Notre Dame’s new ACC schedule is one of the easier ones in the league. The Fighting Irish’s 10-game slate ranks 10th in the conference in total opponent SP+ at 55. The toughest game, Clemson, is at home as originally scheduled.
The schedule isn’t complete fluff to be dismissed, though. It contains three of the top four — and five of the top seven — ACC teams in the preseason SP+ ratings, which take into account returning production, recent history and recent recruiting. A tricky road game at North Carolina (17th in preseason SP+) was added to the slate of the six original ACC teams, which included popular surprise team picks Pittsburgh and Louisville.
Whatever the schedule presented, reaching the ACC championship game would have been the expectation for a Notre Dame team that has the ingredients to be one of Brian Kelly’s best. Can Notre Dame actually do it? BlueandGold.com’s Patrick Engel and Lou Somogyi discuss.
BUY: By Patrick Engel
Notre Dame, in its most stable state since the 1990s, joined what has been the lowest-rated Power Five conference the last two seasons. There is a reason the talk of an ACC title game appearance arose so fast. College football conferences operate in cyclical fashion, and right now the ACC is in a less desirable part of the cycle.
I’m leaning on the trend that has manifested the last three years until I see it disproven: Notre Dame has proven it handle games against the ACC’s second tier, and it will handle all the non-Clemson opponents on the schedule and set up a title game rematch with the Tigers.
