Marcus Freeman has 'a lot of confidence' in offensive line for 2025

Notre Dame has often built its offensive identity through the offensive line. That’s a strength that head coach Marcus Freeman looks to continue to carry into the 2025 season.

Freeman appeared on Always College Football recently. There, he shared how confident he is in the Irish offensive line despite some turnover from last season.

“There’s a lot of confidence, right,” Marcus Freeman said. “The five guys that would be starting right now all have started multiple games for us here at Notre Dame. Again, high ceiling guys.”

This offseason, Notre Dame saw several of its offensive linemen from last season move on from the program. That included Rocco Spindler, Pat Coogan, Ty Chan, and Sam Pendleton. In that group, Spindler made 23 starts, Coogan made 26 starts, and Pendleton made seven starts. The Irish did not add any offensive linemen through the Transfer Portal.

“You know what? I feel confident about the depth of our offensive line. Maybe they don’t have a lot of in-game experience but the talent and the ceiling of those guys are extremely high. Now, it’s about getting those five to gel together. As I’ve said, they’ve all started games, but they haven’t started multiple games together. How do we make sure they can gel together as an offensive line,” Freeman said. “But it all starts with the big guys up front and the confidence level is extremely high with them.”

Injuries became a major issue for Notre Dame in 2024, particularly along the offensive line. Despite that, the Irish were able to lean on their depth throughout the season. That’s contributed to either returning players getting experience last season or players who were supposed to start last season returning healthy in 2025.

Among those injuries was offensive lineman Charles Jagusah, who missed the entire regular season. He went down in the offseason. There were also injuries to starting center Ashton Craig, who tore his left ACL, Spindler went down with an ankle injury, and left tackle Anthonie Knapp missed the national championship game with an ankle injury, among all the other injuries to the Irish roster in 2024.

Now Marcus Freeman returns an interesting group of offensive linemen. Charles Jagusah, Anthonie Knapp, and Ashton Craig are all back. Aamil Wagner and Billy Schrauth have also started games for Notre Dame. Others can offer experience, if not starting experience.

The offensive line at Notre Dame is going to have a major task at hand too. With a first-time starter taking over at quarterback, regardless of who wins the quarterback battle, protecting him and communicating clearly is going to be vital.