Notre Dame head football coach Marcus Freeman held a press conference Monday at Notre Dame Stadium, previewing Saturday night's 2023 road game between his 10th-ranked Irish (5-1) and No. 25 and 5-0 Louisville (7:30 EDT; ABC). Here's everything he had to say. Answers are largely verbatim. Question are edited for brevity and clarity.
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OPENING STATEMENT
“Good to see you guys. It's crazy how two weeks in a row you have very similar games, with, obviously, a different outcome. I said it last week in the press conference, that great teams find the way to execute when it matters the most, and that's what a reflection of Saturday was. When we had to make a play, offensively and defensively, we were able to make a play. And, ultimately, it resulted in victory. And so, I don't want to let the outcome cloud our eyes, which it won’t. There's always things to fix.
“That was an extremely talented Duke football team. Coach [Mike] Elko has done a great job, and that was a well-coached, well-prepared team. But the reality is that the feeling of a victory goes a long way. And we now have to be able to continue to examine everything we do with the same sense of urgency that we had last week and really, constantly improve. How do you do that? You truly break down everything you're doing and figure out why it happened. Not just say, ‘Hey, we want to overlook things’ or ‘we called the wrong play. Let's call a better play next time. It's OK.’ How do we fix every detail of every play? And that's the challenge. That's the challenge of the head coach and the challenge of our coordinators to not overlook anything and continue to evaluate our process and how we do things to make sure that we get the outcomes that we truly aspire to have.
“And so, I’m pleased with how our guys played for 60 minutes. It wasn't perfect, as you guys were all there and you saw it. But to finish that game the way we did and execute on the third-and-10 and then on the fourth-and-16 and Audric’s touchdown and defensively to get that final turnover, that was huge. And so, we'll enjoy it. We'll enjoy it with our players. But we'll have to turn the page and get ready for a talented Louisville team.
“Players of the game, on offense, Mitchell Evans. On defense was Howard Cross, and then special teams was Jack Kiser. And then the scout players of the week were Preston Zinter on defense and special teams, and Michael Carmody on offense.
“As we get ready to move forward to Louisville, it doesn't take long to watch film to see why they're 5-0. It's another night game, and it’ll be a great atmosphere, great opportunity. They’ve got an explosive offense, an experienced quarterback. They have speed at the skill [positions]. And then defensively, I think they're really sound. They have an edge rusher — I think No. 9 [Ashton Gillotte]— that is going to be one of most elite pass-rushers we see. They have two corners that are physical and aggressive. So, they'll present a challenge for our program, and we’ve got to have a great week of preparation and get ready to play for Saturday night. So, with that, I’ll open up the questions.”
Q: You’ve had huge emotional swings the past two games in a row. So, from an emotional standpoint, how do you build these guys back up to the point where they're not running on empty emotionally on Saturday?
Marcus Freeman: “You only get 12 of these [games] guaranteed. You've heard me say that before. And the ability to remind yourself that we're going on week 7, these opportunities are dwindling down. And so, they'll be grateful. They'll be ready. But we’ve got to keep going back to what will make us prepare for this moment on Saturday? And that goes to our preparation. The challenge is how do we improve faster than our opponents? Like, that's what I just told the coaches. That's our challenge. Every college football team will improve throughout the season. The ones that improve the fastest are the ones that usually play for championships and are playing at the end of the year for things that are extremely important. "So that's our challenge, is to improve faster than our opponents. And how to do that? It starts with you as an individual, truly figuring out why you're in a position you're in. And it's the same things I might have told you last week. Why are we in the position we’re in, as an individual? And what do I need to do to improve? Like, what do I need to do in my process to improve the position I'm in. And then if we do that as individuals, collectively, as a team, we’ll improve — hopefully, with a lot of urgency.”
Q: What's your relationship with Louisville head coach Jeff Brohm, and was there any thought of maybe staying at Purdue when he took the Purdue head coaching job in ’17?
MF: “It was [an] extremely short [interim period]. I got a chance to meet him when he was the head coach. I was still kind of on staff there a little bit, and I remember him saying, ‘Hey, let me kind of get my foot on the ground and figure out what we're doing here.’ And by that time, [Luke] Fickell got the job at Cincinnati. And I remember telling [Brohm], ‘Hey, appreciate you even giving me the opportunity to talk to you, but I'm going to move on to Cincinnati.’
