Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.
Top News
The season opener against Ohio State is marked for a 7:30 PM ET kickoff on ABC and will be the ESPN GameDay matchup of the week, as well.
Notre Dame added another piece to the 2024 class as future nose tackle Owen Wafle (0.9201) committed on Monday. You can read our post HERE.
The Division I Council has eased restrictions on conference championship game participants, effectively paving the way for the elimination of divisions across FBS football. As a result, the Pac-12 has already dropped its division format beginning in 2022.
The Division I Council has also removed the 25-man football recruiting class size for a 2-year trial period. Programs will still have to stay under 85 total scholarships.
Tennessee and Virginia have announced they will open the 2023 season in Nashville at Nissan Stadium.
The Syracuse Carrier Dome has now been re-named the JMA Dome after the central New York wireless company.
Uniform of the Week
Which uniforms will Ohio State wear to open the season against Notre Dame now that we know it’ll be a night game? You’d think they will lean into their traditional red jerseys and gray helmets, but maybe not? The Irish haven’t faced the Buckeyes in a while, especially inside The Shoe, and they’ve quietly put together a pretty long list of alternate uniforms in recent years.
We have this all-black look above. They have an all-gray uniform, too. Recently, they’ve paired red pants with their traditional home uniform. They’ve also worn throwback red jerseys with black helmets. Or, throwback red jerseys with red helmets. Ohio State has also worn about 4 different uniforms with white jerseys, too. They have plenty of options if they opt to try something different against the Irish.
Recruiting
Former Notre Dame safety Litchfield Ajavon has transferred to Rice.
As expected, Pitt wideout transfer Jordan Addison is headed to USC. The Trojans also picked up star safety Braxton Myers (0.9521) out of Texas recently.
One of the nation’s top corners in Daylen Austin (0.9372) gave a verbal to LSU. The Tigers also picked up running back Trey Holly (0.9247) over the weekend, as well.
James Madison linebacker Diamonte Tucker-Dorsey was an All-American last year and is in the Portal.
Former Clemson quarterback Taisun Phommachanh has committed to Georgia Tech.
Former blue-chip linebacker Brenden Jennings has transferred to UCF, his 3rd school as a 2021 recruit!
Former Virginia Tech and North Dakota State quarterback Quincy Patterson is transferring to Temple.
The nation’s No. 69 overall player in corner Marcus Washington, Jr. is re-classifying from 2023 and will be joining Georgia this summer.
YouTube Channel
I know Kyle Mooney’s humor isn’t for everyone. Damn, it is for me though. His short-lived YouTube channel that closed shortly after he was picked up by Saturday Night Live is a treasure of weirdness. He also featured heavily in the GoodNeighborStuff channel, too. Some of his characters have made it over to SNL, like the 420 weed smoking guy who never actually smokes weed, another favorite of mine.
Nothing can beat ball champions for its 5 minutes of utter absurdity as Kyle perfects his gibberish questions into the most uncomfortable situations imaginable in and around a San Francisco Giants game. “Smell of that green grass, sweet crack of the bat, maaan it’s good to be back.” I know there must be footage of people figuring out Mooney’s game and watching that could be fun, too. But, he’s at his best when the person is completely unwitting and playing right into his absurdity, like the guy in the end of this video describing the pitching change.
Tunes
Harry Styles’ 3rd solo album comes out today, titled Harry’s House on Columbia Records. The title coming in part inspiration from Joni Mitchell’s song “Harry’s House/Centerpiece” from her 1975 album The Hissing of Summer Lawns. It’s hard to believe Styles’ last album came out right before Christmas in 2019 as it’s been able to stay relevant in pop culture through the tumultuous pandemic era. The 2019 holiday season seems so, so long ago.
On April 1st, he released the lead single “As It Was” which quickly broke several streaming records at Spotify and Apple while going to No. 1 in many countries, including the UK and United States. I think we know which artist is going to be dominating the scene this summer. I’ll be interested to see what the rest of the album sounds like. This song does have a feel of The Weeknd and a little bit of MGMT with some strong electronic vibes possibly on the way with the other tunes, too.
Trivia
Which seasons during the Brian Kelly era (2010-21) were the best and worst respectively for 3rd down conversions on offense?
The Other Football
Frankfurt got passed Rangers in penalties to win the 2021-22 Europa League. It’s their second time winning the competition and first since 1980. Celtic was my first soccer team as a kid, so good news here!
