Notre Dame football: Al Golden gets ridiculous lack of respect in DC rankings

What Al Golden built the Notre Dame football defense into last year is nothing short of amazing. And yet, it appears the Fighting Irish defensive coordinator is still not getting the love he deserves nationally.

Perhaps some of that lack of respect is because Golden is seen as someone who inherited a ton of talent when he arrived in South Bend. Maybe it’s just that people don’t usually look at the Irish as a school that puts together strong defenses.

Whatever, the reason, the Notre Dame football defensive coordinator got a bit more disrespect last week when he was only ranked 9th on the list of best DCs in the sport. Even discounting the list because of who made it, seems ridiculously low.

Notre Dame football defensive coordinator keeps getting disrespected

Twitter account Big Game Boomer put together what users see as the 50 best DCs in college football. Despite being an account dedicated to the sport, it appears he doesn’t know a whole lot about the subject.

The men who are ranked ahead of Golden are certainly not bad. 

Iowa’s Phil Parker is right at the top of the list. He’s followed by Ohio State’s Jim Knowles, Nebraska’s Tony White, Clemson’s Wes Goodwin, NC State’s Tony Gibson, Georgia’s Glenn Schuman, Texas’ Pete Kwiatkowski and Utah’s Morgan Scalley.

That’s an impressive list. Golden is ahead of talented coordinators like Penn State’s Tom Allen and Florida State’s Adam Fuller.

But still, it appears that the Fighting Irish defensive coordinator continues to be overlooked. As someone who has benefitted from talent like Howard Cross III and Xavier Watts more than someone who is one of the best coordinators out there.

That also seemed to show how hard it was for the Notre Dame football coach to land a new job despite all the head coach openings. That means he will have to prove 2023 wasn’t a fluke. And the Irish will be the beneficiaries.