Why Marcus Freeman’s first season made Jack Swarbrick’s expectations higher

Count Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick among those impressed with how Marcus Freeman pulled the wheel around on the Irish’s 2022 season following a home loss to Stanford. And among those who have heightened 2023 expectations because of it.

Swarbrick is not basing his bar-raising in how he saw Notre Dame prepare for and beat then-No. 5 Clemson by three touchdowns Nov. 5, even though that stands as Freeman’s best Year 1 highlight. It’s instead rooted in witnessing the aftermath of two setbacks that could have sent the season irreversibly off course.

“You don’t learn a lot about a coach when you’re beating Clemson handily,” Swarbrick said on the Dec. 21 episode of The GoJo Show with Mike Golic Jr. “You learn a lot when you’re losing to Marshall and what that night is like, what the next day is like, how he addresses the team, how he leads. It was compelling. It was textbook. I feel great about the foundation and great about where we are. It’s as cohesive as a staff as it has been in my time here.”

Swarbrick is not organizing a parade because Notre Dame went 9-4, though. The Irish still lost to a pair of unranked teams at home. One is from the Sun Belt Conference, and Notre Dame paid it $1.25 million to come to South Bend. The other went 3-9 and had one other win over FBS competition. Viewed through the lens of who was on this roster, 9-4 feels like a disappointment.

But looking at it in the context of how it ended vs. how it started? There’s a lot to like from that view. Notre Dame went 9-2 after losing its starting quarterback, beginning 0-2 and Freeman admitting to not knowing what was going on. It went 6-1 following that Stanford loss. The Irish’s resiliency was hard to miss in those final seven games. It showed up in the Gator Bowl, when Notre Dame erased a 21-7 first-quarter deficit in a 45-38 win over No. 19 South Carolina.

“I think it does,” Swarbrick said, discussing his expectations. “I expect to have the staff back. There’s a better understanding of who we are and how we should approach it.”

Notre Dame shutting out Clemson for three quarters or hanging 264 rushing yards on South Carolina are not the root of his heightened hopes. It’s why they happened after some inexcusable lows, which caught him by surprise as much as anyone else. Swarbrick credits it to Freeman’s stronger pulse on the program, the type of messaging needed and his willingness to start the change with himself.

“I knew we were in trouble against Cincinnati [in 2021] all week,” Swarbrick said. “People were saying and doing the right things, but it wasn’t real. I didn’t sense any of that before Marshall or Stanford. I wasn’t seeing something at practice that alerted me to a concern. The preparation felt great. The performance wasn’t anywhere close to what it needed to be. You spend a lot of time figuring out why.

“Marcus focused a lot on the teaching. He spent a lot of time saying the answer can’t be, ‘They can’t do it.’ The answer has to be, ‘We didn’t teach it well enough.’”

Swarbrick, of course, is aware of the impact that personnel has on a season. Notre Dame had an undesired quarterback change and shaky play at that position before then. It had a work-in-progress receiver unit that ended the year with six scholarship players. The Irish were effective enough on offense to win nine games, but not without clear flaws. Two consensus All-Americans, defensive end Isaiah Foskey and tight end Michael Mayer, are departing the team.

“We lose some very talented people who contributed a lot to the team,” Swarbrick said. “In some facets, we should be better.

“I’m not sharing any state secrets here, but in the college game and professional game, it’s all about quarterback play. That’s going to be a big part of what defines next year for us.”

Notre Dame appears to be close to helping itself there. Wake Forest transfer Sam Hartman – who holds the ACC record for career touchdown passes – is reportedly set to pick Notre Dame by the end of the week. He would bring a higher level of certainty and experience than anyone the Irish have on their current roster. He’s a 46-game starter who had totaled 7,929 yards, 77 touchdowns and 26 interceptions since the start of 2021.

Hartman would have to fend off Tyler Buchner, the original 2022 starter who returned from a 10-game absence to throw for 274 yards and account for 5 touchdowns in the Gator Bowl win. But whether Hartman chooses Notre Dame as his 2023 home or not, Swarbrick’s confidence that Freeman can take the program to the standards it sets remains strong.

“I’m even more confident in him and sure he’s the right leader for the program now than I was the day I made the decision,” Swarbrick said, “and I was pretty confident then.”