Notre Dame head football coach Marcus Freeman held a press conference Monday at Notre Dame Stadium, previewing Saturday's 2023 home game between his ninth-ranked Irish (3-0) and first-time opponent Central Michigan. (2:30 EDT; Peacock streaming). Here's everything he had to say. Answers are largely verbatim. Question are edited for brevity and clarity.
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OPENING STATEMENT
"I wanted to start this off and open up with paying respect to all those that have been impacted by 911. I had the opportunity this summer, when we were in New York, to go see the 911 Memorial. And I've been in New York but have never been there. And to go and see those names and to see, obviously, the place where the old World Trade Centers were located, that really had an impact on me.
“And so, on this day, I want to make sure I opened up with that and really pay respect to all those that have been impacted by 911. We're going to start our team meeting today with educating our players on the history of 911, because it's 22 years ago, and maybe [24-year-old] Sam [Hartman] would be the only one. Sam, maybe he won’t remember, being 2 years old, [at the time], but I want to educate them on really the impact of that day.
“Pivoting to football, I was so pleased with the way our team, our program, the support staff really managed the circumstances over the course of the six, seven hours that we were at NC State. And we had a great plan, from nutrition, really having a plan if we had a delay. Those plans started at like 8:30 in the morning. You’re making calls and saying, ‘Hey, if we would have to have a postponement, here's what we'll do. And it was really good to see from, from nutrition to operations to equipment, they did a great job. And sometimes as the head coach, in the midst of everything, you really don't see everything, but it was really good, just recapping how we handled that, it was really positive.
“I know the Hollywood story out there is that Audric [Estimé] had a hot dog, and went out and ran an [80-]-yard touchdown. Trust me, that sounds a lot better. but the reality is that we did have a good plan for that postponement, and I wanted to make sure that I gave credit to our support staff and really the planning they did for that moment.
“After watching film, I'm really proud of the way our team handled a tough environment versus a really good football team. I really believe, after watching that tape, that opponent, NC State, is a good football team. They’re tough. They’re physical on both sides of the ball, special teams. And so, I was proud of the way our guys truly handled some resiliency, but then they came back and really shut the door in the fourth quarter.
“It got to a seven-point game, and we forced a missed field goal. And everybody’s like, ‘OK, here we go.’ And then we ended up having to punt. And then our defense came back out and was resilient, and then our offense comes back out and scores. And we really did a good job in that fourth quarter of saying, ‘This is going to be who we are. We're not going to look at the circumstances and what the score is, but really stay in the moment.’ And, as I tell those guys, win the Interval. Every play. That's all that really matters.
“Offensively, we started slow — two three-and-outs. We can't do that. We know that, but I really liked the way we used multiple different personnels and formations and different schemes out of those personnels to create some mismatches that we were able to have some really positive plays throughout the entirety of the game.
“The two-minute drive before half was again really good. That's three games in a row that I've been aggressive when the other team has had the ball in calling timeouts, because I believe we have a chance to get the ball in our offense’s hands with no matter how much time. Probably if it's more than 30 seconds, I’m going to call timeout, so we can get the ball in our offense’s hands and let them get a chance to run a two-minute operation. I was pleased with the way they did that.
“We obviously can't put the ball on the ground, and Sam knows that. And we have to do a better job of, one, protecting him, but he's got to do a better job of protecting the football in those situations. You know one pre-snap penalty again, and so we want zero. But I mean it's still a great job in that environment where, for the first time, we're using a clap cadence. To only have one pre-snap penalty was huge.
“Defensively we were opposite from the offense. We started extremely fast. I think out of the first seven drives you had five three-and-outs, we forced a punt and then we had an interception. And then you look at the first touchdown drive, you have three penalties. You can't have that, and that's something I challenged the defensive staff and our players [on]. If we want to be a great defense, we can't have three penalties, one of them being a personal foul. I think one was a hands-to-the-face, and one was a defensive holding. So, that can't happen, because the result of that is a touchdown versus a good team.
