2015 Pre-season Rankings: #15 Notre Dame Fighting Irish

SportsRatings 2015 College Football Pre-season Top 128

Notre Dame Fighting Irish  (Independent #1)

#15	2014 Results	AP #26 USA #28	Strength:#33  Success:#32  Overall:#35
		Record: 8-5	Bowl: Beat LSU 31-28 (Music City)
	2015 Outlook	Picks: AP #11 | USA #11 | Lindy's #7 | Athlon #12 | Steele #13 | ESPN #18
		Record: 9-3	Bowl odds: 98%   Playoff odds: 9%

If the Irish can win three tossup games—and avoid falling into a couple of trap games—they could go 12-0 and be Playoff bound. They're gonna need their "luck" back in order to do it.

Offense 7 ret. starters	2014 Scoring Offense: #38 (raw) #23 (adjusted for opposition)
	2015 Projected Scoring Offense: #26 (adjusted)

Goodbye Everett Golson, hello Malik Zaire. Ultimately we don't see the offense getting any better nor too much worse for the switch.

Passing Game	2014 Passing Rank: #19 (raw) #17 (adjusted)	2014 Sacks Allowed (raw): #76
	2015 Projected Passing Rank: #25 (adjusted)	2015 Sacks Allowed (proj.): #79

Everett Golson (3,445 yards, 29 TDs, 14 int) had a great year for the Irish in 2014—at least, a great half-year. In the 2nd half of the season the turnovers increased to the point where he was replaced by Malik Zaire (266 yards, 1:0) and that's how it stood until Golson transferred to Florida State. Zaire will have all the top targets back: Will Fuller (1,094 yards, 15 TDs), Chris Brown (548 yards), Corey Robinson (539) and CJ Prosise (516). We're not quite sold on the idea that Zaire is a better passer than Golson; he's probably more efficient but a bit less productive.

Rushing

2014 Rushing Rank: #70 (raw) #41 (adjusted)

2015 Projected Rushing Rank: #54 (adj.)

The Irish have leading rusher Tarean Folston (889 yards) back but lose the next three in line, all of whom topped 250 yards. #2 Greg Bryant (289) is academically ineligible and Everett Golson was #3 with 283 yards. The offensive line should be about the same as Nick Martin, Ronnie Stanley, and Steve Elmer are back. The surprise loss of Bryant dings our prediction but Malik Zaire averaged 5.7 yards per carry last year (187 total) and should prevent the totals from falling too far—or boost them, if they let him run like he did against LSU (96 yards).

2014 Adjusted Stats:	Rush Defense: #55    Pass Defense  per-game: #84   Per-attempt: #73
Defense 9 ret. starters	'14 Scoring Defense: #84 (raw) #53 (adjusted)	'14 sacks: #71	'14 picks: #24
	'15 Projected Scoring Defense: #28 (adjusted)	'15 sacks: #48	'15 picks: #12

Notre Dame's defense looks to be much tougher this year. Three starters return to the defensive line—it was four until Jarron Jones' MCL tear this summer—and we look for a stronger pass rush. At linebacker all three starters return including top tackler Jaylon Smith (112 tackles). The secondary has three starters back from last year including Cole Luke (11 pass breakups) and they get 2013 starter KeiVarae Russell back from academic suspension. They also bring in grad transfer Avery Sebastian who started for Cal last year. The D goes from being the team's weakness to probably being a good match for the offense, and staying healthier this year wouldn't hurt.

Special Teams/Situations

• Kicking Game:  Kyle Brindza was the team's punter (41.5 average) and placekicker (14 of 24 field goals); he's gone.
• Return Game:  Main punt fielder Cody Riggs (7.3 average) is gone but Amir Carlisle (21.7 on kickoff returns) is back.
• Turnovers projection:  We see almost no change here. You'd think that getting rid of Everett Golson, who became a turnover machine, might have an effect, but Notre Dame's fumbling overall wasn't too out of whack, and however many fewer interceptions Zaire throws could be recouped by the defense increasing theirs a bit.

