of. The health. Marcus Freeman talked about it post game. Like we weren't cramping. They were cramping. Yeah. Yeah. They were going down. We weren't. Yeah. So we were built for this. We knew this was the type of game it would be. And I think Notre Dame did a great job of keeping the game close. If Notre Dame plays a clean game, this is a 20 point win. Right. I have no doubt. Agreed. Yeah. Yeah. It was just, I think it was 99 or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. So to think about everything that went against them. And for them, when the rubber meant the road for them to stand up in that environment and say we're the tougher team, we're the more physical team and we're about to be the most fundamental team when it counts the most. Like they check all the boxes when it counted the most and you have to tap your cap to Marcus Freeman. And I love seeing him on the sideline telling them when that last stop by Christian. Great. I told you so. I told this played out the way I told you it would. So kudos to them. And sometimes it's championship teams. You have to win ugly ones like this. But it's just, I mean, you can go back. The greatest team that was at the 2001. Hurricanes. They almost lost the Boston college. Which is like a four-win team. And they had every had to take it all the way back on the turnover. So these are types of games. I think all what the LSU team. They almost lost the Texas. A pretty average Texas team. On the road to start that season. So, you know, as much as we might want to nitpick. I think they showed a lot of grit, a lot of toughness. And I think the character of this team. Came through the night. In an ugly way. It was ugly. But they were still able to show who they were in my team. But isn't that one character shown when your backs are against it? You know what I mean? Like that's when your true character comes out in adversity. It's easy to be positive when everything is going your way, right? And no one can sit here and say that everything went Notre Dame's way. Yes, they got the win in the end. But they kind of had to dig pretty deep. You know what I mean? At the end of this game to figure out how to get this thing done. So, you know, we'll get more into that. But Ryan Roberts, welcome back to Irish Breakdown. Brother, thank you for hanging out with us. And your first thoughts, man. Like, first of all, I love doing the post game shows with you, man. First thoughts on this game. Heading into the game, I saw a statistic that Notre Dame under Marcus Fremo is 0 for 4 against top 25 teams that they are favored to lose in that contest. So, this was the first game that Marcus Fremo has won at the University of Notre Dame against the top 25 team that he was an underdog to. That speaks volumes, obviously, to the magnitude of the victory. I don't care about all the miscellaneous things that some people are going to try to poke holes into this victory. You beat a tough SEC team with a lot of talent who is really well coached on the road. That speaks the volumes. But let me take you through Vince real quick before we dive deeper into this contest. Right. So, my emotions as a Notre Dame fan, because, ultimately, we are all Notre Dame fans here, which is why I think that our perspective resonates with some people. So, here's my emotions in this game. Notre Dame has a little bit of a back and forth, first half. They're tied six up for the majority of it, at least into the second quarter. And my initial pulse was, wow, Notre Dame is not playing that well. Texas A&M is actually out playing Notre Dame, yet they're within shouting distance. And they're within an opportunity to open this game up. Then my emotions went this way. End of the second half, or end of the first half, Sean Davis, they stalled out in an opportunity that should have went up to begin the half. Okay. So, then what happens? Notre Dame takes the lead. I'm like, oh my God, is this in the second half? I'm like, is this the game that's finally going to get Notre Dame potentially over the hump and start something great? And it looked like it did for a second. As soon as Texas A&M scored to tie the game up, what happened? The PTSD came back, baby. And for a second, I'm like, oh my God, Notre Dame's going to lose this football game because let's be honest. They were a road underdog. They were tied in the fourth quarter in a very hostile environment against an SEC team. Everybody out there, except for one or two of the mainstream analysts said that Notre Dame should have lost that football game in that moment. Everyone would have said it. And this was the most resilient team that I have seen now in three and two plus one game years under Marcus Freeman. So hats off to the team, lock on against them, the offensive line, shuffling, six career starts, rightly Leonard's first game. A lot of things that people wanted to talk about of why Notre Dame was supposed to lose this football game. And folks, they didn't. And they started off with a great 2024 victory. Love it. Yeah, no doubt about it. I mean, look, we talked a lot. We obviously talked about this game specifically a lot for the last eight months. I mean, we talked about teams a whole, but this opener, I mean, look, across college football, you looked at it. They showed, you know, the top 10 teams and, you know, who they played in the first weekend. I mean, this is the mark. This was the marquee matchup. I mean, outside of maybe, you know, Georgia Clemson, which ended up being a blowout, right? This was the marquee matchup. This was the one that went down to the wire. And, you