“And so but no matter what the situation is, I thought they kept battling. Three interceptions is huge. And the offense ended up scoring 14 points off of those three interceptions. That was big. They're playing hard. They're playing fast, and I said this before, but you can see the clarity that our players have. Why are they playing so fast and why are they playing so aggressive? Because there's clarity. They know what they're doing. They know why they're doing it. They know how they're doing it, and they’re playing violent. And so, really good job on our defense, and it was good to finally get some special teams in there.
“Spencer [Shrader] hit a new school-record, 54-yard field goal, barely missed the 56-yarder. And if you watch it, he hit it almost above halfway up the goalposts, so plenty of leg. I don’t know how far that equates out to, if there’s somebody that can do the geometry and stuff and measure the angles and tell you how far the ball would have gone, but it was really good to see. He's got a huge leg. And then Bryce [McFerson] averaged over 50 yards a punt. I think our net was about 44 yards. It was a good day. It was a really good day on special teams.
“Players of the game — on offense was Holden Staes. Got his first touchdown two weeks ago, and this week's got two. I said, ‘Just keep doubling it up.’ He's doing a great job. Defensively was DJ Brown, who's playing at a high level right now, and special teams was Spencer Schrader. And then the scout team player of the week [on offense] was Jordan Faison. Man, he's going to be a good football player for us. I keep talking to [ND men’s lacrosse] coach [Kevin] Corrigan. I said, ‘He's looking really good. I know he's going to play lacrosse here, but he's a good football player.’ The second guy was Devan Houstan. He was the scout team defensive player of the week. It’s the second time he's won it, so that's encouraging to hear. We encourage — hey, spread it out. You're don’t have to give it to the same guy, but he earned it. And then special team is Leo Scheidler.
“Moving on to Central Michigan, I look forward to getting a chance to meet coach [Jim] McElwain. I have a lot of respect for him. I really started following him as a young coach or maybe still as a player when he was at Alabama. I think he went on to Colorado State and Florida, and the things he did there. I think he had a year at Michigan before he went to Central Michigan. So, looking forward to getting a chance to meet him. He's got a good football team. It doesn't take long to really watch that. Their offense is explosive. The quarterback makes it go. He is an athletic quarterback, and he can run it. You can watch the first series of the last game. He takes the ball 40-50 yards and scores a touchdown, so we have to be ready for that. I think they’ve got some good skill. And our defense will have a good challenge.
“And then defensively for them, again, a team that ranked as one of the top teams in the MAC defensively. I think they have nine of 11 returning starters, so an experienced group that again is going to be attacking, creates chaos — a lot of TFLs. And so, we will have a challenge, and we look forward to this challenge. I know somebody's going to ask about Ohio State coming up, and it doesn't take long to put on film and understand that we have a challenge [this week].
“I've always said, ‘We get 12 guaranteed opportunities.’ So, we're down to nine, and for us to overlook any opponent would be just crazy, right? We've got to look forward to this opportunity to play at Notre Dame Stadium versus a good opponent and look forward to getting back to work today. So, with that I’ll open up for questions.”
Q: You mentioned pass protection needs to be improved. What specifically, if you’re watching tape, do you feel needs to be improved to reduce the sacks?
MF: “I think it's a lot of different things. I think Sam was sacked four times, but it's not all just pass protection. It's the routes. We’ve got to make sure that our details are correct in the routes and that we're on the same page. We’ve got an option route, a guy runs an out or runs in. And everybody's detailed out. The technique of pass protection. Sam getting the ball out of his hands, or sometimes you know what, you go against good defense. They had some good pressure packages, and one or two that I kind of said, ‘Hey, we might need to look at this defensively.’ It was really good that they were able to do that. So, it's not one specific person, one specific position. It's a group. As a collective group, we have to continue to improve in all aspects of the pass protection.”
