Welcome back to the latest edition of Five Wide Fullbacks, America’s most enthralling question and answer segment in the college football internet space. Today we look at the 2024 Irish schedule, Harbaugh in the NFL, the best and worst new head coach hires, the rumored Gug expansion, and we wonder whether Notre Dame football players need more sand in their pants.
1) Jim Harbaugh is back in the NFL and will join the Los Angeles Chargers on a 5-year deal worth $62.5 million. What does Harbaugh’s legacy look like at Michigan and can he succeed again in the NFL?
The best we can hope for is that Harbaugh’s legacy will be stained forever at Michigan, but I remain so downtrodden about 2023 and how the public has reacted or will eventually react to any future punishment coming Ann Arbor’s way. They’ll probably get something handed down at some point and it’ll hurt Sherrone Moore the most. I’m sure the school was more than happy to ride this happy wave, keep Moore on board as the public favored choice, and see how long the good times last.
Maybe Michigan’s program slowly craters and I’ll get excited about that eventually. As we’ll see below, their schedule is about to get way, way tougher. But I doubt it ever really gets that bad–nothing can make up for 2023 from this hater’s point of view. Harbaugh’s legacy is secure. He choke slammed Ohio State three times in a row and won a National Championship as the consummate Michigan Man, nothing will change that.
Harbaugh to the Chargers, of all places, is actually super interesting. They cratered this year and I’m sure Harbaugh will give them a nice bump in the next couple years.
However, this is still the Chargers we’re talking about here. They are one of the most tortured franchises in the NFL and in North American sports. Harbaugh is a really weird dude and him taking control of one of the most chaotic American sports teams might cause the San Andreas Fault to crack and send Los Angeles into the Pacific Ocean finally.
2) What is the best and worst head coach hiring so far in college football this off-season?
I’m putting some chips down on Bob Chesney at James Madison being an excellent hire and one of the next great young coaches in the country. He’s rebuilt 3 smaller programs (Salve Regina, Assumption, Holy Cross) and gets to walk into a very healthy program in a sneaky awesome spot with the Dukes. I can see him staying put for 2-3 years, jumping to a lower Power 5 program, and then end up in a job like Penn State down the road.
Why does the jersey look photoshopped?
The worst hire so far I’m going for good old Ken Niumatalolo at San Jose State. This could’ve gone one of 2 ways. Either Coach Ken continues with the triple option and rebuilds the entire recruiting operation with the Spartans or he forgoes his history and tries something new offensively. It appears he’s doing the latter and will build a Spread-n-Shred offense under offensive coordinator Craig Stutzmann. I see this going poorly.
3) Army has dropped UNLV and Syracuse from their 2024 schedule, opening the door to the heavily rumored matchup with Notre Dame in New York City this fall. Is there any hope that this will be anything else besides a Very Bad 2024 schedule?
If we slot in that Army game the schedule should look like this:
August 31st @ Texas A&M
September 7th vs. Northern Illinois
September 14th @ Purdue
September 21st vs. Miami (OH)
September 28th vs. Louisville
BYE
October 12th vs. Stanford
October 19th @ Georgia Tech [Mercedez-Benz Stadium]
October 26th @ Navy [MetLife Stadium]
November 9th vs. Florida State
November 16th vs. Virginia
November 23rd vs. Army [Yankee Stadium]
November 30th @ USC
The bottom end is missing a truly dreadful program but 2 MAC teams (both coming in the first month) and a pair of service academies in the same season is not good. Playing the service academies a month apart both in New York City is also stupid. Not only do we have these meaningless games but they are removing the chance for another good win on the schedule.
The opener in College Station, plus the first trip to Purdue in over 10 years, and a home game with Louisville before the bye week is potentially a decent start to the schedule. However, if either A&M or the Cardinals underachieve (at least 1 doing so seems probable) we’re looking at a really mediocre overall schedule through October.
We’ve made fun of Michigan’s schedule for years and they’ll have played Texas, USC, Washington, and Oregon through November 2nd. Sure, the Irish finish at USC and maybe the Trojans rebuild into a great opponent by the end of the season in a post-Caleb Williams era? In contrast, Michigan finishes with Ohio State and has a far more interesting slate overall in 2024.
I think a playoff appearance with at least one quality win over a strong opponent is needed for a good season.
