Army coach lays out the big difference between his squad and Notre Dame Football

When the Notre Dame football team takes on the Army Black Knights, no one in the sport doesn’t realize the two programs have some serious differences. Not the least of which is that the Irish entered the season with expectations of playoff contention while Army is one of the Cinderella squads of the 2024 campaign.

There are several reasons why the two programs are on different paths to the same destination. And the cadets coach is very aware of what exactly sets the two teams apart this weekend, and every weekend.

"I can thank my mentor and former head coach Paul Johnson, as he always said, 'They got 22 Parade All-Americans, and we've got 22 guys who have marched in a parade,'" said Monken, when talking about Notre Dame football and what the winner of 79 games at West Point has in front of him. "So, the difference between them and us, it's a long way.”

Notre Dame football can’t let overconfidence get in the way of the win

"We know the challenges that are going to be there, the defensive front that they have, but it's everybody, all 11 guys,” Monken continued. “Their secondary guys are athletic, fast; we don't much up physically. So, what we've got to do is execute at a really high level doing what we do and hope it will be good enough."

While he’s not wrong that the Notre Dame defense is one of the best in the country, the Irish know they can’t get overconfident or think they can just roll over the Cadets. While they won’t admit it, that’s likely one of the reasons they had so many problems in Week 2 against Northern Illinois.

The Notre Dame football players and coaches seemed to have learned their lesson. They’ve been nearly totally dominant every week since that loss. Now they need to show they learned their lesson one more time.