Notre Dame Ready For Buechele Or Swoopes In Opener

It’ll be freshman Shane Buechele or senior Tyrone Swoopes taking the first snap against Notre Dame on Sept. 4.

The Irish are ready for either Texas quarterback.

“It doesn’t change much,” Notre Dame senior linebacker James Onwualu said.

Longhorns coach Charlie Strong said last week he “kind of” knows who the starter will be, though he said he won’t announce it publicly.

The team will know, the third-year coach said, but as he stated: “I’m not going to put it out there because I don’t want Notre Dame to know who we will be starting at quarterback.”

Whether that makes a difference in the opener will be determined.

Swoopes, who is 6-8 as a starter and took almost all the snaps last year in a 38-3 loss to the Irish, settled into a short-yardage role with the “18-wheeler” package in 2015. He scored a team-high 12 rushing touchdowns.

Buechele, the talented former four-star prospect from Arlington, Texas, enrolled in January and competed immediately for the starting job.

“They’re both good quarterbacks,” Onwualu said, “they both have their good things and they both have their bad things.”

Onwualu — who along with Torii Hunter Jr., Mike McGlinchey and Isaac Rochell was named a Notre Dame team captain this week — said Wednesday the team has begun transitioning into Texas preparations.

But even before Texas became the main focus of practices, Onwualu said he and a lot of the players were doing individual film studies and met with the coaches.

Onwualu said the Irish are set up to handle either Buechele and/or Swoopes.

“We’ll be able to adapt,” Onwualu said.

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