Thanks to Marcus Freeman, our long (48 hour) national nightmare is over. Brian Kelly sent shockwaves through the Notre Dame fan base and raised eyebrows around the country when he bolted South Bend for Baton Rouge on Monday. Once upon a time, the school known for glacially-paced background checks may have run a search for a replacement that would let the paint not just dry but be manufactured, canned, shipped, sold, used, and then dry several times over while the college football world spun around it. This time Notre Dame showed that times have changed, that it’s willing to make bold moves and make them quickly.

While an official announcement might take a bit longer, word leaked out today that Marcus Freeman will succeed the man who snatched him away from LSU’s Brinks truck last year and coquettishly tooted that truck’s horn this year. Multiple national sources have leaked the news, perhaps none more reputable on the subject than IrishSportsDaily and FootballScoop’s John Brice:

 

And credit where credit is due – the first reliable scoop came from none other than former WOPU spokesman Mick Assaf, who was actually credited by The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman for this tweet:

 

A groundswell of support for Freeman started to build almost immediately among former, current, and future players on social media. Reports floated around from long-time Irish beat reporters like Pete Sampson and Tom Loy that there was momentum for Freeman inside the administration as well. Freeman is a departure from what Swarbrick has said in the past, that previous head coaching experience is a sine qua non for any Notre Dame coaching candidate – but Freeman is also a different kind of candidate. In his short time on campus he has reportedly blown away everyone he’s come across with his charisma and energy. Fans started tossing around the “Head Coach In Waiting” tag months before he ever did anything on the field.

Then we saw the on-field results… Freeman posted roughly the same quality of defense that the beloved Clark Lea had the last couple of years, despite losing Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, Ade Ogundeji, Daelin Hayes, Shaun Crawford, and Nick McCloud to graduation, losing Marist Liufau, Paul Moala, and Shayne Simon early in the season, and losing Kyle Hamilton for the second half of the season. Freeman’s defense set a new sack record for the now-closed Brian Kelly Era; the 40 sacks in 12 games this year ranks seventh nationally and is already ahead of the 13-game total of 34 set in 2018 and 2019. The 33.1% third down conversion rate is behind only 2019 and 2020 in the Kelly Era. The squad’s 15 interceptions are one short of the 13-game Kelly record of 16, logged in both 2012 and 2014.

Freeman has also been a monster on the recruiting trail. He’s landed commitments from three five-star defenders in the 2022 and 2023 classes; from 2010 through 2020, Notre Dame landed four defensive five stars total, all in the 2011 and 2013 classes. The 2022 Irish linebacker class is unquestionably the best in the country, with all four commits making the Butkus Award semifinalist group. He was instrumental in stealing blue-chip defensive end Tyson Ford away from Oklahoma. And he has the Irish as more than just a hat on the table with more top recruits than I can remember in my long time of following Notre Dame football.

There are risks, of course. The primary one is that, as noted above, Freeman has never been a head coach before. Some previous coordinator elevations – looking at you, Charlie Weis and Bob Davie – were chewed up and spit out by the meat grinder that is the Notre Dame job. Davie even traveled the exact path that Freeman now has, although he never understood or appreciated the school the way Freeman seems to. How Freeman fills out his staff will be key; Weis, for example, was probably struck a significant blow when planned quarterbacks coach and long time head coach David Cutcliffe had to back out due to health issues. Who from the current staff will be retained? Who moves on by choice? Who moves on involuntarily? Who are the new faces, and what roles do all faces, new and old, end up with? Will Freeman have enough and appropriate shoulders to lean on when he isn’t sure about something?

Still, at the end of the day, there’s just so much upside to this decision from Notre Dame. Any head coaching hire at any program comes with the stark reality that you might have to hit the reset button in three years. With the program as healthy and stable as it’s been in 30 years, why not roll the dice on the guy who has a high ceiling, is a phenomenal recruiter, and has made a huge impression on everyone who has crossed his path so far? Is the risk that comes with tabbing a mid-level Power 5 coach or high-performing Group of 5 coach really any lower?

Finally, we would be remiss if we didn’t note that this is a big move for non-football reasons. There are only seven Black head coaches in Power 5 football, eleven in FBS. Marcus Freeman is highly qualified for all sorts of football reasons, but he’s also half-Black and half-Korean, two ethnicities that are underrepresented in coaching ranks and that face discrimination outside of the game. Notre Dame often – and correctly – is proud of what it fights for around the world, as you can tell from any NBC halftime show. It can correctly be proud of making a Black and Asian man the face of its storied program as well. From a purely practical standpoint, don’t think the impact of that will go unnoticed on the recruiting trail either. Notre Dame faces a lot of negative recruiting from other programs for being too white, fair or not; those pitches are a lot harder to make now.

As for the rest of the assistants who used to work for The Coach Who Shall Not Be Named, there may be much less turnover than you might expect. First, word got out yesterday that Notre Dame retained strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis, which was interesting for two reasons: Balis was arguably the most critical piece of the post-2016 rebuild, particularly if you listen to the players, and any outside candidate would almost assuredly want control over who the strength coach is. Many head coaches consider that role one of the most important in a program. Notre Dame moving quickly to lock down Balis suggested that someone was very close to being in the head coach’s chair already. (Wink wink nudge nudge say no more eh!)

Tonight Matt Fortuna, Pete Thamel, Ross Dellinger, and others reported that Tommy Rees turned down Kelly to stay at Notre Dame as offensive coordinator. McNulty is a Rees guy and so is all but certain to stay as well. Freeman’s good friend and previous hire Mike Mickens will certainly stay. One would also imagine that Chris O’Leary, who Freeman hired, would stay, and likely Nick Lezynski, who Freeman convinced eleven months ago not to take the Vanderbilt linebacker job, would be elevated to a full position coach role.

Brian Polian, on the flipside, will almost definitely be gone; he has drawn interest both from Kelly at LSU and from a few FCS schools for a head coach job, with early indications that he would be more likely to take a head job somewhere. Nobody seems to have a good read on any of the remaining assistants; where Lance Taylor, Mike Elston, Jeff Quinn, and Del Alexander will end up is anyone’s guess at this point.

The Irish program took a gut punch when Brian Kelly left Art Modell style, no doubt. To the administration’s credit, they straightened back up and came out swinging immediately with this decision. We couldn’t be more excited about what the future might hold for new Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman.

What a world.