With fall camp right around the corner, there's plenty of hype surrounding the Notre Dame football team. There are also plenty of questions.
Some of those questions are rather obvious. Some are ones that won't get an answer until the season is underway. But Marcus Freeman needs to do his best to go out and get answers to questions because learning on the fly is less than ideal.
Is there really a quarterback race on the Notre Dame football team?
Notre Dame football is supposedly set to see a battle between CJ Carr and Kenny Minchey. And while there were questions during spring practice about who might win the job, those questions have turned into statements.
Just about everyone around the country believes that Carr will be the guy. Almost no one has picked Minchey to be "they guy." So will the race really be a race? There will be plenty of lip service about this, but how the two guys work in fall practices has to actually matter if you're going to claim there's a QB battle.
Who will step up on the defensive line?
Bourbacar Traore, Jared Dawson, Gabe Rubio, Bryce Young, Jason Onye, Josh Burnham, Donovan Hinish, and Junior Tuihalamaka. There is plenty of talent on the Notre Dame defensive line, but are there guys who can step up like Rylie Mills and Howard Cross III?
This is, in fact, the biggest question the Fighting Irish are facing this season. Notre Dame's identity the last few seasons has been based on their defense. While the offense is expected to step up this year and carry more of the load, it's going to lean on a first-year starting quarterback no matter who is under center.
Can the defensive front come anywhere close to as good as it's been the past two seasons? Especially with a new defensive coordinator in Chris Ash? It can't just be "the defensive line looks good." The question is, which of these guys and how many can really be the leader of that unit?
Will special teams be the Notre Dame football team's Achilles heel?
There was a lot of ink spilled over Notre Dame's loss to Northern Illinois last year. While there were plenty of reasons why that loss happened, one thing is abundantly clear. Had the kicking game been just a little bit better, it wouldn't have been a loss.
Kicker Mitch Jeter had two field goals blocked. Had the Irish managed to avoid just one of those blocks and Jeter had nailed the kick, people were just talking about avoiding a big upset.
Jeter struggled all season, hitting just 13 of 21 field goal attempts. When he missed time due to injury, his backups went just 2-for-6. And it wasn't just the kicker that was a problem.
Punter James Rendell wasn't terrible, but he wasn't very good. According to Pro Football Focus, he tied for 121st out of 192 punters with a 60.0 rating. Rendell also had the most punts of any of the guys he tied. He was also tied for 112th in yards per attempt.
Rendell is back and will hopefully improve, but Jeter has been replaced by transfer kicker Noah Burnette, who hit just 15 of 21 field goal attempts last year for North Carolina. Burnette did hit 19 of 20 in 2023, so the hope is he can return to that form.
With an arguably much tougher early season schedule than in 2024, the Notre Dame football team needs to get its special teams house in order quickly, as there's bound to be closer games that could come down to a well-placed punt or a long field goal attempt.