“So, other than that, I haven't had much communication. Obviously, we faced them two years ago when I was a defensive coordinator here, and then we were able to face the quarterback [Jack Plummer] last year [with Cal]. And so, I have some familiarity with him, but not much personal.”
Q: When you're able to go back and watch the film, how would you characterize and what would you attribute all the penalties to?
MF: “The atmosphere there was difficult, and it was loud. And that's no excuse. We have to make sure that we fix the mistakes that we had, obviously. Our false-start penalties, there were different cadences that we were using, and that's what I challenged our coaches to do. Not just say, ‘We’ve got to be better.’ But, how do we fix it? And that's what we've discussed as a coaching staff, that there's different cadences we can go on. Do we want to go on a clap? Do we want to go on a cadence? A silent count? And what we can't do is have false starts. We've got to all be accountable for that. And we’ve got to fix it and improve it.
“And they [Duke] were doing so many things defensively too that would give us issues. When you stem and do some things, our guys have to really be locked in. So, we’ve got to do a better job in practice of putting our players in that type of situation, so that when we get to the game, we can execute better. Defensively, lining up offsides? Every single play you’ve got to go through your checklist, and it starts with making sure you're aligned, not across the ball. And so, we have to fix that. We can't just say, ‘Hey, we’ve got to be better.’ We have to have a plan to fix that and address it, and we do.”
Q: With the injured wide receivers, when you're watching the film, how evident is it that maybe missing both Jayden Thomas and Jaden Greathouse is a really big deal and it really affected how you guys played in that game? And then what is their status for this week?
MF: “Yeah, we expect them both to be back. We'll start them both practicing [Tuesday]. They're both improving. They ran around yesterday, on Sunday, and I think we'll do some rehab and run around today too, but we expect them to be back for practice tomorrow.
“Yeah, to only have three receivers that played in the game, over the course of the 60 minutes, it takes its toll. And that's no excuse. We have to be better. And so, we have to continue to develop our other guys that are continuously improving, but we have to develop them with a sense of urgency that they can help us. And if you’re on the field, you’ve got to play to the standard. We can't make excuses that you're playing 60-some plays. You’ve got to continue to perform mentally and physically at the standard we're demanding, and so they played their hearts out. We know we’ve got to be better. “
Q: In the micro moment of calling the fake punt on Saturday, what did you sense that let you know it was maybe not only the right time, but also that your guys kind of needed it from a macro standpoint? How important was it also for you to continue to send that “aggressive” message?
MF: “I was very confident throughout the week that we were going to be able to run this fake punt and execute it. [Special teams] coach [Marty] Biagi did a great job of installing it and making sure our players knew exactly what we were going to do on that play. For me, it was really looking at where that ball was. I knew when we got the ball to a certain area of the field, and the down and distance was what we were looking for, I was confident to run it. And so, it happened to be the first punt was right in the vicinity of where I wanted to run it. And so it didn't take long to say, ‘OK, let’s run it.’ And they executed it really well.”
Q: And then continuing on that mindset that you talked about — staying aggressive, how do you balance that in that late-game situation, where you say, initially, I kind of wish Audric would have gone down at the 1-yard line on the late TD run?
MF: “Listen, always you can go back and second-guess, and the analytics would tell you to go down. But then the other side of it is, ‘Hey, you're putting all your eggs in one basket, saying that we have to be perfect on this field goal.’ The things that can happen in the operation of a field goal, you’ve got to weigh the percentages. We didn't assume Audric was going to break that and score a touchdown. We were really thinking more about centering the ball a little bit and planning to kick a game-winning field goal. But it's really hard, when you're down, to take points off the board. And this was a conversation we had with the coaching staff.
“If we can go back and do it again, would we say, ‘Alert down, down on this?’ And, as the head coach, I have my own philosophy on things, but we're going to be aggressive. I don't ever want to take points off the board, but also my job is to put our team in a position to win. And you could win in either case, right? That's the reality. You can win it if you go down at the 1, and it's perfect with the snap, the hold and the kick. And there's no time left. You could win the way we did win. But at the end of the day, it's a win. And we found a way to do that.”
Q: Chris Tyree’s decision to dive for the punt, was he thinking that might hit a teammate since it came up short, or what was his thought process?
