Rose Bowl post-mortem: Is Notre Dame football closer to Alabama or Pitt?

On the field, what is holding Notre Dame football back?

Talent.

This may seem harsh, as after all, there has been a bunch of high NFL draft picks to play under coach Brian Kelly at Notre Dame. The issue is that a team like Alabama, or Clemson for that matter, has NFL talent at every position. They have NFL talent backing up their NFL talent, and the Irish don’t have the same kind of depth.

Just look at the offensive line for Notre Dame. They were an elite group this season, but began to struggle when Jarrett Patterson went down at the center position. Alabama’s center, Landon Dickerson, went down and they didn’t miss a beat.

Their backups are more capable, and when you add in a position group like cornerback for Notre Dame, where the Irish aren’t bad but they also aren’t great, there is a weakness that teams like Alabama can then exploit.

The Irish, meanwhile, are never good enough to find a place to exploit the other team. It’s incredibly hard to beat elite teams when you don’t have depth and the other side has no weaknesses. Debate strategy if you want, but this is the most basic issue that the Irish are consistently facing in the College Football Playoff.

The other issue that Notre Dame faces regarding talent is that they don’t have, and haven’t had since Brady Quinn, an elite quarterback. You’ll remember that Quinn covered up how awful Charlie Weis was for a couple of seasons.

Well, on a team that is good to great with an average quarterback, this takes them to that elite level. Ian Book was good, but he could never do what Justin Fields did in the Sugar Bowl. That’s another key difference in the talent level.