Q: Defensively a lot of the talk this offseason was needing to create turnovers. Three interceptions this week. What does that do for you guys early in the season?
MF: “It's huge to give our offense the ball in plus territory, and they end up getting 14 points off of those three interceptions. That's a huge momentum, morale base. And I think it's a lot of different things that go into it. We knew we’d be challenged down the field. Ben Morrison made a great play down the field. DJ Brown had one that I think was off a tipped ball. And Xavier Watts had one. So, the ability to change up your coverages, the ability to not always be in the same coverage, because that's what kind of happened. I think that third quarter, we started to get comfortable playing a little bit of man, and [Brennan] Armstrong was getting the ball out of his hands and making some plays. And so, we were able to kind of switch up the coverages and do some different things that, hopefully, created some confusion. But guys have got to be in position to make plays, and they did.”
Q: You touched on resiliency. With that being something that maybe last year was up and down a little bit, was there a point this offseason where you can pinpoint where you saw that, where you said, ‘This is going to be something we can lean into this year?’
MF: “I think you always try to put your players in difficult situations and see how they respond. And it can be a situation that they know what's coming or they don't know what's coming. When [Matt] Balis was here, we worked in depth about us. ‘Don't tell them how much [they’re going] to run.’ I just want them to make sure they just continue to get back to the line, and leadership emerges, and they just go in and do whatever we ask them to do.
“And so, that, to me, is a reflection of that. No matter what the score is, no matter if it's a seven-point game and North Carolina State has the ball in our territory, the ability to just focus in on that rep and not look at the finish line. It's the same thing as summer conditioning, period,. If you tell them, ‘You’ve got 10 half-field gassers, [they might respond], ‘OK, I'm going to coast and try to get the 10.’ Instead, lust say, ‘Hey, get on the line. We'll stop when we're done.’ I think it gives them the ability to just stay locked in, in the moment, and truly not look at the finish line.
“Because when things get really, really tough, and you're just looking at the finish line, that's where you see guys tap out, guys that say, ‘Man, this is too difficult.’ But if you just stay in the moment, I think that's where you'll see a resilient bunch of guys.”
Q: In all three games, you've had eight guys with at least one catch, but we keep hearing from people, ‘This guy hasn't had the ball or what's wrong with this guy?’ Do you have a point where you say, ‘Hey, we need to look for this guy?’ Or are you fine with just saying, ‘Hey, the open guy's going to get the ball?’
MF: “I love what we're doing, the ability to spread the ball out. You know, last year if you look at it, it was almost the Michael Mayer effect. It was if Michael Mayer’s in single coverage, you’re going to Michael Mayer. I think the ability for us to really go through a progression, it really puts the defense at a disadvantage, because you can't just double-cover one guy. And that's the great thing about the weapons we have at tight end, at wide receiver, in the backfield. We throw to our backs too in the pass game.
“We're able to go through a progression and not just say, ‘This is the go-to guy.’ And I think that's a reflection of how you see the ball being spread around. And so, you're going to be the guy when the ball comes your way. But you always have to anticipate the ball’s coming your way. And I think that's the beautiful part about how we're playing offensively right now, is that everybody and anybody on any play has a chance to have the ball going their way.”
Q: With the success of the two-minute drill, has it gone well enough that you would consider throwing at it in as a change of pace, an uptempo pace? I know you'd like to lean on the running game, but that two-minute drill has been so successful. Is there ways to include that in the offense outside of the two-minute drill?
MF: “We definitely have tempo in our offensive system. We haven't used it much. There are varying ways of using tempo. I don't want to be a team that goes Mach speed and runs 100 plays a game, because I believe in complementary football. I believe in the ability to establish the run game and different things like that. But we have different ways of running [tempo]. You can huddle and run tempo out of a huddle. There are just different ways to run tempo, but we do have the ability to be a fast, uptempo team if we want to. Right now it just hasn't been in the game plan.”