4) Notre Dame released its freshest football roster for 2024 which includes early enrolled freshman, transfers, and updated heights and weights for all involved. What sticks out with this recent release?
As noted recently, defensive tackle Gabriel Rubio has stepped away from the program for personal reasons and is not listed on the current roster. Also, possible 6th-year senior offensive lineman Andrew Kristofic isn’t listed so we’re assuming he’s moving on, as well.
The biggest thing that jumps out is that new strength coach Loren Landow has his hands full putting more meat on some bodies!
Testing your eye sight with this picture.
Bell (180), Clark (179), Faison (181), Gobaira (250), Knapp (266!), Mickey (174), Mitchell (178), Prescod (273), Smith (167), Logan Thomas (196!!), and Wagner (284) are players who are light or who remain pretty light from previous rosters. A semi-trailer of whey protein needs to be ordered ASAP.
There are still some big muchachos, too. If my math is correct, there are 12 players listed at 300 pounds or heavier. All but 2 are on the offensive line, though. The interior of the defensive line in particular is on the smaller side, but that does not include incoming freshman Sean Sevillano’s fire hydrant 6’1″ 339 pound-frame.
5) We’re creeping up on 20 years since the Gug was opened in the early months of the Charlie Weis era. The expansion plans were brought up in public around 5 years ago, when will this finally happen?
Tim Prister had a discussion last summer with Jack Swarbrick about this and I believe it’s the last ‘official’ update we’ve seen on the matter. The key takeaways from that discussion:
- The Gug 2.0 project is a major priority
- The University (was) about to start a new initiative last summer and the Gug 2.0 is part of that process
- 100% money raised and 75% on hand remains the University rule, no exceptions
- Operating space for expanded staff is the top aspect of the project
- Sports science and nutrition space will be important too
- Incoming new AD Pete Bevacqua will be “very effective” at fundraising
A recent Irish Illustrated podcast also mentioned the strength of Bevacqua and his fundraising abilities, really pushing the narrative that Notre Dame could be entering a new phase within the athletic department. According to Prister’s article from last summer, the new Gug project will cost in excess of $100 million and maybe more.
Waiting on an update.
I will say, something has always smelled a little off about the Gug expansion. There was some talk that this was a sore spot for Brian Kelly in the months and years leading up to his exit to LSU. Has it taken a long time for Notre Dame to accept the need for a renovation? Were they just not keen about fundraising 9-digits again after the large Crossroads project?
I’ve also wondered if there was push back on the details. Several years ago, the plans discussed had the Gug expanding to the south with a pedestrian bridge crossing Courtney Lane to the Irish Athletic Center and LaBar Practice Complex. I seem to recall there was a bone or 2 thrown to another sport (soccer, perhaps?) in the expansion but it was mostly just for football.
Either way, it’s coming but likely not any time incredibly soon. The project would take 18-24 months to complete so we’re likely not discussing a new fancy training table for the players to gain weight at until the middle of 2026 or for the 2027 season. However, it would be a cool project for Bevacqua to announce early in his tenure which begins in just over 2 months.
As my Asst. AD friend at Assumption put it last year, “they still talk about Chesney like he’s a god here”. Working at HC, I can tell you everyone liked him. He always had time for you and usually put a smile on your face. JMU is getting an excellent coach. I think he’s a perfect fit there, right now.
I wonder if Chesney might be #1 on BC’s list if he hadn’t gone to JMU ?
Good lord. If that schedule turns out to be as bad as it looks, it’s possible that we could go 11-1 and not make the playoff.
Yeah, I’m afraid that schedule leaves no room for error. I was really hoping we’d find someone else besides Army for the 12th game, but sounds like that game was confirmed today, though site is still TBD
Miami and the ACC really screwed us on this one. They forced ND to schedule a game less than a year out due to a mistake that was entirely Miami’s fault and that neither Miami nor the ACC even tried to fix. Friends like these, eh?
That said, we are doing ourselves no favors scheduling two MAC teams and Stanford. I would love to see some bold and different leadership from Bevacqua on this issue.
I think that’s unlikely the case but only because the committee typically overvalues records as opposed to actually ranking better teams higher, etc.
