Another year, another marquee season opener for Notre Dame football. In all five years that head coach Marcus Freeman has been a part of the coaching staff in South Bend, the Irish have played their first game away from home. This season, that first game will take place at Hard Rock Stadium, the home of the No. 10 Miami Hurricanes.
Winning the season opener would pay massive dividends for the Irish. After their second game, a primetime home opener against Texas A&M, their schedule lightens up drastically for the remaining 10 contests. Getting to the middle of September with less than two losses puts Notre Dame in a good position to make a second consecutive College Football Playoff appearance. Here’s how the Irish can take their first step on Sunday in South Florida.
Win the opening drives
Irish fans don’t enjoy hearing about the can of whooping Miami opened up on Notre Dame in 2017, the last time the Irish faced the Hurricanes at Hard Rock Stadium. And it is true that a game that happened eight years ago between two entirely different rosters and coaching staffs should hardly be brought up at all. However, there is one relevant aspect of the 2017 game that Notre Dame has to be aware of: the environment.
Sure, Hard Rock Stadium rarely sells out, but this is a top-10 matchup in primetime on the Sunday before Labor Day. It’s going to be loud in there, and Notre Dame has to have an answer for the noise.
In the 2017 game, the Irish narrowly missed their chance at an answer, and it cost them at the price of a 41-8 loss. Having marched to Miami’s 35-yard line on the game’s opening drive, Notre Dame quarterback Brandon Wimbush spotted wideout Equanimeous St. Brown running behind the defense on a post route at the goal line. Wimbush overthrew the slam-dunk touchdown, though, and the drive stalled out. By the end of the first quarter, Miami would command a 14-0 lead.
In order to hang right with Miami while playing a first-time starter at quarterback, Notre Dame will have to calm Hard Rock’s environment early. Looking to back previous Freeman-era season openers in hostile venues, an opening-drive field goal at Ohio State in 2022 helped the Irish keep a lead through halftime. Just last year, trading first-drive field goals with Texas A&M settled down Kyle Field a good amount. Whether it’s via an early score or a couple of quick defensive stops, Notre Dame has to do what it can to make Miami’s crowd a lesser factor.
Capitalize on experience
While the experience gap at quarterback between sophomore CJ Carr and Miami’s Carson Beck, a sixth-year redshirt senior, dominates the conversation, Notre Dame has massive experience advantages in other areas. While no signal-caller in the land has played on bigger stages than Beck, his wide receivers are largely unproven. None cleared 500 receiving yards last season, and three of the top six transferred in during the offseason. With defensive backs like junior Christian Gray, sophomore Leonard Moore and junior Adon Shuler on hand, the Irish have the tools to smother Miami’s air attack, even if they can’t break through its stout offensive line.
The other side of the ball tells a similar tale. Half of Miami’s anticipated top 12 defensive backs arrived via the portal in the offseason, with only two returners having made more than one start with the Hurricanes last year. Meanwhile, Notre Dame returns two experienced wide receivers, juniors Jaden Greathouse and Jordan Faison, both of whom played their best football in the postseason a year ago. Graduate transfer Malachi Fields is much more solidified than any of Miami’s portal pass-catchers too, as he posted 808 receiving yards at Virginia last season and has lined up against the Hurricanes before in ACC play.
Away from the trenches and the pocket, Notre Dame enters Sunday with an indisputable edge. By playing to those strengths, the Irish can take another step toward a 1-0 start.
Simplify CJ Carr’s night
It would be foolish not to speak in-depth on the quarterback position, Miami’s area of greatest advantage. Beck has started multiple postseason games. Carr hasn’t started a game of any kind.
Some might believe that an Irish win will require Carr to lead his team and deliver a strong performance. That’s not the case. In fact, Carr can be quite pedestrian in his statistics and still deliver a winning performance by avoiding significant mistakes. Riley Leonard did just that in his Notre Dame debut in Aggieland last year, playing basic yet clean football and letting other parts of his team steer the ship.
As Freeman himself said, the Irish cannot put too much on Carr’s plate. They have to establish their run game, something that didn’t happen in 2017. They also must protect the young quarterback, putting a tall task on Notre Dame’s offensive tackles. Defensive end lines up as one of Miami’s best positions. The Irish must contain those rushers in both pass protection and in setting up their ground attack, lending more flexibility to Mike Denbrock’s playbook.
