Notre Dame football: Irish stunned at home vs Stanford
By Brad Weiss
The Notre Dame football team were big favorites against Stanford Saturday night but came out on the losing end of a 16-14 final.
Going into their matchup with the Stanford Cardinal, the Notre Dame football team was big favorites, especially after dismantling No. 16 BYU a week ago. Stanford went into the matchup reeling after a tough loss to Oregon State, and the thought was the Irish would roll and continue their winning streak.
Instead, Stanford came to play, and it was clear from the outset that the Irish would be in for a dogfight. In the first half, Stanford dominated the Irish, as Drew Pyne struggled immensely in the passing game, and the run game could not get it going either.
The Cardinal would go into the break with a 10-0 lead, and while Notre Dame would challenge at times in the second half, Saturday night belonged to Stanford.
With the 16-14 loss to Stanford, all of the questions from the 0-2 start have come back into frame, and the slate does not get easier. After UNLV, the Irish take on Syracuse and Clemson, both ranked teams, so this season has a chance to really go off the rails in Marcus Freeman’s first as the head coach of this prestigious program.
Where does Notre Dame football go from here?
Notre Dame football was a team that many felt would impact the College Football Playoff race in 2022, but all of that is out the window now. Stanford was a team that the Irish should have put away early Saturday night, but instead, Pyne struggled, the defense had no answer for Tanner McKee at times, and Freeman was outcoached by David Shaw.
With matchups against ranked teams on the horizon, and the team already with three losses, this could end up being one of the worst seasons in recent memory for the Irish. It is never easy for a coach to take over a program, especially after the former head coach left in the dead of the night, but Freeman and his staff have to figure things out moving forward.
