Patterson, Irish make a case for why opting in for the Gator Bowl matters
More compelling than the latest injury report. More revealing than quarterback Tyler Buchner’s December comeback log. More relevant than the tangential questions about transfer portal plunges, politics and policies was the raw, genuine point of view Thursday offered up by Jarrett Patterson.
Tucked away in a concessions area somewhere in the middle tier of TIAA Bank Field, the Notre Dame grad senior offensive guard, during a 25-minute press conference with head football coach Marcus Freeman and linebacker JD Bertrand, succinctly unpacked why all this mattered.
This, being the 78th-annual Gator Bowl, an off-Broadway staple in college football’s persistent postseason parade that is matching two ranked teams for the first time in 17 years … when Freeman was still a teenager.
Patterson and the 21st-ranked Irish (8-4) and No. 19 South Carolina (8-4), admittedly diluted versions of themselves, clash Friday at the 67,164-seat stadium in Jacksonville, Fla., (3:30 p.m. EST; ESPN) in a game that would have been oh-so-understandable had the 6-foot-5, 310-pound Laguna, Hills, Calif., opted out.
“The way I look at it, I have one more opportunity to play with this group,” said Patterson, a player with an unquestioned NFL future who was willing to play physically compromised for the entire season anyway.
“Despite all the injuries, passing on an opportunity — the injuries come and go, but the memories last forever. I really had no thought of opting out or not practicing, anything like that. I wanted to finish this thing off the right way and play my last game as a Notre Dame football player.”
Notre Dame did have two NFL Draft-related opt-outs, in All-America tight end Michael Mayer and All-America defensive end Isaiah Foskey, one a seemingly absolute first-rounder and one who has a chance to be.
They’re just the third and fourth from the Irish program to do so since LSU’s Leonard Fournette and Stanford’s Christian McCaffrey started the opt-out trend six years ago. All of those aforementioned were arguably good business decisions.
Yet many who have followed in that path across the country, draft hopefuls or draft probables or the outright disillusioned, often reveal something about their respective program’s culture with their decisions.
Patterson’s mid-August foot sprain was so perpetual and so painful that after some games this season he wore a protective boot to class on Mondays. The only game that the AFCA second-team All-American missed was the one he wasn’t medically cleared for — the Sept. 3 season-opening, 21-10 loss at Ohio State.
Even then he pushed it to the point of the medical staff having to make a game-time decision.
Meanwhile, defensive tackle Jayson Ademilola won’t play Friday because of an undisclosed injury, but the grad senior starter made the trip to Jacksonville anyway with the hopes of overcoming it enough to contribute.
Starting safety Brandon Joseph, battling a chronic high-ankle sprain, is in a similar situation, though he was able to practice this week. Freeman said Thursday that the 6-1, 196-pound senior would be a gametime decision.
Both players are expected to be drafted in the NFL in April, though Joseph has a U-turn available to him should he choose to return to ND for the 2023 season to build more draft equity.
Unwaveringly, Friday’s game has meaning to them, beyond the bowl swag.
Winning matters. The young, impressionable players on the roster and what they take from their leaders matter.
“I want this group to be the example for our future groups,” Freeman said. “We talked about this all season, this road to where we want to go isn't always as we see it on the front end.
“I want this group to be the example: This is why you trust your coaches, continue to work no matter what the outcome is each week. To finish this thing off the right way with a victory here at this Gator Bowl would be a tremendous example for not only a congratulations to this senior group and this group of players that have been so resilient, but no matter what, they're going to be the example of what we use to propel this program forward.”
Freeman, meanwhile, has propelled himself forward in his second bowl game as Notre Dame’s head coach with lessons learned from the 37-35 Fiesta Bowl loss to Oklahoma State last Jan. 1 and the frantic, multi-tasking frenzy leading up to his Irish head coaching debut.
“Oh, whew, I'm sure my emotions were all over the place,” he said, comparing his bowl scenarios. “I remember having a press conference next to Mike Gundy. It was obviously surreal. You're just kind of figuring it out one day at a time.
“You know what, I think you're still figuring this thing out. I don't think the day will come where you say you’ve got it all figured out. That's the reality of this profession, having the opportunity to lead this great group of young men.
“I think you have a plan and you have a sense of the, ‘Hey, here is how we want to proceed.’ Those plans obviously have to continue to enhance and change depending on the situation you're in. A year later, we have a practice structure. We have a plan that we looked at for this year compared to what we did last year.
“We'll get a chance to go out and play an extremely talented football team and be able to reflect, be able to look back and say, ‘Where can we enhance our preparation and make sure the next bowl opportunity we have (that) we're in a better situation?’”
The reality is that beginning in 2024 Notre Dame will have a realistic shot at becoming a regular in the expanded 12-team College Football Playoff. And games like the Gator Bowl will have to fight even harder for their own relevance once that postseason shift comes.
Perhaps bowls then can spin their games more as previews for the coming season than referendums on the ones being completed. And while there’s value in that concept for Notre Dame — even in this game — Freeman has excluded that from the messaging to this Irish squad.
“The most important thing is winning,” he said. “That's going to give us the most momentum as we continue to look forward. As I told the players yesterday in our team meeting, our focus is right now.
“Our focus is finishing this season off right now in the right way. If you continue to focus on the future, think about the future, you're going to lose the opportunity we have in front of us. The future will be taken care of if we finish the season off the right way.”
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