MF: “With Tyree, we continue to tell him to be aggressive. The punt before, we fair-caught it, and sometimes I’ve just got to be quiet, as the head coach. I go over there and say, ‘Be aggressive, now. If there’s space, be aggressive.’ Because I want him to be aggressive. We obviously don't want him to do what he did on the muffed punt. His reasoning was that, ‘Coach, I was trying to save us yards. I thought the ball was bouncing up, and I was just going to go grab it and get down and save us yards.’
“And so, his intent was correct, but obviously we do not want to make that decision. So, it's a great teaching opportunity for me to shut up. Sometimes don't put something in somebody's head, because that can be the result of it. And I have a lot of confidence in him. We just, obviously, don't want to make that decision at that moment.”
Q: What was your preparation like for playing a team that had such a good turnover margin coming in, with you winning the turnover battle, 2-0?
MF: “That's a point of emphasis every week for us all year, but specifically for that game. We had known how well they'd done in taking the ball away and not turning it over. And so, offensively every week we say, ‘Hand the ball to the official.’ What does that mean? Zero turnovers, and I think we've had one issue on offense, which has been amazing. We've done a great job of ball security.
“Defensively, the challenge was — each week it changes. This game, we said, ‘We have to get to [the quarterback].’ We've been close. We’ve forced fumbles. We force more fumbles than a lot of teams in the country, but we haven't recovered. And the interception was huge by Xavier [Watts]. We forced a fumble earlier in the game, and we didn't get it. We were this close. It's like every week that happens. But to end it that way [with a recovered fumble], it was a sweet feeling for our entire defense. And it was important for us to get a victory that way.”
Q: Internally, Howard Cross’ makeup, what makes him as good as he is?
MF: “He is a confident individual. He is internally confident in his skill set. And Howard Cross is a great practice player. And that's not what everybody gets the chance to see. Like, I see it every day in practice. A lot of times I get to work with the scout-team O-line [against the starting defense]. One of the best joys of being a head coach is on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, working on the scout-team O-line. It's always a challenge when I know we're double-teaming Howard Cross.
“When we're blocking one-on-one, I challenge our scout-team O-line, ‘We’ve got to block him. I don't want Howard Cross hitting the quarterback.’ He finds a way. But that shows you his intent in practice, like the purposeful ways he practices. And if we can get everybody on our team to practice with that intent, that mindset, we’ll get better faster than a lot of teams in the country. And so, that's what you're most pleased about, is that his mindset and in practices he’s very driven and works extremely hard.”
Q: You touched on the quarterback, Jack Plummer. This will be the third year and the third different team that he's played for, obviously. What have you seen from him in terms of his development as you looked at it over these three years? And then what’s the benefit for you in facing him a third straight year?
MF: “It's hard to confuse him, but we’re going to try. We're going to try to give him some different looks, but it’s hard to confuse him, because he's seen everything. There’s no substitution for experience, so he's seen a lot of different things defensively, and he makes decisions quickly. That's the one thing that I've noticed, even just watching him through these couple games of Louisville. He's making fast decisions. He knows exactly where he's going with the ball, and he's doing a good job of putting where it needs to be.
“So, we’ve got to be good in our pre-snap disguises and try to give him some different looks and not just give him one or two looks, and try to get him to hold [the ball] a little bit. And if we can get him to hold it, we’ll try to get pressure on him and try to affect him that way.”
Q: When you have so many issues to fix, how does that affect the rest of your preparation for a game?
MF: “You can’t let it take away from your every week preparation. But you have to address it and fix it. You can’t overlook those things. Sometimes victory helps you do that. When you lose, it’s easy to address every single thing. But the challenge for me and for us is to say, ‘OK, do not let the outcome let us permit things that we wouldn’t in defeat.’ Don’t permit in victories things that you won’t permit in defeat. That’s what we have to do if we want to improve. If we want to truly get better and be very intentful about what we’re doing to get better. We can’t let it affect our normal preparation, but we have to address it, we have to attack it and we have to fix it.”
Q: What were some of the points of improvement you identified with the running game this week?