Q: What sort of progression have you seen from Xavier Watts at the safety position in terms of getting more comfortable and having an ability to make some plays?
MF: “Yeah, I think it’s confidence. He’s a guy that two years ago we moved him from wideout to safety. You're just seeing his confidence level continue to rise, and give a credit to coach [Chris] O’Leary and the job he's done with Xavier in that safeties room. We're rolling three, four guys in at the safety position, and they're all playing at a high level. And so, that's a part of that unit strength that we talk about. It’s that ability to be unselfish, and you can go through many different positions and talk about that. But the ability to be unselfish when you're in there, and to go out and do your job. And that's what you seeing Xavier Watts being able to do.”
Q: You had six three-and-outs and six touchdowns Saturday. How did Gerad Parker manage recovering from those three-and-outs?
MF: “We watched it yesterday and during the game. The first two series — I never want to say somebody plays harder than us, because we pride ourselves on that — they came out of the gate blazing. It wasn’t as much as the schematic aspect of it, but they were beating blocks and being aggressive as heck. We had to settle down and say, ‘OK, hold on. What do we need to do to start establishing some production on our offense?’ That third series, it was like, ‘Hey, we might need to throw the ball a little bit more. Hey, if see drop eight on this next third down, maybe Sam’s going to run.’ That’s what we ended up doing on that first third down of the third series. It was an ability to say, ‘OK, let’s utilize this different personnels.’ I know we like to be able to run the ball, but we said, ‘Hey, we might have to spread it out a little bit to try to just get them to maybe be less aggressive and have some positive plays. Then go down the field and try to score.’ We had some explosive plays too. We weren’t great on third down offensively when you look at the numbers, but we did have some explosive plays on first and second down that led to points. It was adjustments, adjustments, adjustments. How do we get into a different formation? Let’s say, ‘OK, we have great blocking that was on this.’ Everybody talked about the unbalanced that we were doing. We were looking for angles, looking for different angles to try to block some of the guys defensively.”
Q: Do you have conversations with Deland McCullough on when to give Audric Estime a break and get Jadarian Price in there?
MF: “We have discussions throughout the week on our game plan. How many reps are we going to get guys? What do the packages include? But a lot of it is personnel-based. We have certain packages with certain running backs. We know Audric is Audric. He’s going to be the guy that we give the ball to and say, ‘Run this thing.’ But we have some really good players in that running back room that when they come in the game they’re making big plays. Jadarian Price had a really good game, had some really positive plays. Jeremiyah Love, same thing. We have to continue to utilize the strengths of each guy in that room. But we’re not going to get away from who we are. We never make decision based on appeasing. Hey, we have to appease this guy. No. What’s best for us to have success? When you do that, you create that unit strength amongst that room. ‘Hey guys, everybody’s in this for a reason.’ It’s about the team. It’s about Notre Dame football having success. Here’s your role. Here’s what we think you’re doing. It’s a reflection of coach McCullough but also the guys in that room.”
Q: How do you handle a veteran like Jack Kiser making a mistake with an offside penalty? Do you take him out? Where do you draw the line?
MF: “Jack came out after that play, because we were in nickel and JD and Marist were in that series. The defensive offsides on Jack was on punt return, our punt block unit. Every game we debrief. So I said, ‘Hey, what’s one of the things if we played this team again, we would do differently. That’s working a clap on our punt block unit versus their punt team. That’s not something we did. We did a lot off of cadences. They went off of a clap, and that was a good changeup on them. So that’s as much on us as a coaching staff of being able to practice that as it is on Jack. Now Jack knows he should go off the ball. Your job as a defensive player is you go across the line of scrimmage when the ball’s snapped. They get into a habit of going off of cadences, because you’re trying to jump the cadence. All of us take accountability for that, but Jack wasn’t taken off the field because of that. He was taken off the field just because of defensive personnel at that moment.”