know, I give Notre Dame a lot of credit for scheduling this game in game one. I mean, you know, we kind of had that debate. Do you do a game like this? Do you do a Western Kentucky? You know what I mean? Like, how would you rather have it? This is what Notre Dame decided to do. Go on the road in the largest SEC stadium, right? And I think the fourth largest stadium in the country, you go on the road and you come home with a victory. I mean, this sets Notre Dame up big time for the rest of the season, obviously, right? And I want to get your guys' perspective on this. And we can go around the corner. You guys could just jump in. We talked about this game specifically going into it. Was this the biggest game of Marcus Freeman's career going into the game? And now that we know the outcome, do you still think that? Ryan, go. Well, I was going to say I literally wrote an article about this that came out this morning. I do think this was the biggest game in Marcus Freeman's career for a couple of different reasons. And I'll let you guys kind of go ham on it, right? Is that? No, it is not the best team that Notre Dame has played the previous two years. That would probably be one of the Ohio State teams, right? So was it the best team Marcus Freeman's played against? No. But what you have in front of you, we saw Ohio State kind of struggled a day for a lot of the Akron game. We saw Oregon look awful against an Idaho team, an FCS opponent. Yes, Georgia looked very dominant. Miami looked like they were a team. But this is a field that is pretty wide open in a 12 team playoff where you look at it and say if you get into the dance and you have a good day, you might have a chance to get something done here, right? So that was a big part of it. Number two, you're an underdog on the road against an SEC team. And this is the year where we kind of start putting those puzzle pieces together. Marcus Freeman now has multiple recruiting classes in the pipeline, we keep hearing about and you guys practice sports included how fast this team is, right? How they look different, how they look like a completely different Notre Dame team that we have seen in several years. So yes, I think this was the biggest game because I believe that this could be Vince a springboard. This could be the game that I believe you get over the hump mentally. If you're Notre Dame, Marcus Freeman, that's off the back now. All the players are now starting to experience and taste a little bit of that success. So no, it is not the best team that they've played in his three years, but I do think that this was the biggest game so far in Marcus Freeman's career. Sean, I'll say this, I could automatically just agree with double R, but I think it's a little bit nuanced, Vince. And I look at it from the standpoint of as far as Marcus Freeman and the program. I would agree. I would absolutely agree. This game is not, you already know what's about to be said, right? No one picked them. Right. Right. But as soon as Monday hits everybody's going to say we're texting him wasn't that good anyway. So there is, we know it. So they missed the opportunity the last two years to change the national perspective against Ohio State. So those were bigger games as far as the national narrative, as far as Marcus Freeman, trying to establish and legitimize his program and the talent that he's added and getting over the humps of, first of all, going on the road and being able to play the criminal clay clean, he still has to answer that in my opinion. But what they did answer which we talked about in the open is the resiliency, being able to not flinch and being able to be the most physical team and those games in the last two seasons, got away, it got away from them against Marshall, got away from them against Stanford, it got away from them against Louisville. That's all the difference in the true character of what they've been building. So now I think they have the building blocks to build upon this so for that reason I definitely agree with what Ryan said, but I think my national media perspective. I think most people are still going to say no day really hasn't proven anything and that's probably going to come into playoffs, you know, winning a couple games there. Fair. Trevor, do you have some thoughts. I think this was Marcus Freeman's biggest game from an affirmation standpoint. I don't know what it's been but in 2022 and 2023, it felt like even though 23 we got off to a hot start once Ohio State came around. It always felt like for whatever reason Notre Dame was coming and having to play from behind so the margin for error got significantly small, which was so tough to Ryan's point. This game for Notre Dame springboarded the rest, I mean, the hardest team that we have on the schedule coming up next arguably is Florida State. Georgia Tech could be thrown into that conversation just based off of what happened last year with Louisville, they could be thrown into the conversation, but I look at what happened to the team in 2022. You lose to Ohio State in the shoe, and it almost feels like the margin for error is essentially zero. You have to go 11 and 0, the next 12 weeks of the season. And for something like this, I don't want to say, because on the flip side of that coin, which I know we'll probably talk about later, you can't take your foot off the gas now. Now it's time to take what you have and run with it, but I think this was Marcus Freeman's biggest game from an affirmation standpoint. I think it was Dan Campbell, a couple last year, maybe in a game where the Lions