There’s no doubt that Notre Dame’s schedule isn’t particularly scary. Instead of opening the season with Miami or Texas A&M, their Week 1 opponent is Wisconsin, which was 4-8 last season. Despite that rather unimpressive record, the Badgers might be the toughest team the Fighting Irish face in their first six games. So no, there’s no world where the schedule is “tough,” but that doesn’t mean it's as bad as some would like fans to believe, and Monday’s release of the AP Top 25 underlines that.
The top note is that Marcus Freeman’s squad starts the year as the No. 4 team in the country. That’s a very nice start for a team that will, in fact, need plenty of help to stay in the College Football Playoff field. Of course, the Irish start the year as a team that would get a first-round bye thanks to CFP seeding changes.
Another noteworthy aspect of the latest rankings is that Notre Dame has three teams on the schedule ranked in the Top 20 and two ranked in the 15. Miami heads the list as the highest-ranked 2026 opponent at No. 7 in the nation. BYU is the next highest-ranked opponent at No. 14, and then SMU is No. 19 in the first AP Top 25 of the season.
Navy is the only other opponent on the Irish schedule that got votes in this preseason poll and, judging by how bad some of the other teams on the slate are, is likely the only other team that will realistically be ranked at some point this season.
AP Top 25 undercuts criticism of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish schedule
So, with all the complaints about how Notre Dame needs to join a conference, how does having three Top 20 teams matchup with those schools that are, in fact, in a conference and constantly complain about how being in the Big Ten or SEC is too tough?
Curt Cignetti’s Indiana squad faces just one more pre-season ranked team than the Irish do this year. With Ohio State (1), Michigan (16), USC (14), and Washington (17), their schedule is tough but not that much tougher than what Freeman’s squad will see. Ohio State, meanwhile, has five AP Top 25 teams on its schedule, including three Top 10 schools, making it one of the most difficult in the country on that metric.
Over in the SEC, Alabama has three teams ranked in the Top 25 on its schedule, the same number as Notre Dame. Texas A&M has six, Georgia has four (including a Missouri team that really shouldn’t be in there), and LSU has five.
What does all this prove considering 12 teams that were ranked in the preseason AP Top 25 finished the 2025 campaign unranked? Nothing more than bragging rights.
However, keep these numbers in mind when the complaints start coming in, rapid-fire, about how Notre Dame’s schedule is so much weaker than everyone else’s. Using this preseason ranking as the metric, it’s right in line with the big boys of college football.
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