The last word: Final thoughts before Boston College vs. Notre Dame football
Hey, Notre Dame. I know it’s icy in South Bend. But don’t slip. Not now. Not on senior day. Not against a three-touchdown underdog. Not with the narrative having been for weeks now that all you do is play up and down to the level of competition.
This is the last opportunity for head coach Marcus Freeman and his No. 18 Fighting Irish (7-3) to squash that common line of thinking. This is the penultimate regular season game, and the final one is against a College Football Playoff contender on the road. Being that bowl matchups usually pit two evenly-matched teams together, this is Freeman’s last chance to win as a touchdown-plus favorite in his inaugural season.
He’s yet to do it in any of his previous five tries.
Notre Dame was well on its way to covering a substantial spread last week vs. Navy at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, but a 22-point halftime lead turned into a sweat-it-out three-point victory. Yes, it was hot enough in Baltimore to actually sweat. It’s not nearly hot enough in northern Indiana this weekend unless you’re wearing three-plus thermal layers — one for every touchdown Notre Dame is favored by over the visiting Boston College Eagles (3-7).
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Sure, it has become a “just win, baby” type of season for Notre Dame. That’s been the essence since an 0-2 start with one slip up vs. Stanford in mid-October. But for several reasons — one being sending a senior class Freeman has credited multiple times this week with being the foundation for the program’s standing as not just a historic power in the sport but a recently relevant one, too — it would behoove Notre Dame to play a complete game akin to the one it enjoyed the last time it performed at Saturday’s venue.
Give Irish fans a reason other than “well, we’re supposed to lose, so I guess we might win” to believe Notre Dame will head west after Thanksgiving and beat the highly-ranked USC Trojans. The only way to do that is for all three phases to click despite poor weather conditions. It’s still possible for a team to dominate another when weather levels the playing field a bit. Notre Dame has a considerable talent advantage. Prove it on the scoreboard, snow be darned.
Another close win like the one over Navy wouldn’t be a disaster. But wouldn’t winning soundly just sit a whole lot better? Any fan of any team ever knows it would. It’s on Notre Dame to get it done.
