Here’s Mark Fortuna from ESPN with the complete news:

“It’s official: Notre Dame will be going to the Champs Sports Bowl.

The Irish will face Florida State Dec. 29 in Orlando, Fla. The pair of 8-4 teams will look to close out their campaigns on positive notes after mediocre regular seasons. Florida State was No. 6 in the preseason AP poll. Notre Dame was No. 16.”

For a non BCS bowl game, I’d say this will be a great match-up. It will be in FSU’s backyard, but I expect Notre Dame fans to make the trip. How will the seniors go out on their last bowl? Stay tuned to SlapTheSign as we break down this compelling match-up.

Notre Dame takes their talents to Florida for the Champs Sports Bowl. Image from acc.blogs.starnewsonline.com

image from espn.go.com

Last night was the last final time you could vote for ND over Georgia. So hwta were the results? Let’s just say, it was a close one. Number one ranked Notre Dame and their “Pkay Like A Champion Today” tradition faced off against 8th ranked Georgia and their “UGA on the sideline.” The fans decide who wins by voting and the results are shown onESPN’s Sportsnation (a popular TV show on ESPN2).

The winner of the matchup had only 52% of the vote. This one really could have gone either way, that’s how close it was. But, Notre Dame won! Georgia had a surprising 48% of the vote. A little over 63,00 people voted, which is a great turnout. Most people think that Notre Dame don’t have a great chance of winning because their are many people who don’t like our team (Michigan fans for example) and they will vote for the other opponent. Well if you think about it, if our tradition wasn’t so well-known, then why did ESPN rank them number one? I don’t think we will have a problem advancing to the Finals.

Next Monday we’ll breakdown our next match-up. Which will be between Notre Dame and Florida State in the semi-finals.

A local kid, David Perkins, has committed today to Notre Dame. He is a big, versatile player. At his school, Washington High School (located in South Bend, Ind), Perkins  played running back, wide receiver, defensive end, and outside linebacker for Washington last season. He is thinking about playing outside linebacker for ND but he also believes there is a slight chance for him to play running back.

Ranked in the top 150 recruits for 2012 by ESPNU, David is sure to be a player Kelly would love to have. He does it all. Offense or defense, he puts his body on the line everyday. He chose the Irish over Michigan State, Mississippi State, Syracuse, and Tennessee. I’d say he made the right decision athletically and academically (no offense to the other schools).

Here’s what Perkins had to say about his decsion:

“It’s a very good opportunity. It’s a decision made for after football also. At the beginning of the process, I really had no interest in Notre Dame. With time, the relationship began to get better. They started to recruit me harder. They just grew on me the more I talked to them and visited them.”

What Perkins says above explains perfectly of how good of a job Coach Kelly is doing at recruiting for the future. He is getting big time players and convincing these prospects to go the Notre Dame way. I cannot be any more excited about the future for the Irish.