Notre Dame Penciled Into College Football Playoff With Four Games Left; Irish #3 in NCAA’s CFP Poll Based on Strength of Schedule
Reality imitates overhype in the NCAA’s inaugural College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings of 2017, with Notre Dame penciled into the playoff at the #3 spot. Georgia, source of Notre Dame’s sole loss, is at #1, in part because of their 1-point win over Notre Dame. The committee chairman reportedly credited Georgia and Notre Dame’s strength of schedule as factors in the rankings, namely with regard to the number of their respective opponents ranked in the CFP poll.
Half of Notre Dame’s schedule is ranked in the initial (Oct. 31) CFP poll of the season. The Irish are 3-1 against CFP-ranked opponents played thus far, Georgia, USC, NC State and Michigan State. They have yet to play Miami (Fla.) and Stanford.
Notre Dame opponents in blue boldface or, in event of a Notre Dame loss, red boldface; Notre Dame in green boldface.
College Football Playoff Rankings – 10.31.17
1 – Georgia 8-0
2 – Alabama 8-0
3 – Notre Dame 7-1
4 – Clemson 7-1
5 – Oklahoma 7-1
6 – Ohio State 7-1
7 – Penn State 7-1
8 – TCU 7-1
9 – Wisconsin 8-0
10 – Miami 7-0
11 – Oklahoma State 7-1
12 – Washington 7-1
13 – Virginia Tech 7-1
14 – Auburn 6-2
15 – Iowa State 6-2
16 – Mississippi State 6-2
17 – USC 7-2
18 – UCF 7-0
19 – LSU 6-2
20 – NC State 6-2
21 – Stanford 6-2
22 – Arizona 6-2
23 – Memphis 7-1
24 – Michigan State 6-2
25 – Washington State 7-2
Despite their overall strength of schedule, Notre Dame had an unexpectedly semi-padded first half of the season; yet they have continued winning amidst tough sledding in the home stretch. At 7-1, Notre Dame is one game better than basic bowl eligibility, with four games left against teams with winning programs — Wake Forest; #10 Miami (Fla.); sometimes-nemesis Navy; and #21 Stanford.
In 2017, fans have yet to see some of the recurring nightmares that have occurred during the Brian Kelly Era, such as The Flat Game, The Skid or The Flu Game.
Hopefully they got their flu shots, and, for their sake, hopefully Kelly might finally have learned how to dial up his planning and preparation to avoid the flatness and skids that sometimes doomed his program in the past.
Brian Kelly, despite post-season success at the small college level that included multiple national championships, has never won a major bowl game. He now has been in Div. I-A/FBS for well more than a decade, and is 0-3 in major bowls, getting embarrassed in one and blown out in the other two. He got a team in a fourth major bowl, where they got blown out in his absence, after he jumped ship for a bigger stage.
Notre Dame has not won a major bowl game in a quarter-century. That also means that Notre Dame has not won a major bowl game in the entire current, 85-scholarship era of major college football.
Time will tell whether Notre Dame will have the chance to bring home a major bowl win this year, or whether that effort will take place within a playoff run.
Ironically, one of the playoff locations this year is the Rose Bowl, where Notre Dame won their first consensus national championship with a victory over Stanford in 1925, featuring Knute Rockne, the Four Horsemen and the Seven Mules to cap off the 1924 season.