The month of August ends on Sunday with the Fighting Irish closing out the first weekend* of the college football season in primetime on ABC against the Miami Hurricanes. Only 192 days ago, Notre Dame lost the National Championship Game to Ohio State and now we get to start a new campaign in Marcus Freeman’s 4th season in control of the blue and gold.
*Technically, TCU at North Carolina on Labor Day closes out Week 1 this upcoming Monday.
The quest to get back to the title game starts now.
#6 Notre Dame (-2.5) at #10 Miami
Hard Rock Stadium
Miami Gardens, FL
Date: Sunday, August 31, 2025
Time: 7:30 PM ET
TV: ABC
The rest of the country should be dialed in to watch this game so expect a big TV rating and lots of hot takes come late Sunday night and Monday morning. Two teams the nation loves to hate, let’s go!
Vegas Corner
Many months ago, the line opened as Notre Dame -2.5 and has remained remarkably stable. Not even Carson Beck’s off-season injury or Notre Dame’s fall camp quarterback competition has budged this line. With just a few days to go until kickoff nothing has changed.
Weather Report
A few days ago there were some concerns, as we approach hurricane season, that Invest 99L was going into develop into a tropical storm and possibly head directly for south Florida. The National Hurricane Center is no longer tracking 99L, so we’ll be fine.
However, scattered thunderstorms and a 70% chance of rain are expected for Miami Gardens on Sunday evening. Temperatures should be climbing towards the upper 80’s throughout the day but by kickoff they look to drop to a much more manageable low 80’s and high 70’s. Let’s hope there are no long lightning delays on a Sunday night game.
Series History
Notre Dame leads 18-8-1 (0.685)
The tradition of this series is there (19 meetings between 1971-1990 and things got truly heated for the last several games in that era) although this is only the 5th meeting between Notre Dame and Miami over the last 16 years, and the first since 2017.
The Hurricanes moved into Hard Rock Stadium (then called Dolphins Stadium) for the 2008 season after tearing down the old Orange Bowl and this will be only the 2nd meeting for Notre Dame against Miami in this stadium. The first being the no-good game and last meeting from 2017.
2017 in Miami Gardens sucked, there’s no other way to put it.
The Irish did get their first win at Hard Rock Stadium last year in the Orange Bowl victory over Penn State. However, traditionally speaking the road games against Miami have never been easy. Notre Dame is 0-6 against Miami playing at the Canes home stadium.
In more positive news, the Irish are 5-2 against Miami stretching all the way back to the immortal 1988 meeting in South Bend.
Fun Fact(s)
Miami Gardens where Hard Rock Stadium resides was officially incorporated only back in 2003. As of the 2024 census, the city had a population over 116,000 ranking it the 265th most populous in the United States behind Manchester, New Hampshire and ahead of Waterbury, Connecticut.
The stadium sits just under 22 miles to the north of Miami’s campus in Coral Gables. For Notre Dame, this would be like the football stadium being in Berrien Springs, Michigan in comparison. The Hurricanes football team travels in buses to the stadium on game days while the Lakeside Village on campus right by Route 1 runs shuttle buses for fans to Miami Gardens.
They call them Hurry ‘Canes buses, honestly great name.
Wide receiver and Pro Football Hall of Famer Andre Johnson is the most famous Hurricanes player from Miami Gardens. Current star Ohio State wideout Jeremiah Smith also grew up in Miami Gardens.
Coaching Staff
Head coach Mario Cristobal will turn 55 later next month and enters his 4th season with Miami, the school where he played in college (winning a pair of National Championships) and got his start coaching as a grad assistant in 1998. He’s improved the team record each season, although the program is coming off a stinging end to 2024 that saw the Canes rise to 9-0 and 4th in the AP Poll, only to finish 3rd in the ACC and ranked 18th nationally.
Shannon Dawson enters his 3rd year running the offense after coming over from Houston after Cristobal fired Josh Gattis following the 2022 season. He’s built a nice resume as OC of a Air Raid variety at West Virginia, Kentucky, and Southern Miss before last year’s explosion with quarterback Cam Ward averaging 43.9 points per game.
Miami fired defensive coordinator Lance Guidry after the Canes defense struggled for most of the 2024 season. For 2025, in steps Corey Hetherman.
Hetherman just signed a hefty extension with Minnesota in December and Miami paid $600,000 in buyout fees to lure him away.
He had been Doing Good Things™ at Minnesota in one lone season with the Gophers and even signed a hefty contract extension just over 7 months ago. Nevertheless, Miami paid the buyout and brought Hetherman to Miami.