It’s hard to think they’d put a power 5 program with that record below #11. But I do get and sympathize with the concern. The lowest in the last 3 years an 11-1 team was before conference championship games was this past year with Bama at #8 (with no 10-2 teams ahead of Bama). So even if a few 10-2 teams did actually jump an 11-1 team, that would still put ND in the playoffs.
I am not that concerned about the schedule. Our unchangeable commitments are the six ACC games this year, USC, and Navy. If those are light this year, so be it. Eight.
Almost every P5 team plays a FCS game and we play Army. I imagine we tried to get someone stronger than Army for November 23rd but at the late date and with most conferences playing their conference schedule their opening with three non-conference games, we had limited choices. Arkansas would have been nice but they probably wanted a September game. Nine
Every conference team plays a G5 team so that’s also a wash. Ten.
For a comparison to a generic P5 team leaves A&M in College Station, which is a definite plus, and Purdue also an away game.
Since we are playing them, here’s Purdue’s schedule – nine conference games and the ND game. Their two other non-conference games are Oregon State and FCS Indiana State. Since we’ve compared their FCS game to one of our G5s, we have A&M to compare to Oregon State.
Outside of Ohio State, Penn State and Oregon, Purdue’s schedule is heavy on last year’s Big West teams.
Great info! I think that you missed the second bye week — looks like there’s an empty week on Nov 2nd. This bye seems like a good placement, allowing the team to have extra prep for Florida State
Sure did!
The big thing about the schedule is it puts a lot of pressure on that opening game. Lose at A&M and you probably can’t lose another game. 10-2 not gonna make it for ND. Last years team had a tendency to kick ass in wins in a way that kelly teams didn’t seem to so advanced stats liked nd more so hopefully that’s a trend that continues but still, kinda can’t lose the opener
Thinking about Army, they have been canceling numerous future games due to joining the AAC. They’ll still have Navy but it will be a non-conference game this year in addition to their eight AAC conference games. Should Army and Navy finished at the top of the AAC, they would play the Conference Championship game and their game the next weekend. Air Force is also a must game for them.
UNLV was scheduled to host Army on Oct. 19, 2024. To fit in ND on November 23rd, they had to fit it into the AAC and the ACC scheduling for Syracuse so that the Orange could find a twelve game opponent. Since both UNLV and Syracuse were canceled by Army, it was natural for them to play each other which is scheduled for October 5.
Syracuse is part of the ACC rotation and scheduled to play ND in 2025. Rather than Army, Syracuse could have filled the 2024 open slot ND had instead of in 2025. That would have meant six ACC games this year unless the ACC could get another ACC team to move to 2025. ND’s home and home with a neutral site games would have been at risk.
So with all the moving parts, we do end up with Army at Yankee Stadium November 23rd.
Thanks again for a great set up for good discussion, Eric.
MC, your posts are always an amazing compendium of huge amounts of relevant information. Thanks for putting all that work into them.
Finally, for all:
I understand about Army. But being one of the seriously old guys on the site, I actually think it’s great to play them. When I was very little Army was the big rivalry. So big that the young Father Ted took them off the schedule (gambling etc.)
My Uncle Hank got leave from his post-war B-17 squadron (he was a bombadier) and was at Yankee Stadium for the 0-0 tie that preserved our Natty. And my first home game was next year, when Terry Brennan ran the opening kickoff back 97 yards. Unfortunately, I was only 18 months old so I don’t remember. Still… Saw them beat us the year Pete Dawkins won the Heisman. Later on saw a few games which were very very good, including one in the Meadowlands which ended with one of the best tackles I’ve ever seen to stop Army at the half yard line, and then of course our last game in (the new) Yankee Stadium in 2010.
Army will play us hard. I figure and hope we’ll win, but because tradition is a living sine wave coursing through generations, I for one am not wringing my hands because they’re on the schedule.
I enjoy your comments with those personal anecdotes. Thank you. A couple of books from a Mishawaka seller who donates part of their profits and has other ND football related books. (See their seller description at bottom) Free shipping within the U.S.
Army vs. Notre Dame, the big game, 1913-1947
Notre Dame and the Game That Changed Football : How Jesse Harper Made the Forward Pass a Weapon and Knute Rockne a Legend
Thanks for the references. I have the second one, it’s good. Gonna get the first one ASAP!