won. The reporter walked up to him and was like, Hey, what did you learn about your team today? And he said one of the coolest quotes that I had heard from a coach and he said, I didn't learn anything new. I just confirmed a few things. He's like, we knew what this team was about. Marcus Freeman knows what Notre Dame has and what their capabilities are this season. But I think the way that they played, the way that they were able to battle adversity, some of it was self inflicted, for sure, 99 yards and penalties is absolutely killer. Fixable mistakes, though. Fixable. And so I look at a first game of if this is your foundation and looking at how well the defense played today, and the offense was making plays when they had to when it mattered in crunch time. If that's your foundation of where to build on, I like where we're at. Well, and there were so many built in excuses in this football game for Notre Dame if they wanted to take them, right? Like again, first game as a new offensive coordinator, first game for a quarterback for six career starts in the offensive line. Road game in Texas A&M like there's in, we could be honest to ourselves, there would have been some people in this fan base that would have left this game and been like, Oh, it's okay, like the X, Y and Z and they'll grow from here and screw that man. Like the standard needs to raise more than that man. I'm tired of the built in excuses. This team was resilient. That was my biggest takeaway. I expected or shouldn't they expect it? I was leaning towards when they were tied up in the fourth quarter and a couple offensive, offensive drives had stalled. My PTSD again kind of kicked in where I'm just like, man, I think they're probably going to lose this football game. Like, I don't like this at all. But this team showed that they believed in the process. They showed they believed the Marcus Freeman and Marcus Freeman believed in them. Like when the chips were down, he believed in the run game getting going, the offensive line improving. Riley Leonard making plays, the defense making getting theirs. Like he believed in everything everybody believed tonight. So I really think that this was a game of like there was a resolute feeling out there. It was a feeling of there was belief in that they were tired of the same old same old. Maybe I'm completely wrong about that. We'll see how the season turns out. But that's the pulse that I got tonight is that offensive line took it upon themselves to be better when they need it to be. Riley Leonard took upon himself. The running game took it upon himself. The defense took it on himself. This was a resilient bunch tonight. I've got I've got a question about Marcus Freeman in a second that I want to get to. But before we get off of the big game question, right? Or the biggest game question, you know, that type of thing. Do you guys think from a national media standpoint, if you just do you think if we erase the name Texas A&M and just knew that this was an SEC team on the road, it's pretty much the same conversation. Or do you think it had anything to do with it being specifically Texas A&M? Or is it just the vaunted SEC Notre Dame can't go down into SEC country and win on the road? You know what I mean? Like, did it even matter that it was Texas A&M? Or could you have put like any SEC team in there, except for maybe like, I don't know, Vanderbilt, like something like that, although they did win today. Do you think that had it, you know, the from a national media standpoint, was it just the SEC like they just can't be beat at home kind of a conversation? Or do you think Texas A&M actually had something to do with this? It's kind of a cop-out answer, but I would say yes and yes. It's hard to say just if you label the SEC, then I think- One side or the other, we don't play the team. Fair enough. I'm just kidding. Fair enough. But it's tough because I think if Notre Dame goes down and they play Kentucky or South Carolina or Vanderbilt, I don't think that there's this narrative around the team that, well, they don't win these kinds of games. Because historically, yes, they absolutely do win these games. We just beat South Carolina two years ago, right? So I think there's about eight teams in the SEC where that becomes the narrative for Notre Dame. But again, I know we'll get into it later, but the narrative will be twisted a certain way regardless. Texas A&M at home against Power Five opponents, the last 41 games up until tonight were 20 and 21 when lost at home. So nobody wanted to talk about that before the game. It was, it's the 12th man. It's at night. It's hot, which clearly did not affect the boys from South Bend at all. I want to talk about that in a minute too, yeah. So, but short answer, I don't think it matters if you just insert SEC. I think it has to be just slightly more granular because I think the narrative is the same if Notre Dame goes and plays LSU at home at night. If they go play Alabama at home at night, even if they go to Florida, go to the swamp, just because it's that it has that aura about the team. Same thing with Texas A&M, their win-loss record at home against Power Five teams is below 500, but it's the 12th man. It's college game day was there. Johnny Manziel was there 13 years ago. So it's, that's why it had that, that feeling I think nationally. Light it. Hey Irish Breakdown listeners, it's Urban Meyer. This fall the game changes. Join me, Heisman Trophy winner Mark Ingram and broadcaster Rob Stone as we bring you a new perspective on football and culture every week. We will be joined