Q: When you look at a gameplan, do you try to predict this is going to be more high scoring or more low scoring? Or are you trying to win every game 63-0?
MF: “It all comes down to complementary football. They have been a high-scoring offense. You look at what they did last week. I know the first week they didn’t score as many points versus Michigan State, but last week they scored 40-plus points. We have to understand the challenges that presents. Defensively, really if you look at last year’s numbers over the course of the season, they were really good, especially stopping the run. We meet on Mondays. I meet with the coordinators. Hey, what do you think it’s going to take for your side of the ball to have success? We meet together, because I want to make sure as the offense says, ‘Hey, need possessions,’ the defense is understanding, ‘Hey, we have to be a little bit more aggressive to try to get them off the field.’ If you think about playing Navy, where offense knows the possessions are going to be limited. So, we have to make sure we’re playing complementary football. But yeah, to go to your point, to be able to go 63-nothing would be great.”
Q: What is JD Bertrand’s status?
MF: “He’s in concussion protocol. So he’ll be non-contact tomorrow. But I talked to him yesterday. He’s doing much better. But he’s in concussion protocol, so to be determined right now.”
Q: So we don’t know a timetable?
MF: “No.”
Q: What is Devyn Ford’s status?
MF: “He’s expected to be back. He’s finishing up his concussion protocol, but he’s expected to be back by Saturday.”
Q: Still a couple weeks for Gabriel Rubio?
MF: “Yeah. He’ll be out this week.”
Q: What is Eli Raridon’s status?
MF: “Still progressing. I doubt he’ll be back this week. Not 100% sure, but I doubt he’ll be back. It’s progression. When you come off your second ACL, it can be physical and mental. That is something that until he physically feels 100% and mentally feels like he’s ready to go, you can’t push that guy to get on the field. So we’re working with him to physically make sure that he’s feeling like he’s 100%. Then mentally, you feel capable that you won’t go out and reinjure yourself.”
Q: Your pass rush has generated turnovers and the fourth-best pass efficiency defense in the country but not a lot of sacks. Is that the next evolution? Or are you OK with the other two things?
MF: “If it generates interceptions and great pass efficiency defense, I’m great with it. We kind of counted. He was getting the ball out of his hands around four seconds, which isn’t a lot of time to get a sack. I know we hit him, I think, double digits. We got some QB hurries. I know everybody look, and even coach Wash. I had to talk to Coach Wash. Don’t get frustrated with the numbers. We can sometimes be outcome-driven. What is the number of sacks? Let’s look at how many times we hit the quarterback, we affected him with our coverages and really look at the interceptions that are a result of the pressure you got on him. We were very strategic in how we wanted to rush this quarterback. We could not be out of control and just free rush this guy. We wanted to create pass rush games that forced him to do certain things. I’m really pleased with the execution and the outcome of what happened. I know the sack numbers weren’t what we all aspire to have, but the outcome in terms of the interceptions, in terms of the pass efficiency was exactly what we needed.”
Q: Can you live with having to generate pass rush pressure with second-level blitzes to help the front four?
MF: “I think we have to. I have full confidence in our pass rush with four guys. But that’s who we are is being able to keep offenses off balance by bringing second-level linebackers but also defensive backs in terms of the pressure package and being able to be multiple in our coverages behind it. That all comes into factor. Our defense has done a really good job. I’m disappointed in the last touchdown we gave up. I just didn’t think we finished the game, that series, the way our standard has been set. They will come. The sacks will come. Just continuing to buy into what we’re trying to do defensively, because the results defensively as a big picture have been exactly what we wanted.”
Q: How does everything you dealt with on Saturday speak to the maturity of this team?
