Inside Marcus Freeman's offseason path to coaching evolution at Notre Dame

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — On a nuclear-powered Naval aircraft carrier deployed in the Pacific Ocean — with a bunkmate and a communal bathroom as part of the baked-in ambiance — Marcus Freeman searched for answers, ideas and inspiration.

The Notre Dame head football coach, heading into what has predictably and historically been a defining season at the school — year 3, also pushed himself last month to evolve in more traditional places and ways. Like, for instance, visiting with the coaching staffs of five NFL teams in late May — the Pittsburgh Steelers, Cleveland Browns, Baltimore Ravens, Washington Commanders and Los Angeles Chargers, the latter with whom All-America left tackle Joe Alt and standout cornerback Cam Hart are settling in as recently drafted rookies.

“I was just on this mission,” Freeman told a small group of ND football beat media Friday at Notre Dame Stadium. “‘How do we prepare better? What do you guys do? What do you do? What’s your thoughts?’”

And then he did the same aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln for 36 hours before returning back to South Bend to get ready for Sunday’s summer-term report date, welcoming back veteran players for workouts and classes. The first-time-enrolling freshmen check in the following Sunday, June 9.

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“Basically, what the Admiral was telling me was they were going through spring ball,” Freeman said of the Naval experience. “They were going to get ready to dock and then they’re going to go out for the game.

“It’s real. We were talking about how they were practicing. ‘What are they looking for? How many mistakes do they make? How do they correct them?’

“They have 5,000 people on that battleship, but it was so good for me to just get a different perspective, different ideas of how to prepare better, and then say, ‘OK, what’s best for Notre Dame football?’”

The introspection, the self-correction, the self-coercion out of his comfort zone was a part of Freeman’s offseasons ahead of year 1 and year 2 on the job as well. But the consequences of what it would mean in this upcoming season, tangibly connected to his so-far 19-8 bottom line, are heightened now.

So are expectations for him and the players he’ll take into the Aug. 31 season opener at Texas A&M.

“Every time I go to a Notre Dame club, I hear about that,” Freeman affirmed of the year 3 intrigue.

And here's the backstory: Legendary coach Knute Rockne went 9-0 in his own year 3 (1920). And his Irish, with halfback George Gipp, outscored opponents collectively, 251-44, in an era before the Associated Press started its poll and awarding national championships.

Frank Leahy won one of those AP titles in his year 3 (1943) as did Ara Parseghian (1966), Dan Devine (1977) and Lou Holtz (1988) in theirs.

Hunk Anderson (3-5-1), Terry Brennan (2-8), Joe Kuharich (5-5), Gerry Faust (7-5), Bob Davie (5-7), Tyrone Willingham (6-6) and Charlie Weis (3-9) all underwhelmed in their respective year 3s. Willingham, in fact, was shown the door at the end of his.

The only quasi-middle ground was Jesse Harper’s 7-1 season in 1915 in the pre-polls era as Notre Dame first full-time head coach; the third season of Elmer Layden — the former fullback in the Four Horsemen backfield in his playing days — going 6-2-1 in year 3 as an Irish head coach and finishing No. 8 in the first-ever AP poll to end the season; and year 3 of the 12-year Brian Kelly Era (2010-21).

Freeman’s predecessor went 12-1 in his year 3, and his Irish played for the national title in 2012 — and got blown out by Alabama. Objectively, Kelly’s impact on the Notre Dame football program was profound. His clumsy exit to take the LSU job just after Thanksgiving in 2021 perhaps clouds that.

But it allowed Notre Dame to have the program in a place to roll the dice with a successor who had zero college head-coaching experience. And now Freeman stands on the doorstep of a historical marker, coaching in a college football world that looks very little like any of his predecessors’, with NIL, unlimited transfers and, soon, direct payments to players all part of the seismic changes.

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Freeman is doing an impressive job of staying ahead of the curve in the new frontier, while less smoothly at times in pushing through the growing pains in some of the more-visible coaching areas that have been rites of passage for coaches for decades.