by the biggest name in sports and talk about everything inside and outside of the lines. Let us guide you through a new era of college football. Watch Triple Option on YouTube or listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get podcasts. I almost had a mean joke about Johnny Manziel. Sean Davis, how are you my friend? You're crazy. I'm not even going down that rabbit hole with you. No, I think what Trevor said is absolutely spot on. And, you know, just to go back to what I just said previously, you know, when you look at the national media, you know, Notre Dame is between a rock and a hard place and there's really nothing that they can prove other than winning a national championship. That's the truth and the matter. And it's okay. It's okay. It is what it is right now. I think the program is moving in that direction. I mean, I watched Georgia today. I can't, after one week. I don't know. They look like they're better than everybody at this point. But of course, I don't really respect Clemson at this point. So, right? I don't really know what that means, right? So, I think we're getting closer. I think this third year is going to be a very special ride. I think this schedule was a nice parting gift by the. Previous AD, thank you, Jack Swarford. And getting through this game. Does nothing in my opinion. I think Texas and them. It would have to be Alabama or Georgia at night. Between the hedges in order for being people to take notice and say, oh, man, they be Georgia at home, which by the way, Notre Dame had a chance to do with the ball of a minute left. Right. So that just shows you how close Notre Dame has been. You know, and I think that's. That's why people are jealous, right? They can't argue against the brain. They can't argue against the academics. The only thing that they can speak about is 1988. And you guys don't win the big game. That's it. That's all they have. And those things are true. And Notre Dame can only blame themselves when it comes to that narrative. So I'm just at a place where it is what it is. And it's time to either put up a shadow and just erase everything that they put before us and win a national championship and then stand there and say what you're going to say now. As LeBron said, what are you going to say now? You know, it's funny because I was just about to turn off the TV and start putting my notes together for the show and, you know, the announcers were like, you know, they're talking about, you know, the games coming up and the, you know, the schedule coming up for both teams and Of course, Chris Fowler's like, yeah, you know, the SEC and the defense is only get better from here. Really, you just watched arguably the best defense in the country, do what they did to A&M and the five star quarterback. And you have the goal to say that the defense is only get better from here. Like that, that like ticked me off. Like I was like, I was so mad when I heard that. I'm like, you just witnessed this in person. You saw what this defense did. We're going to get more into that. But like, the SEC thing is just it. That's why I asked you guys that question. You know what I mean? The SEC, I hate that the word the term SEC bias, but it's true. Right. It's just, it just, it grabs these, these national media guys just so hard. They just can't let it go. Even though they just witnessed what Notre Dame did defensively against A&M, you know, and Colin Klein and how wonderful the coordinator he is and all these different things like not tonight. Like you ran into a bus saw in Notre Dame right outside of the one drives where they gave up the game time touchdown like they were fantastic tonight. So big picture fellas. We've seen Marcus Freeman now for two years plus two games. If you want to count the bowl game that he took over right. Did you, did you learn anything about Marcus Freeman tonight? That's my question. Did you learn anything about Marcus Freeman Ryan? Did I learn anything about Marcus Freeman? It's a great question. I don't think I necessarily learn anything about Marcus Freeman per se. I think I just more learned about the group of players that he's assembled. Like I, I've never questioned Marcus Freeman's desire to win. Right. Like I've never questioned the stoic nature of which he does things. I've never questioned the character that he does things. I've never questioned that he has a great defensive mind. Like all those things I think are pretty apparent with just watching the guy as a defensive coordinator and just seeing him in the first couple of years. I just wanted to see how this team responded to what we've heard this offseason, right? Like we, cause what we see with Marcus Freeman and he comes off as a very genuine family oriented man and a great person. But behind the scenes you hear that like this guy is demanding, right? Like he demands excellence, which I want to hear. So again, I think that comes back to that resilience that we saw in the fourth quarter is, I think that that is an image of their head coach. Like I think that the team just bought into them. So I don't think Marcus Freeman is any different today as far as how he presents himself. Maybe found foundationally what he does behind the scenes to a degree. But I think that he is the same exact person that we've always known Marcus Freeman to be. I just think that this is, I don't want to say the first time, but it's one of the first times that we have seen a team. That is completely bought in, right? Because two years ago, we know that everyone wasn't bought in. Like we've talked about that, right? And