MF: “One, it’s our footwork. We have to improve our footwork. There were a couple of times a misstep will cause the defensive line to get penetration. When you get penetration on the defensive line, it’s tough to execute in the run game. We have to be better with some of our angles in blocking the perimeter. They brought an extra safety in the box, and we have to find a way to get him dug out. Well, it’s about fundamentals and angles. You can easily say, ‘Ahh, RPO them’ or ‘Hey, next time we’ll get them,’ or ‘OK, why did we get this done?’ That’s what we did as a coaching staff. It wasn’t just we have to get this done. We know that. Why didn’t we? If we can continue to address those issues that way, then we can find a way to fix it. We have to find a way to fix it, but in order to fix it, you have to understand why it happened.”
Q: How much do you lean on analytics in your real-time decision-making?
MF: “Some. I use it. I try to teach our team some of the ways that we can learn from the analytics. I’m just not 100% dependent on it. There’s a part of feeling the game, feeling your team. What do you need? In some of those with those fourth-down situations where they’ll tell you to go, we need to continue to kick and build the confidence of Spencer [Shrader]. So those are all things that I take into consideration. I use the feedback, but I still — there’s a part of you have to use your gut. You can’t put all your decision-making on somebody else’s input. You have to use it, and I use it. But at the end of the day, I have to trust in my gut what’s best for the football team.”
Q: How do you gauge in practice how much you need to preserve their legs after six game weeks? Is it a heavier rotation or less of something on Tuesday or Wednesday?
MF: “We got back probably at 3-something in the morning. They have the day off, but you have to understand that this will be our third-straight night game and sixth or seventh straight undefeated opponent. We have another night game next week. You have to take in and factor some of the requirements they have for school. I’ve adjusted. I adjust each week based off the loads that I get back from the game, based off what the previous week looked like and based off the demands they have this week. We move some of the lifts around. Hey, what time are they getting up? It’s specific for actual individuals more than it is a team. What does this individual need to make sure on Saturday he’s ready to reach his full potential? We’ve made some tweaks to take in account the night game, take in account the late arrival, with Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s practices how we’ve adjusted it a little bit.”
Q: What have Junior Tuihalamaka and Joshua Burnham done well for you this year at vyper?
MF: “Both of them are continuously getting better. I know that’s not the answer you guys love to hear, but they are. The only way you get better is through reps, intentional reps through practice. Josh was playing at a really high level and then some of his reps decreased. Just because of the game and those things. But he went in there Saturday and did a really good job. Made some big plays for us. Same with Junior. He’s a consistent football player for us. I have a lot of confidence in both of those two guys to fill in with Jordan’s void.”
Q: What actually needs to be said and practiced to correct penalty issues when you should be able to assume that a senior knows he needs to line up onside?
MF: “It’s so easy to say, ‘Ahh, we know that. He should know that.’ But there’s a cause and effect for everything. That’s what I’m trying to prevent is just saying, ‘Ahh, he should know that. We know he should get aligned. We know that we should have 11 guys on the field.’ There’s a cause and effect for everything. So we have to figure out what was the cause that got that outcome. Why did Zeke [Correll] flinch? The first thing is we didn’t practice it enough. We have to practice it better. We have to be able to create — we had crowd noise last week. We knew it was going to be loud. But did we ever shift on Zeke? Did we ever do the things that caused him to jump? Let’s first figure out, 'Hey, Zeke, what did you hear? What made you flinch?’ We have to figure that out: why he did it, then address it. But if we just say, ‘Hey, Zeke, you know you can’t do that. Be better next time.’ You’re really not figuring out why he did it and you’re not really going to improve unless you figure out why each individual that made a mistake, why they did and then what do we have to do to have a better process to get the outcome we want.”
Q: How do you balance the challenge of focusing on this game without letting it impact what follows?
MF: “We have a saying, ‘One game, one life.’ This is all that matters. The reality is you can’t be worried about the outcome of the game as much as preparing yourself for the game, preparing this team and making sure we’re ready to perform at our highest level on Saturday. That’s just a constant message, a constant thought process. What is it going to take in today’s practice to make sure we’re ready for Saturday? What is it going to take tomorrow in preparation to make sure we’re ready for Saturday? The other part of it is how do we get better? How do we get better? That’s more important than anything. We have to continue to focus on improvement. Then Saturday will come. Obviously, you’re judged off whether you win or lose, but we can’t think about that. We have to focus on improving in today’s preparation and making sure we have a better chance to be successful on Saturday.”
Q: When do you get the data to inform your recovery-based decisions? What does it look like? Who interprets the information?
