Marcus Freeman not ashamed to discuss failings with those who exploited them
The sting from Notre Dame football’s loss to Northern Illinois isn’t going away for a while. Probably not until the Irish can put it behind them and make the playoffs truly.
On the bright side, head coach Marcus Freeman isn’t letting the loss only be a negative. He’s said he wants to ensure this kind of thing doesn’t happen again. His actions this week back up that talk.
After the game, Northern Illinois’ Thomas Hammock reached out to the Notre Dame football head coach to explain why his Huskies overcame the Fighting Irish. And to Freeman’s credit, he listened.
"We've talked on the phone a couple of times, and exchanged text messages,” Hammock told the Pardon My Take podcast. “It was my first time meeting him. Obviously, I have a lot of respect for him as a head coach and I want him to do well for obvious reasons."
Notre Dame football coach is not ashamed to discuss his failings with those who caused them
Unsurprisingly, there are two very disparate takes about this situation. Some Fighting Irish fans are rather unhappy that Freeman’s team lost to Hammock’s squad in the first place. To them, it’s adding insult to injury that he feels the need to get help from a MAC program to improve.
“Freeman getting lapped and mentored by NIU’s head coach im done bro,” wrote one fan along those lines.
It’s not just Notre Dame football fans who have a problem with this either. A prominent USC fan account had thoughts on this teamup.
“Imagine you are Notre Dame Head Coach Marcus Freeman. Your school just paid 1 million to play NIU. You lost to NIU. NIU coach feels so bad for you he’s offering you free coaching courses. Marcus Freeman may be a deadman walking at Notre Dame.”
However, there are plenty of people in the college football community who understand what this really is. Marcus Freeman knows there were holes in his game plan last Saturday, and he knows there are ways to improve.
Why wouldn’t the Notre Dame football coach turn over every rock to make sure this kind of thing doesn’t happen again? It’s another illustration that when Freeman says he wants to find answers, it’s not just coach speak. He means it and is actively searching for those answers.