there was some defections from the roster because not everybody's bought in. I think that we got to look at tonight, what a Marcus Freeman team looks like more than anything. What is it supposed to, how is it supposed to act? What is the aggressiveness that it plays with? What is foundationally what it's built off of? I think that was always there. I just think that the team now mirrors Marcus Freeman a little bit more. So it might just be a little bit more pronounced. John, what do you think? I think two things stand out for me. I want to go back to the very beginning. I think it's tough enough to be the head coach as an experienced head coach in a place like Notre Dame. But for your first head coaching job to be Notre Dame and everything that surrounds it, right, and it entails. I think for him to do that and to be as confident as he is. I think we saw the full confidence tonight. I pointed out that I saw the full confidence in the way he was moving differently during fall camp, in my opinion. And I think that manifests it itself for the first time on the field. I think in previous seasons, we saw at times when things got tough, a little bit of doubt trying to creep in. But I think he held fast and held firm to what he believed this team needed to be. He always said from the jump, we need to be and we're going to be a trenches team, offensive defensive line. Yes, we're going to add talent at key positions, quarterback skill positions. But just think about, I just want to point out the tough decisions he's had to make. He had to take unprecedented. He had to take an offensive coordinator that he didn't pay. Look, who does that? But he took it. He took it. No blank, put his head down, went to work. He took the stand for loss. He took the martial loss on the chin. It kept believing in, this is what I'm going to do. Double R, how many times did we talk about the temptation of playing those young linebackers early? It was there. We knew they were longer and more athletic. We knew they were more instinctive, but he didn't do it. He let them develop until it was time to let them off the leash down in college station tonight. And then last but not least, underrated. He made the decision to move on from a popular strength and conditioning coach named Matt Vegas and took some heat from it from people that covered the team. A lot of people questioned that decision. Look at tonight. He's standing there talking about the difference it made that in a big game, the health of his team was paramount. For me, I salute the man for sticking by his guns. When things and obstacles were put in his way and he could have yielded multiple times. But he stuck to his guns, he stuck to his plan, he stuck to his two mentors in his life and the advice that they did in the wisdom they gave him. And tonight he gets to kind of take a deep breath and say, I told you so. He told his young men as they came off the field after getting a big stop. That's for me, that's everything that I saw from him. Tonight, I think this was a big exhale moment, like he finally gets to see the manifestation of what he believed in. All of us go through that in life, right? You believe, you believe, you believe, and you just hope to see the fruits of that. And he got to see the fruits of it tonight. It was pretty cool, honestly. It was pretty cool. Trevor, what do you think? To echo Ryan's point, I think the team that you coach and the persona that they take on is a byproduct of how you are as a leader. And we got to see that tonight with Marcus Freeman. And we've got to see that from the beginning. He is somebody, you want to talk about a coaching job in America where you could have potentially the most excuses that you could have. And he never did. He accepted what his role was. He came in with a game plan. Previous teams, stars didn't align there, which is tough. And you kind of play with the cards that you're dealt and he did. There are so many excuses that you could point to why you lost this game and why you didn't get this recruit and why you had to go with this coordinator because this guy couldn't go somewhere, right? And the thing that I respect about him the most is he stuck true to his guns. And now this Notre Dame team is starting to reflect how he is as a coach. The thing that I think he's improved on the most is I think this year he's significantly more tactile in his approach to the game. He went out and got the people that he needed to in the off season. It's refreshing to have a head coach leading the team that you love and are so bought into who follows through with what he says so many times is what we have to get more aggressive on defense. We have to be able to make big plays in the offense. So, you know, we have to, you know, be better. You hear coaches say these things all the time, right? And it's refreshing that now Marcus Freeman, the guy at the helm for Notre Dame, is following through. He knew Notre Dame was going to have a longer season this year. Right? What did he do? He went and got a strengthened and conditioning coach that has NFL experience where regular seasons are 16 games on. We, you know, we've talked so much in previous shows about how Notre Dame needs a more explosive offense. What did he do? He went out and fought and got on paper the number one offensive coordinator in the country. And I know there's people in the chat and I was feeling this way a little bit watching the game to of is Mike Denmark in town. I think he is. I saw him. I know he's here, but I think Marcus Freeman has made all of the right moves to what