Marcus Freeman reacts to Sam Pittman firing after loss to Notre Dame, running fake punt up 29

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish, led by head coach Marcus Freeman, went into Fayetteville over the weekend and blew out the Arkansas Razorbacks. That would be the straw that broke the camel’s back, and Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman would lose his job in the wake of the loss.

Now, a couple of days removed from the firing, Freeman shared his thoughts on Pittman, praising him. At the same time, Freeman noted that those firings are a reality of the coaching industry, like it or not.

“You never want to see somebody in any profession lose their job,” Marcus Freeman said. “He’s a man that has a family, but this is the profession we chose. So, the human side of you feels for him and his family. But he’s going to be okay because he’s a — I don’t know him personally, but I’ve heard he is a competitive, great human. Competitive, good, selfless people succeed. That’s what we need on our team and our world, like competitive fighters who are selfless, that put others in front of themselves. I’ve heard those types of things about him. My interaction with him pregame was great. Everything I expected from what I’ve heard about who he is.”

Sam Pittman had been at Arkansas since 2020. During that time, he was tasked with rebuilding the program, which he did. The problem was that he struggled to maintain the success he found early in his tenure. Losses in back-to-back weeks to Memphis and Notre Dame would be the end of his tenure, as Pittman finished at 32-34 there with three bowl wins and one AP Top 25 finish.

There was some criticism of Freeman and Notre Dame launched during and after the game for a fake punt early in the second half. At that point, the Irish were up by 29, and it could have been interpreted as running up the score. That’s a decision he also addressed, noting that he wanted to both keep his team playing hard and also put it on tape for future teams to be aware of in their games.

“In terms of the fake punt, I didn’t want to relax. We had to come out of that locker room with an aggression no different than the first half. There’s no lead that’s comfortable. There’s no lead that’s comfortable. When we went three-and-out, I think, on that first drive, I felt like it was the right time to send a message to our team. This was about our team that, hey, this is something we’ve worked on. Let’s go execute it,” Freeman said. “That also is something on film for the next opponents, right? I’m not even thinking about this opponent, but I’m thinking about I want to make sure the next couple opponents see that. It could really make them think deeply about how they want to attack our punt unit.”

In the end, Notre Dame won comfortably 56-13. Arkansas would not score in the second half of that game. That also marked the best defensive game, statistically, for the Irish, as they look to figure out some questions on that side of the ball.

“That’s what went into that decision-making. We didn’t get any points off of it,” Freeman said. “But it was a mindset that we have to be aggressive. There is no taking your foot off the accelerator. This is what we’re doing and they executed it well.” 

Next up, Notre Dame is set to host Boise State, a College Football Playoff team from a year ago. Arkansas, meanwhile, is heading into a bye week with Bobby Petrino as its interim head coach.