We’re coming down to the final day of the season in the Premier League. Both Man City and Liverpool had to come from behind to win their penultimate games this past weekend. City (vs. Aston Villa) hold a 1-point lead over Liverpool (vs. Wolves) although the Sky Blues hold a +6 goal differential lead. In the battle for 4th place and the final Champions League spot, Tottenham slid past Burnley 1-0 while Arsenal fell hilariously 2-0 at Newcastle. Now, Spurs have a 2-point lead while facing last-place Norwich and Arsenal faces Everton to close out the season.
Trailing 2-0, that Everton team scored 3 goals on Thursday in the 2nd half against Crystal Palace to save themselves from relegation. The last spot for relegation will come down to either Burnley (please, yes) or Leeds.
Nine days from today, Huddersfield Town and Nottingham Forest will play each other in the Championship Playoff Final for the last spot to be promoted to the Premier League. I’m rooting for Forest, they haven’t been in the EPL since 1999!
United States Soccer has announced that the men’s and women’s national teams have ratified identical Collective Bargaining Agreements, a massive win for the latter program that has won 4 World Cups, 4 Olympic Golds, and 8 Gold Cups.
Streaming
I remember being a teeny tiny bit disappointed watching The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou in the theater. I know it didn’t do terribly well and lost money, but anything was going to be tough to follow up the forever classic The Royal Tenenbaums which might be my favorite movie ever. Still, I often come back to Zissou for some reason. Is it all the David Bowie songs featured on the soundtrack?
I’m a sucker for Wes Anderson, though. I was re-watching this movie recently and there’s not enough interesting story to keep you super interested. It’s weird and dumb which Anderson does reasonably well at a decent rate. It’s not nearly as funny as I remembered, either. But, the freaking Anderson whimsy is so real. His set pieces and picture framing are always so enjoyable. I would enjoy his movies without sound, I think. Except, keep the Bowie songs.
A Look Back
Yes okay, “highlights.” This is one of those games that makes little sense in hindsight. It was really windy but a fairly sunny day. It was the pandemic season with just 10,182 in announced attendance for an Irish home game. Both offenses combined for 28 completions on 41 attempts which isn’t too bad! But, it was only for a total of 243 passing yards. Notre Dame threw the ball 7 more times in a hurricane against NC State than they did in this home game against Louisville. Live and learn, I suppose.
The best thing about this game is the last series. Each team only had 7 offensive drives and with a 5-point lead Notre Dame got the ball at their own 23-yard line with 7:55 remaining in the game. They’d put together a 14-play drive featuring 12 runs, got into Louisville’s red zone after a nice 24-yard run from Kyren Williams, then kneeled out the game for the win. Fitting end.
18S Paddock Club
It’s car upgrade season! The 6th round of the Formula 1 season brings us back to Barcelona, the traditional testing track and annual jumping off point for the first major upgrades for the cars as teams have years of historical data to rely on with the Catalunya circuit. So far, only Haas and Alpha Tauri have announced they won’t be bringing any big updates but we could see 16 other cars all bringing various levels of changes starting today in the Catalonian capital.
At the top of the grid, after much grousing about Red Bull’s updates through Miami vis-à-vis the budget cap, we are expecting to see Ferrari introduce their first major upgrades of the season. This is rumored to include a new floor, new high downforce wing, and new paint that will remove the shine from the red in order to lower the car weight. For their part, Red Bull is expected to bring further weight reduction measures to their car.
Elsewhere, Alpine is bringing a major updated rear wing, Alfa Romeo with updated wings and floor, McLaren with new carbon fiber brake covers and likely much more, while Aston Martin is brining a brand-new ‘B’ car that looks shockingly similar to the Red Bulls.
Spanish Grand Prix
Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya
FP1 5/20 8:00 AM ET
FP2 5/20 11:00 AM ET
FP3 5/21 7:00 AM ET
Qualifying 5/21 10:00 AM ET
Race 5/22 9:00 AM ET
This will be a huge litmus test for Formula 1 this season, maybe even the litmus test on the calendar. So far, the new regulations have worked wonderfully in their expressed purpose of allowing cars to follow more closely with less dirty air causing havoc on downforce levels. Traditionally, this Barcelona circuit is tough to overtake on, the poll sitter usually wins, and the much-hated sector 3 slow chicane exacerbates all of the track’s problems.