he needs to do to build a good foundation to move this team forward. And I don't think that that's a change, but to the original question, that kind of confirmed for me that Notre Dame has the right guy for the team. Which is a really comforting feeling. I like where your heads at Trevor and I completely agree with everything that you said. So like the question is, you know, did we learn anything about him tonight? Right? I think since he got the job, he's made off the field. I think he's made all the right decisions. I think he's the right guy demeanor wise. I think he's the right guy, you know, from a work ethic standpoint, from a recruiting standpoint, all of those things, right? I think he's a, I think he's a good person. You know, not that that necessarily matters depending on where you, what school you root for, but I mean, he checks all of those boxes off the field for me. Now, where I think work needed to be done was as a head coach on game day, right? And we can go back and we can dissect some decisions that were made over the last two plus years and, you know, some in game moments and some time outs or some going for it when you didn't need to go for, you know, things of that nature, right? I think that he has, and we've talked about this before and it goes all the way back to when he was a defensive coordinator at Notre Dame and in the first game when he made mistakes and then he put himself up in the front of the room and he's like, that was on me, guys. Like, I will do better. Like that was on me. That was huge for me. And he has continued that in his own personal growth as a head coach. You know, his motto for the team is you challenge everything. I think he challenges everything that he does. And I think you saw that as a head coach tonight. I think that he managed this game as a head coach better than I've seen him manage big games before, right? He looked more relaxed on the sidelines than I think he's looked in big games before. He didn't lose his, you know what, he didn't lose his stuff on the sidelines. We've seen that, right? The leader has to be the one in control, right? You have to be because the guys behind you are going to follow your lead, whether it's the assistant coaches, whether it's the players. I want to echo what you guys were talking about as far as the players that he's recruited. Look, the vast majority of the guys that were making plays tonight are guys he brought in. I mean, look, you can say a lot of things about Marcus Freeman. You can say a lot of things about Joe Rudolph, but man, and Mike Dembrock, but they went all in on this offensive line and they're like, these are our guys. These are the guys that give us the best chance to win and we're going to go for it. And we're not going to, you know, yank them out at the first sign of adversity. Like these are our guys. We're rolling with them, you know. And I think a lot of people are like, okay, I mean, I don't know if that's right. The right decision or not, but that's what he did. And at the end of the day, on that final drive, what was the side of the line that opened up that hole for that touchdown? It was the left side, right? I mean, look, they made their share of mistakes and we'll get into the specifics and all of that stuff. But I think I saw, in my opinion, throughout this entire off season, into fall camp, as you mentioned, Sean, and then into tonight, I've seen the growth of a head coach, right? I have. And he is not apologetic for the decisions that he's making. He's not an excuse maker. And if they would have come up on the short end, he would not have been an excuse maker about what happened tonight. And I think that is serious growth for a head coach, not that he was ever an excuse maker, but he has made decisions to put him and his program in position to win games like this, and it finally came to fruition tonight, right? There's going to be the naysayers on Monday that are going to talk about, well, this isn't a great SEC team and all, whatever, it doesn't matter. We know that this is a big win because of the stakes that were around it, the stakes that were surrounding it. Trevor mentioned the, the sliver, you know, what was the margin of error, right? If they lose this game, they got a, they got to run the table. If you want to make, if you want to be, I have a guaranteed spot in the playoff. I mean, an 11 and one Notre Dame, I think makes the playoff. Well, you just, you just got to cross a huge hurdle in game one. Now you can kind of take a breath and you step back, you get to come home, you get some manageable opponents. Of course, you don't want to take anybody for granted, blah, blah, blah, get all that. I get it, but they're manageable opponents, okay? And you're going to do it from home and all of it goes with that. And then you start to build and you start to create, you start to fix some of these mistakes and, you know, all of these fixable, look, 11 penalties for 99 yards, that is, that is astronomically too many. Nobody will say that that's okay, right? But now is when you start to fix those things. Look, they just went out there on, you know, talent, duct tape and, and good will, like tonight. You know what I mean? Like to get this win. So I personally think I learned something about Marcus Freeman and his maturation process. Look, he's not a whole fan coach yet, right? I'm not saying that, but I like where he's at and his team believes in him. And that's huge. That is massive because those were his guys out there making place. So that's my rant on Marcus Freeman. I do want to ask you guys