“I don’t even try to put that pressure on our program or myself: ‘Oh, we have to win the national championship (in) year 3.’” Freeman said. “Our vision is still the same. We have to reach our full potential. … I think there’s just a confidence in what you’re doing as you go into year 3. And you’re probably going to be different as you go into year 4 and 5.

“But it’s just a different mindset because of the experiences you’ve had. What you’re looking to enhance is different in year 3 than it was in year 1. In year 1, you’re trying to figure out what to do: How do I want to run practice? OK, you’re the leader of this program, what does that mean? There’s no playbook for this thing. You have to learn.”

The 38-year-old Freeman's continuing learning journey comes with new leadership around him as well in year 3 — new athletic director Pete Bevacqua starting in March and president Rev. Robert A, Dowd taking over a day ago, on Saturday. The two men who hired him, believed in him — AD emeritus Jack Swarbrick and outgoing president Rev. John Jenkins — are retiring.

Two of the things Freeman is focusing on this offseason is one that was particularly challenging to him in year 2 — his team’s performance in road games — and one that’s been more of the chronic contributors to the Irish not winning a national title since Holtz’s in 1988, and in particular during the Kelly Era, when so many of the other elements fell into place.

Not having the “right” quarterback.

The Irish have only three true road games in 2024, mixed in with some neutral-site matchups — some more neutral than others. But Notre Dame’s first trip to College Station, Texas, since a 24-3 beatdown by the host Aggies in Davie’s last season (2001) should prove to be a reliable gauge of whether progress is being made in road-game operations, approach and performance.

In a 10-3 season in 2023, Notre Dame was at its worst, or at least its most disappointing, in road losses at Louisville (33-20) and Clemson (31-23) as well as much of its Sept. 30 survival of Duke (21-14) and now-ND quarterback Riley Leonard in Durham, N.C.

“There’s no substitution for experience and the things you learn,” Freeman said.

Freeman’s first regular-season game as a head coach came on the road against his alma mater, Ohio State, and against the highest-ranked opponent an Irish team has ever faced in a season opener (No. 2), back on Sept. 3, 2022. The Irish started strong, then faded in a 21-10 loss.

“I think probably going into that first year, I spent a lot of time talking about it,” Freeman reflected on the road-game experience. ‘We’re going to Ohio State, and this is what it’s going to sound like. Let’s play crowd noise.’ That, to me, is the difference in my mentality going into year 3. And, hopefully, the same thing with our program.

“I want to focus on the real things that can make us better. Confidence is important. Our players need confidence. Our players need to believe they are prepared. Not scared or worried about going to Texas A&M, Ohio State or a big environment. I want those guys so confident, they’re ready to go when we take the field whenever that date is. They truly, in their heart, believe they can get this job done.

“I gained a lot of wisdom just talking to some experienced individuals.”

Progress on the quarterback front is already in plain view. It’s hard to remember a QB room, at least in the past few decades at ND, with the depth of Leonard, junior Steve Angeli, sophomore Kenny Minchey and early enrolled freshman prodigy CJ Carr.

With momentum building for more.

On Sunday, Rivals top 50 2026 prospect Noah Grubbs verbally committed to the Irish. If he and 2025 commit Deuce Knight (No. 52 in his class) eventually honor their commitments and sign with ND — on the heels of Carr’s signing (No. 50 in 2024), it would mark the first time since 2008 that the Irish signed top 100 prospects at quarterback in as many as two consecutive classes.

And on Sunday, one of the 2027 class' early ascenders — QB Trae Taylor of Carmel Catholic in Mundelein, Ill. — is attending Notre Dame's Irish Invasion camp.

Every bit as critical, though, is getting the quarterback developmental model right once that talent does arrive.

So, Freeman took a critical eye this offseason to what went right with sixth-year grad transfer Sam Hartman as Notre Dame’s starter in 2023 and what went wrong.

“I’ve got to make sure I say this the right way — I don't know if we always put him in a situation to be as successful as he can be,” Freeman said. “He gave us everything he had. And there was a lot of good. It's not what he wanted, not what I wanted.

"But I did learn that what's most important is that you dive into a relationship. You spend time with the guys. I spent an enormous amount of time with Sam, one-on-one, getting to know him.