MF: “It’s kind of broken down to the 101 version for me. By the time it gets to me, I say, ‘Listen, I just need to know who’s high, who’s low, where these lows are at. How do I need to adjust? Who’s going to be fatigued? Who had an extremely high/low game? I look at it on an individual then a position basis. Then make the adjustments accordingly. I get it by Sunday. John Wagle and his team take all the numbers and get it to me. Then we meet on Mondays between that sports performance team of Wagle and Rob Hunt and Dr. [Matt] Leiszler. There’s like four or five of that meet. I have a structure. Hey, here’s what I’m thinking for this week in practice based off the numbers that I got and what our team needs. Any feedback? Any opinions? And I utilize it and say, ‘OK. Great. Understand it. Here’s what we’re going to do.’ And then I make a decision.”
Q: Is it reps? GPS? Snaps?
MF: “You wear a GPS. It’s the Catapult system. But it gets you loads, it gets you total loads, gets you sprint volume, it gets you jogging volume, it gets impacts. All those different things that give you feedback on the wear and tear on each player.”
Q: Did you see things to pick apart on the game-winning drive even though it ended well?
MF: “You have to evaluate every play one play at a time. We false started on the very first play. The second play, they had somebody running free. What do we have to do to correct those things? Then you look at the third-and-10 and the execution of it. The positive is, OK, when it mattered the most on that play we executed. I’m sure the play Sam scrambled for a first down on the fourth-down play, there’s always coaching and improvements. What I do love about that play is the improvement Sam made from the Ohio State game to that one. He knows in his head there’s no way I can slide in this situation. I have to make sure I get the first down. I tell myself and we’ve talked. A lot of it has to do with what he learned that Ohio State game. You can’t make it close. The communication was trying to get him to tell him, ‘Hey, we’re going to try to center this and kick it.’ That was the communication delay. We don’t have a signal to tell him, ‘Hey, we’re going to center this.’ It was being able to make sure that he knows that. It ended up being a touchdown.”
Q: Are conversations happening with the officials to warn players that they’re lining up offsides or the field goal team is getting set to trigger a false start? Were you guys given warnings and they still happened?
MF: “There are conversations I have with the referees. Before the game, probably not before they called it. But afterwards a discussion of what did you see. This is what we do on field goal. Then it’s communication back and forth. Then you turn in plays for interpretation. Every week you’re going to turn in plays and say, ‘OK, I want your interpretation on why this was called or why wasn’t it called.’ So we can continue to learn too. Sometimes they say, ‘Hey, we got it wrong.’ Sometimes they say, ‘No, we got it right. Here’s what you need to understand.’ We’re all trying to continuously grow from this and learn. Nobody’s perfect. Referees aren’t perfect. We’re not perfect. But it’s making sure that we have a clear understanding of what you’re going to enforce and what you’re looking for.”
Q: Have you reached out to get anymore clarification on the punt spot that was overturned by review?
MF: “They owned it and said it shouldn’t have been reviewed. We appreciate the honesty. What can you do now? The game’s over. The communication that we can have with the ACC officials is extremely important. That we can go back and forth and they can tell us why something happened or they can own a mistake. At least we can learn from it too. We talked to them immediately after the game. They told us that it wasn’t reviewable.”
Q: Are there things that you can take from watching NC State limit Louisville’s running game that can help your defense?
MF: “NC State is such a unique defense that you’re probably not going to take schematically everything they’ve done. But there are things in football that you can take from every opponent that’s had success. Say, OK, does this fit into our system? As I’ve told coach Golden and coach Parker, I always want to be innovative, but for us to have success, we have to do what we do and do it well. Our guys play best when they know what they’re doing, why they’re doing it and how they’re doing it. We can always look at some of the those things, but the No. 1 reason NC State had success was those guys played fast. They are bought into their defensive scheme, they own it and they play extremely fast. More than anything, it’s a reminder that, hey, continue to give our guys the opportunity to play fast and that’s why we’ll be successful.”
Q: Status update on … Eli Raridon?
MF: “He’ll be back this week.”
Q: Nolan Ziegler?
MF: “He possibly will be back this week.”
Q: Matt Salerno?
MF: “He’s out for an extended period. Not saying the entire season. He may possibly be back for postseason play.”
Q: KK Smith?
MF: “He’s still in the rehab phase. I do not expect him to be back.”
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