a question though, because I don't know how many times I had to hear it over the last eight months. Was that, you know Notre Dame's not going to be able to handle the heat down in Texas? Okay. Can we just touch on that momentarily about how this actually played out with, and then again, this is a big picture comment, right? How's Notre Dame going to be able to prepare for the heat in Texas and are they going to do the right things and they're going to need depth and they're going to need this and they're going to need that. Fellas, I saw a lot of Maroon jerseys on the ground cramping up and I didn't see a whole lot of white jerseys that I mean maybe I missed something but I do you think they answered that question fellas. I think for me trust I'll point to one series I believe it was in the second quarter, because I know how Notre Dame used to react as a coach instead. And they had high mission on the Texas A&M moved the ball down the field they got to Irish territory. They wrote with them. Normally they were panicking immediately put meals and cross back then you know you know they rush to put across the rally meals back in the game. As soon as they got to you know scoring territory, a close to it. Nope, finish it out. And they did. And watching that series I was like oh if I was expecting it to come. I was expecting crossing meals or running the field. And when they didn't the one word that jumped in my mind is like, he trusts his kids and he trusts his coaches. Now, now he fully trusts his coach and staff and his kids. And that was really cool to see. And that's when the program starts to turn the corner. Because that's the situation where you since there's no panic. There's no panic. It's very similar to what we saw last year with Michigan, like they did. They went in waves, they left their second guys finish it out. And when you have that type of team, it talks about the closeness to trust plan for each other everything all the cliches we hear but it matters. It matters. And so for me, I think just that right there. That showed the trust, not only in their abilities but in the health, the overall health of the team, you know, being strong and it carried the day because you saw the stronger team was in the fourth quarter. Yeah, no doubt. It was a big difference in the fourth quarter. I completely agree with you Sean. Trevor, what do you think. I think the heat is such a weird thing to game plan for because that's one thing as a coach that you have zero control over 100%. And I'm here to tell you, I live in Indianapolis, we had our rehearsal today and our ceremonies outside. I'm here to tell you it gets really, really, really hot. Hot enough to where I called men's warehouse and I now have a second button up with my tucks because one shirt's not going to make me not going to get me through the night. Okay, look. Yes, it's hot. It's hot everywhere. You know why because it's the summertime. It's just, look, I get it. I could go on this rant, which I did earlier today. But look, I think Notre Dame answered that question. Again, it was an easy thing to come to Notre Dame easily could have said, well, I mean, there's the heat. It's really loud. How do we prepare for something like that. I don't know what they did because I have yet to go see a practice, but I guarantee whatever they did it worked. Because to some degree, that's something that Marcus Freeman doesn't have control over. And luckily for Notre Dame, the players that they're recruiting, and the pipeline of kids that they have coming in are not all from North Dakota and Maine. So they are used to playing in the heat around the country. I mean, it's just in short. Yes, I think they answered the question that they can handle the heat. And it's just, it goes to the testament of Marcus Freeman, the difference of what I've seen from him this year. This was the most prepared I've seen Notre Dame be for a game in a very long time. Things didn't go our way and typically as a fan, you sit down and you watch it and you throw your head in the, you know, hands in the lap, whatever and it's here we go. And you sometimes you can see that on the players faces, and it was almost like nothing shocked them tonight. It was okay. Well, here's another thing we have to overcome. Let's just overcome it. So I think through battling all of that and having to prepare for every different aspect of this game and all the outside noise. I think the heat took a backseat. I think that's why they were able to handle it because I think that's the one thing that they could look at and say, whether we have the best we could practice or the worst we could practice the weather's the weather. And that's just how it's going to be. That's how I look at the heat man. I just learned two things. One is that Trevor hates Maine and North Dakota, two states that I'll never visit. I'm assuming. The other thing is Trevor's already getting ready for the ceremony tomorrow of, oh no, babe, it's sweated my eye. I'm not crying. I don't want to echo everything too much. I think you guys hit on it perfectly. It was tech saying M guys that were dropping like flies. I think a certain quarterback for the Aggies was throwing up on the field at one point, right? So yeah, I think your name was very prepared for that in that challenge on the road. Well, I have a question because we both saw this at camp tempo. Yeah, this was the most up tempo camp we've seen. They did so much in those five minute periods in comparison to the two previous camps. Sure. It's just noticeable. And we're like, Oh, really planted a