Stephen A. Smith puts Notre Dame on blast for reaction to being left out of College Football Playoff

ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith put Notre Dame on blast for the program’s reaction to being left out of the College Football Playoff this weekend. The Fighting Irish ended up opting out of a bowl game at 10-2 after being the first team out of the bracket. Smith took that opportunity to take a shot at Notre Dame AD Pete Bevacqua.

“Who the hell is making the judgment about who’s the top 10 team, who the top 12 team? I personally think the players should go to the top 16,” Smith said on First Take. “And me, personally, it wouldn’t bother me if the top 20 teams had a playoff system. I’m not gonna lie to you, it wouldn’t bother me at all, because there’s an inordinate amount of teams in college football. When you’re talking about the top 20, everybody got a chance. And so you can look at it like that. And if you can’t make it in the top 20. I don’t want to hear about you … I don’t want to hear a word. But in the end, it comes down to the dollars.

Notre Dame put on blast by Stephen A. Smith

“And when you’re looking at the ACC, what are they supposed to do? Miami getting into the postseason was not a guarantee, it was up in the air. And so what ACC was doing everything it could to ensure that one of its own got in, because they knew it wasn’t going to be Virginia, it wasn’t going to be Duke with their five losses, okay, they had a shot to get Miami in there, and they took it.  Which means millions. And Notre Dame already made it clear, we ain’t a part of y’all and we’ll be dead and we gonna share that revenue. So who the hell is Bevacqua to be bitching and moaning about it?” 

There was an argument from some that Notre Dame should’ve gotten in over Alabama. At that point, Notre Dame fans and officials lost the argument against Miami, whom they lost to in the season opener.

“And I don’t want to hear about Alabama either, because Alabama, even though they have three losses, they had two at the end of the season, just like Notre Dame, with this strength of schedule was ranked 11th,” Smith said. “Fellas, Notre Dame was ranked 42nd okay, 42 and what happened is Alabama went out there and had to play an SEC championship game while Notre Dame was at home sitting on its couch as an independent. I don’t want to hear it.”