Once again, tire degradation should take center stage with temperatures expected in the mid-80’s for qualifying and Sunday’s race. With that slow chicane, this track offers some of the weakest DRS zone straights on the calendar and the more balanced circuit should favor Ferrari, in theory. However, if Red Bull’s further weight reduction continues to improve their tire situation while running lower downforce perhaps Ferrari could come away incredibly frustrated after introducing their upgrades.
This is potentially a make-or-break weekend for Mercedes’ title chances as they look to extend their record-breaking 8 straight constructor championships. They are somewhat blessed to be comfortably in 3rd place but really haven’t threatened within 1 second of the top 2 teams during qualifying. They’re coming with an upgrade package of an all-new floor to work on their zero sidepod concept in order to stabilize their bouncing woes. If it doesn’t work well, Mercedes may turn their focus to the W14 car and 2023. I think we’ll see a strong race from Hamilton this weekend on a track he’s dominated at in the past.
1st Place – Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
2nd Place – Max Verstappen, Red Bull
3rd Place – Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
Trivia Answer:
Best – 2020 (49.7%)
Worst – 2010 (38.3%)
Wonder if Gallagher got a big NIL offer from WVU.
Obviously with Freeman and co. it’s not over (unless he got a big NIL offer).
I have heard a number of different speculations including girlfriend, but it also might be as simple as wanting to stay close to home
O is that close to home? I thought he was from Texas? That would make more natural sense if he was closer to home at WVU.
I think that you might be thinking about Greathouse who is from Texas. Gallagher is from SW Pennsylvania
he may just enjoy the mountains
On3 is tracking NIL…Gallagher is their 106th player overall and has an NIL of $227k…which scrolling through their top 200 players is basically 5* money with a few other outliers like him.
i don’t know how they are finding out how much NIL any given kid is getting.
The NIL number isn’t actually what the player has been offered for NIL. It is an estimation of what an NIL deal would generally be worth, based on a number of factors.
Ah, okay. Thanks. i had been thinking maybe there was some sort of reporting being required of the consortiums.
Also our offense is going to have to be humming for USC with the addition of Addison. They will be tough to stop for any team this year. Thankfully I expect their D to be weak.
Favorite tweet of the week:
Q: Will anyone be able to stop USC’s offense this year?
A: The IRS
Between being a Leeds fan and a fan of Sergio Perez, may be a tough sports weekend.
Burnley is just the worst, come on Leeds!
This was basically me watching Burnley yesterday:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T5qalNX5G94
Man, you’re pretty hard on the Life aquatic.I am kind of reversed on this. Royal Tenenbaums is the only Wes Anderson film I haven’t seen fully (and bottle rocket)- because I fall asleep each time. In theory, it should be my favorite. It hits all the right notes but yet it doesn’t make a good song.
I re-watch Rushmore and Life Aquatic and still find them to be two of his funniest if not THE funniest. Maybe because Bill Murray plays bigger roles in those two? or for some reason feel slightly more tethered to reality?
Or Maybe that one-liner from jeff Goldblum when getting rescued mid poker game, “I fold”
I do like it! Anderson is pretty close to “can do no wrong” territory for me. Just, wish it was a little better.
fair. Was hoping you’d argue more
What did you think of French Dispatch? I loved it. I feel like every time I see a new Wes Anderson movie, it takes the top position of “Wes Andersoniest”.
I haven’t watch it yet, but it’s next in my HBO Max queue.
I’m a sucker for Wes Anderson, too, but dammit Owen Wilson’s Kentucky “accent” was too annoyingly bad for me to enjoy that movie.
Times have changed when I think it’s good news that a 4star RB (Sedric Irvin) decommitted. I think it might bode well for someone higher ranked at the position.
“that doesn’t seem like the fair move… at THIS point” is a constant refrain in my family after Kyle’s reaction to that pitching change.
After just finishing binging Drive to Survive, very geeked for Barcelona. Hoping Leclerc can bring it home, also wouldn’t mind a good race from Mercedes just because a 3-team title race would be fascinating.
Such a funny line!
What timing, just announced Kyle Mooney is one of several cast members leaving SNL.
All good, but there is late breaking big other f-ball news: Mbappe stays at PSG ! Super big for us Parisiens, and screw Real!
I’m way late on this but I recommend checking out Seu Jorge if you haven’t already. He acted and sang some of the songs on Aquatic, and he has an entire album full of Bowie covers on Spotify that are fantastic.