faster pace. I think that also helped them to get ready to get just get ready for rigorous physical football game. You get the temperature because I bet you one thing. No, the name was more ready to go play in the heat anywhere that Texas A&M coming here and December. I didn't guarantee you that bring Texas A&M to South Bend and December. No chance. Right. No chance. So when we talk about weather, man, it plays a part, but it only plays a part when you unprepared. And I think they did a fantastic job. I think it was echo by golden market screaming and my den brought how much tempo play the part. Right. And my den, den brought going tempo and practice help out golden in the defense prepared for tempo. So, and which is great because most teams, I think they said on the broadcast, most teams like to attack algo's defense with tempo. And now, if that's not Achilles Hill anymore of his defense because of the preparation of fall camp versus Mike then brought, you know, this is the defense disguise it and skies really delivered. It really is. Yeah. Look, there's a super chat in here that I remember seeing earlier, but we've got so many. And by the way, we will get to all the super chats. That's our last segment of the day. But we will get to all of your super chats. We appreciate you guys bringing those in. We'll definitely get to all of those in our final segment. But there was a super chat in there that somebody put in there. Basically for Lauren Landau, you know, basically saying it was pretty clear that he's had an impact on this team. And it, it always makes me chuckle when I listen to, you know, people in the media talking about how they can, they can already tell. You know, the effect that Lauren Landau has had on this team just by watching the first five periods of practice is like, all right, pump the brakes a little bit. Right. I mean, if these guys don't look like D one athlete, you know, high D one athletes and they probably don't belong at Notre Dame in the first place. But today. Okay. Now you can start having that conversation because this team and I'll even throw in the nutrition staff on this one as well, because those are the ones that are in charge of, you know, making sure these guys are getting hydrated and they're getting the, you know, the proper electrolytes and, you know, all of the sports science that that Marcus Freeman is so high on. Right. I mean, he, he's got a nutritionist and he's got all of these different things. They've been working on this for weeks. Right. Notre Dame was the stronger team in the fourth quarter period end of discussion. They weren't going down with injuries. They weren't going down with cramping. And they were the ones that offensively took it to Texas A&M and punched him in the mouth on that last drive. Right. I mean, look, right on there wasn't really going to be dropping back and chucking balls on that last drive. I mean, yes, you made a couple of passes and, you know, both columns made that great grab and all of that. And we'll get into the specifics in a bit, but they're like, look, we're going to run the ball right down your throat and we're going to show you that we deserve this win. And that's what they did. And you can give the coaches obviously a lot of credit, but you can also give a lot of credit to the strength and conditioning staff and the nutrition staff because after that long game after being out in the heat and doing all of those different things. Notre Dame was the one less standing at the end, literally and figuratively, because of the way that they were prepared for that game. You know what I mean? Like, it was very clear. It was very, very clear. So, everybody can start having those discussions now that Lauren Lando is doing a great job. I'm all for it now. I thought it was funny back in like July, but now I'm all for it, right, because we actually saw the fruits of that labor. Now, the next step is to see the fruits of that labor at the end of the season in like November and December and hopefully January right like that's when we really want to see it. But we saw it in game one, there's absolutely no doubt about it. So a lot of credit goes to those guys. They were absolutely prepared for the heat. They were absolutely prepared for the slugfest that came, and they were absolutely ready to play a fourth quarter game. And I think that's huge too, right, because that is, that is a program defining trait that you're ready to play football like that, right, in SEC country on the road, you know, all of those different, you know, all those different boxes that they needed to check, they check them all. And so, across the board, I was very impressed with that. So, fell as any final big picture thoughts before we move on to the next segment. Let's go. Let's do it. So, hey, before we move on to the next segment, everybody, make sure you hit that like button, that subscribe button, that notification bell share with your family and friends boards and ours breakdown.com. If you want a range of emotions from utter despair to utter glee, you got to be on the boards during the game, because if you're on the game thread, you won't even know what hit you. Okay, it is hilarious just to watch the roller coaster of emotions on the boards. It's worth the price of admission, as they say, so make sure you guys get over boards on average breakdown.com. It's a lot of fun over there, and I'm sure, I'm sure the board is still flying at this point, after that big 23 to 13 victory. So, boards on average breakdown.com. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC]