MF: “There’s multiple different things that occurred Saturday that will help this team grow. You look at some of the adversity on the field. You look at some of the distractions in terms of pregame it’s raining. Then we postpone the game. Then we come back out and it starts raining again. We have a 15-minute halftime instead of a 20-minute halftime. All these different factors came into play. And our players, I kept hearing them say, ‘Stay in the moment. Stay in the moment.’ That’s what we preach. Stay in the moment. Because the rest of the stuff, we don’t have any input into it. They’re just things that happened. They’re distractions. Our leadership amongst our players, the maturity of those guys. The freshmen, a lot of times they don’t know. They’ll follow after what the older guys do. We have a great group of seniors and leaders and captains that continue to drive home the message. Stay in the moment. Don’t worry about factors that we have no control over.”
Q: What went into the decision to attempt the 56-yarder with Spencer Shrader?
MF: “I have confidence Spencer can make a 60-yard field goal, because I’ve seen him do it in practice. But a lot of it comes into factor: the wind, what type of field conditions. I’m in communication with coach Biagi: Where’s the line? Because the line could be different in terms of the direction we’re going. The line, whichever way we were going that part of the game, was right where we were at. He said, ‘Hey, I feel confident he can do it.’ Then I said, ‘Let’s kick it.’ You had an option to kick the football or punt the ball there. I think it was a little bit too far to go for it on fourth down. It’s a constant communication on how we feel Spencer’s mindset is. But there’s no yard line for me below 60 that I don’t feel confident with Spencer out there.”
Q: How did Chris Bacsik’s equipment staff come through in Saturday’s game?
MF: “We had multiple cleats just because it’s a grass game and we knew it was going to be wet. We had multiple dry undergarments for our guys to be able to change into. When we first got into the locker room, we said keep your pads on. It’s a 30-minute delay. Then once we realized it was going to be longer, we said take your pads off. A lot of those guys had wet clothes. They were able to get into dry clothes. We had to re-tape and all those different things. I don’t know if we had two jerseys for every single player there, but you have two hours. Your clothes dry. I thought Bass was well-prepared. Our equipment staff — the whole operation. We had to call the plane. We talked about calling the plane and saying, ‘OK, can we still make it out of here at this certain time. We’re delayed.’ All those conversations go on during that break. There’s a lot of operations outside of the game of football that has to be done, and they did a great job.”
Q: How important is complementary resiliency with this team? Like when the offense fumbled, then defense forced a missed field goal and then the offense scored a touchdown.
MF: “You accomplishing your job has nothing to do with what just happened the last series or what just happened to the offense and what just happened to the defense. That has to be the mindset we have. We can blame the other side of the ball. We can blame the field conditions. We can blame what happened last play. Or we can say, ‘OK, we have to win this play.’ That’s what I was able to see. You talk about resilient group. I talk about resilience to focus on doing your job at that moment and not blaming. We’ve all been a part of teams that have seen, well, the offense isn’t moving the ball, so the defense starts chirping because they’re doing a good job. Or the offense is scoring, but the defense can’t stop them. We have to continue to preach to our guys, that stuff doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is winning the interval on this play. I heard guys talking about, but I saw that execution on Saturday.”
Q: What did you see out of Gerad Parker that let you know he could have success calling plays in a two-minute drill?
MF: “We do two-minute drills every week in practice. That’s why you work it. You put different situations, different time on the clock, different timeouts. You move the ball. Is it two-minute before half, two-minute at the end of the game? That builds confidence in the coordinator. That build confidence in the players. The offense doesn’t always win in practice. But I have a lot of confidence in Gerad Parker as our offensive coordinator, in the guys that we have on that field, in a two-minute situation. Really throughout the whole game. We have a great coaching staff. We have a great group of guys. It’s a privilege to work with these guys. We work together. It’s a team. There’s some great minds amongst this coaching staff. The ability to create a culture where guys feel empowered to speak. It’s not just blind obedience. That’s what I love about this coaching staff, because you hear great ideas. It’s not just the coordinators. Great ideas from all 10 assistant coaches. Guess what? I get input as the head coach. I get input from the great minds that we have. It gives me a lot of confidence working with this coaching staff.”
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