The Hurricanes also brought defensive backs coach Zac Etheridge from Houston and Will Harris as safeties coach from Florida to fill vacant positions this off-season. Former NFL Dolphins star and Hall of Famer Jason Taylor was retained as defensive line coach.
Portal
As you’d expect, Miami like many Power programs went into the portal searching for talent. Their off-season acquisition of quarterback Carson Beck for a reported/rumored $4-6 million NIL package grabbed most of the national headlines but there were many more transfers to Coral Gables, including:
QB Carson Beck, Georgia
RB CharMar Brown, North Dakota State
WR CJ Daniels, LSU
WR Tony Johnson, Cincinnati
WR Keelan Marion, BYU
TE Alex Bauman, Tulane
TE Jack Nickel, UAB
C James Brockermeyer, TCU
DT David Blay, Louisiana Tech
LB Mohamed Toure, Rutgers
LB Kamal Bonner, NC State
NB Keionte Scott, Houston
NB Charles Brantley, Michigan State
CB Xavier Lucas, Wisconsin
S Zechariah Poyser, Jacksonville State
S Jakobe Thomas, Tennessee
K Bert Auburn, Texas
Beck (QB), Daniels (WR), Brockermeyer (C), Toure (LB), Scott (NB), Lucas (CB), Poyser (S), Thomas (S), and Auburn (K) look to be projected as starters for the Canes at the time of this writing. Apparently, Cristobal doesn’t like to release an official depth chart so that’s really fun.
Respectfully, he looks like an alien from Men in Black.
Brown (RB), Marion (WR), Bauman (TE), Blay (DT), and Bonner (LB) also should be heavily in the mix. Bauman is the younger brother of recently medically retired Notre Dame tight end Kevin Bauman. The other tight end Jack Nickel was committed to the Irish for 9 months before signing with Michigan State and later heading to UAB.
Top Players
QB Carson Beck – His 2024 season didn’t go as planned and was ended via an elbow injury but Beck grabbed a bag to head down to Miami and looks to rebuild his NFL stock. In 2 seasons of starting he’s thrown for 7,912 yards with 58 touchdowns and 20 interceptions. When he’s on, he’s very difficult to stop. Last year, he looked a lot more mortal with a less talented Georgia team around him that in 2023.
WR Malachi Toney – Even with several incoming transfers, some expect true freshman Toney to start and possibly lead the team in receiving. He’s apparently been making big waves since the spring. A low 4-star recruit out of in-state American Heritage High, Toney reclassified and should be rising into his senior year of high school! Another potential no. 1 receiver on the team Jojo Trader has been banged up during August, so that’s something to keep an eye on.
OT Francis Mauigoa – A first-team All-ACC pre-season selection, Mauigoa is a former 5-star prospect out of IMG Academy, an anchor at right tackle, and considered by many to be the top overall tackle prospect for the 2026 NFL Draft.
DE Reuben Bain – The true junior got hurt in Miami’s opener last year and missed 4 games and ultimately wasn’t able to build much on his stellar freshmen campaign in 2023. Despite the missed time, Bain has made 11 sacks in his career and is considered one of the top edge rushers in the NFL Draft right now.
Notre Dame’s pass blocking better be ready.
DT Akheem Mesidor – A jumbo pass rusher who is entering his 6th season of college football following 2 years with West Virginia and the past 3 with the Hurricanes. Mesidor has been steadily effective throughout college and opens 2025 with 36 tackles for loss and 23 sacks so far in his career.
CB OJ Frederique – Miami has to replace a lot in their secondary but brings back freshman All-American OJ Frederique. Just a 3-star out of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Canes got a steal after he started 7 games in 2024 and was considered by many Miami fans to be their most steady and best overall secondary player. He was dinged up during fall camp, for what its worth.
Bad Matchup
Miami’s Pass Rush vs. Carr’s Inexperience
The Hurricanes turned to the portal to rebuild their secondary for 2025 but bring back a lot of pieces to a very solid front this fall. With Bain and Mesidor already mentioned, our old recruiting target Justin Scott is hoping to make a big jump as a true sophomore after featuring in the rotation last year. This will be a big test for the Irish offensive line working with an inexperienced quarterback.
Good Matchup
Notre Dame’s Secondary vs. Miami Receivers
I think there’s a belief that Notre Dame, led by Jeremiyah Love, will have to run the ball really well to get some points on the board and take some pressure off CJ Carr. That was going to be my matchup to focus on in this section. However, even though Beck has shown NFL talent, the Canes trying to rebuild their passing game with a lot of new faces at receiver and get on the same page from game 1 against this Irish secondary could be a treacherous beginning for them.
Special Teams
Miami is replacing the extremely reliable kicker Andres Borregales who made 74 of 86 kicks in his career, and only missed 1 field goal last season. He was drafted in the 6th round by the Patriots this past spring.