“The quarterback position is so important. I've said that before. We have to trust each other, and I spent a lot of time gaining his trust. And the same thing with Riley. I spent a lot of time with him, on phone, in person, trying to formulate a relationship that I've built for how many years with Steve Angeli. I spent a lot of time with Steve Angeli, I spent a lot of time recruiting CJ Carr, Kenny Minchey.

“Riley Leonard, this happened in January. I learned that from Sam — spend time. Be intentional. Dive into a relationship. Get to know him. He needs to get to know me. Be vulnerable with that person.”

Hartman in 2023 finished 14th individually in the national pass-efficiency rankings (159.5), the highest end-of-the-season showing for an ND quarterback since Jimmy Clausen finished third in 2009. But Hartman's extremes, while not unprecedented, were shocking for a player with that kind of starting experience.

He peaked in the opener against Navy (231.7) and dipped to a 76.9 rating against a Clemson team he had lit up the year before (234.9) while playing with his old Wake Forest team.

“The one disservice we did — and I didn't know it was going to happen — we changed [offensive] coordinators,” Kelly said of Tommy Rees’ abrupt February 2023 exit to leave for Alabama. “[Hartman] has got to kind of wait to learn what the new offense will be. There's a new quarterbacks coach. There's a progression for him to learn. Our offense has to be put together first, and then we’ve got to teach him. The time was cut short.”

And Gerad Parker, who left in December to become Troy’s head coach after one year as offensive coordinator at ND, at times coached like an inexperienced offensive coordinator.

And now the Irish have another new offensive coordinator, their third in three seasons. But Mike Denbrock arrived in December, not four weeks before spring practice was set to start, and started putting the pieces together then. He also has two previous tours of duty at ND as well as a track record that includes presiding over the nation’s No. 1 team in total offense and scoring least season at LSU.

“Even though it's new for the entire offensive unit, [Denbrock] is here,” Freeman said. “They're meeting together. They can go through it. They can talk through it. I believe we have the personnel around Riley Leonard to make sure he's successful. And that's probably the [difference in the] two situations.”

Leonard, if he beats out Angeli in training camp — as expected, will be ND’s third transfer QB to top the depth chart in the last four years. Freeman would like him to be the last one for the foreseeable future.

“I think when the portal first opened, ‘Oh my God, this is like free agency. Let’s go into this portal and let’s find guys.’” Freeman said. “Then you realize, ‘OK, one, you can’t get everybody into school.’ And then, two, you’re like, ‘Is that what’s best for your football team?’

“We have a philosophy now. We’re going to double down on high school recruiting. I believe in that. We have to build our foundation on high school recruiting. There’s a lot of different reasons for that.

“But we will supplement in the transfer portal at specific positions of need, and that can change every year. But Notre Dame football is going to be built based off high school recruiting, and I feel more strongly about that now than I ever have.”

He also feels like Leonard can be the “right” quarterback for right now. For that defining year 3 journey.

“When I think back to preparing for Riley Leonard [in the 2023 Duke-ND game], I think he’s a great decision-maker. That’s the thing we talked about. He makes really good decisions, and he can use his legs to hurt you.

“It’s not just a guy that can scramble to throw the ball. There are designed quarterback run plays that can present an issue for your defense. And so tough. Just tough. I went back and studied some of last year’s games, and I watched [ND-Duke] recently.

“The first half, he just did OK. We did a really good job [defensively]. Then, the second half, he said, ‘OK, I’m going to create some plays with my legs’ and they started doing things with him running the ball, which opened up some things in the pass game. He had a long run and broke some tackles.”

And then suffered a game-ending ankle injury on a sack by All-America defensive tackle Howard Cross III, now Leonard’s teammate — who Leonard jokes still owes him a dinner.

“He’s a competitor,” Freeman said of Leonard. “I don’t know what the NFL projects him as. I just know that dude is competitive and a gamer. When the game is on the line, I want to give the ball to him — if I’m at Duke last year.

“I see him making good decisions. He’s got a good arm. He presents a challenge with his legs in the quarterback run game and his ability to extend plays. I think he’s going to be a heckuva player for us.”

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