The Canes were able to lure away Texas kicker Bert Auburn after the spring to replace Borregales. The fluffy-haired Flower Mound native had a strong start to his career with the Horns (50 for 61 in 2022-23) but went cold last year missing 9 out of his 25 attempts. Auburn has been automatic on PAT’s going 178 for 178 since 2021 but no word yet on if he’s actually the starting kicker.
This goofy bastard left Austin after the spring.
Does Miami have an Australian punter? You bet! Junior athlete Dylan Joyce is heading into his 3rd year as the starter.
Fifth-year senior wideout Keelan Marion looks set to return kicks after separate 2-year stops at UConn and BYU. With the Cougars, Marion totaled 865 return yards and a pair of touchdowns last season so he’s worth paying attention to on Sunday.
Junior receiver Ray Ray Joseph was the starter at punt returner last year and should hold down that job in 2025. Just over half his yards last year came against Florida A&M and Ball State–it’s tough to return punts these days.
Prediction
There’s been a lot of talk leading up to this game about how confident the Miami fans are which surprises me a little bit, but also it’s college football pre-season and who is going to stomp on their own dreams? While doing research for this game and the 18 Stripes pre-season poll I was taken aback at just how much Miami is rebuilding from last year. From a returning production standpoint, I didn’t think there was a shakier team in the top 15 or so.
The leading rusher, 4 out of the top 6 pass catchers, a couple offensive linemen, plus 7 starters on defense, including all but 1 player in the secondary, all moved on from 2024. Oh yeah, plus the no. 1 pick in this past spring’s NFL Draft in quarterback Cam Ward.
They have a small core of extremely good players in Carson Beck, Francis Mauigoa, Reuben Bain, and Akheem Mesidor. But, the Canes are hoping on development, integrating transfers, and hitting the ground running at a ton of positions for 2025.
Miami is also betting new defensive coordinator Hetherman turns around a defense that let the program down last year. While they started 9-0 last year, there’s a reason why the Hurricanes nearly lost to Virginia Tech, California, and Louisville before finally succumbing to Georgia Tech. They gave up 30+ points in 6 separate games! And, perhaps crucially, the Canes had the worst defense according to FEI among the top 25.
I suspect Notre Dame really wants this game.
Some quality defensive improvement may be expected under Hetherman but can the offense repeat last year’s smashing success of #3 overall in FEI and scoring a national-best 43.9 points per game? Unless Beck picks things up and is throwing fire on Sunday night surely the Miami offense is poised to take a step back–Cam Ward was really, really good last year.
Still, a loss here for Notre Dame feels possible with CJ Carr walking into a very tough road environment. Can he be average to below average and the Irish still win? Probably not if Beck finds himself back to his 2023 ways again and the Hurricanes are more disciplined on defense.
My guts says this will be a program victory for Notre Dame though, a gritty victory over an opponent with some excellent top end talent but not yet proven to be defensively on par with the Irish and not enough weapons on offense to take advantage of a veteran quarterback behind a very good offensive line. Miami got a lot of buzz last year but have still lost their last 5 games against ranked opponents. I think that’ll stretch to 6 games in a row.
CJ Carr goes 18 of 31 for 194 yards, 1 touchdown, and 1 interception playing just well enough to win.
Hold me, I’m Irish!
I’m worried about how confident we all feel. That betting line scares me because gamblers should be the most objective people, and I’m not expecting a close game.
I think the line is close because of the unpredictability of a young first time QB. He could be solid and manage the game well, or he could come out and lay an egg by throwing picks or stalling drives. I think that makes this a tough game to predict
That list of transfers is wild. NIL/portal makes it hard to predict early games.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year!
Here’s to another great season and fun reads from EM and the gang! Thanks for all you guys do
My “30 second” evaluation via are we better or worse than last year:
Safety: worse, though still solid
CB: even
LB: even (Kiser’s a loss, but I expect no drop off)
End: better
Tackle: evenish (we’re healthy now)
OL: even
TE: even
RB: even
WR: better
QB: ???
I’m going to miss Watts, but I’m not worried about safety, which basically means that we should be as good if not better everywhere except possibly QB. Given the talent that Miami had depart, and how much discontinuity they have with incoming players, I find it incredibly unlikely that they can say the same.
So, if we were better than Miami last year (I think we were) I definitely think we’re better this year. ND should be a solid win with the only questing being does Carr end up more a liability than an asset. I just don’t see that being the case – if it were, (1) Angeli doesn’t transfer, and (2) the coaches would have been shopping for a transfer portal QB.
ND by double digits.
I’d have the O-line rated better. Only one new starter and he is going to be good. Every one else has experience.