Coaching      Hot Seat Ranking: #49 (WARM)
Brian Kelly had established himself at one point, when Notre Dame had a 12-0 season in 2012. But since then they've gone 9-4 and 8-5, and the worst part was going 1-5 in the 2nd half of last season. So now he's edged just barely into "warm" territory on our scale, though if you ask some fans he should have been fired by now. There are always "those" fans. If the drop in wins continues, however, "those" fans may be a majority.
Recruiting    2015 Recruiting Rank: #15          2014 Recruiting Rank: #8
Another year, another top 25 recruiting class for Notre Dame. Like last year, they load up on consensus 4-star players but don't get the 5-stars.

2014 Recap
Notre Dame's season started with a lot of promise and ended with a thud—before redeeming themselves somewhat with a big bowl victory. The 48-17 win over bowl-bound Rice was one of their best performances—2nd only to beating Michigan 31-0. The Irish were 5-0 after beating Stanford 17-14 and touted as a Playoff contender, but after struggling with North Carolina (50-43) they were only a borderline top 25 team in Strength at 6-0. The close loss to Florida State (31-27) further fooled people into thinking the Irish were a top team; they weren't. That was revealed plainly a few games later as Arizona State pulled away 55-31, then Northwestern stunned the Irish in overtime. Louisville added to the hurt (31-28) and after USC put the 49-14 bomb on them, the Irish had lost 5 of their last 6 games. Almost as stunning as that collapse was their recovery against LSU in the Music City Bowl, where they edged the Tigers 31-28.

Last year's prediction: We ranked Notre Dame #33 and projected a 7-5 record; they finished #33 in Strength with a 7-5 record. Not sure how much better than that you want. Ok, the game-by-game picks. We had Notre Dame starting 5-1, and they won all 6 (Stanford we gave a 57% chance to win). That was the only game we had wrong through ASU (game nine) but then Notre Dame lost to Northwestern and Louisville.

2015 Outlook

Notre Dame 2015 schedule & forecast
9/5	Sat	vs.	Texas	81%	W
9/12	Sat	@	Virginia	80%	W
9/19	Sat	vs.	Georgia Tech	62%	W
9/26	Sat	vs.	Massachusetts	92%	W
10/3	Sat	@	Clemson	51%	W
10/10	Sat	vs.	Navy	95%	W
10/17	Sat	vs.	USC	48%	L
10/31	Sat	@	Temple	59%	W
11/7	Sat	@	Pittsburgh	68%	W
11/14	Sat	vs.	Wake Forest	95%	W
11/21	Sat	@	Boston College	79%	W
11/28	Sat	@	Stanford	47%	L
Straight up: 10-2  Cume: 9-3  Bowl eligible: 98%

Notre Dame's schedule looks like this: 7 solid wins, 2 tough wins, and 3 tossups. Depending on how those pan out the Irish could repeat last year's mediocrity or be on their way to the College Football Playoff.

The seven solid wins include the opener against Texas and the first road game against Virginia. UMass, Navy, and Wake Forest are the easiest of the easier games. And we'll put Pittsburgh in here, too, despite Notre Dame's constant trouble with the Panthers.

The tough wins are Georgia Tech at home and Temple on the road. The Yellow Jackets arrive playing the triple-option and the Irish don't have an extra week to prepare. Playing Navy every year helps, but it would have been nice to schedule the Midshipmen before Georgia Tech. Temple is a classic trap game, following USC, with 2 weeks off before it, and on Halloween. Both these games could be trouble.

The three tossup games are Clemson on the road, USC at home, and Stanford on the road. These should be self-explanatory. It's a tall task to beat all these teams but it has to be a good sign that your worst game is a 50/50 proposition.

It's hard to imagine Notre Dame becoming consistent enough to win all 12 of these games. If they manage to do it, it will probably look a lot like 2012 where they lucked their way to several wins throughout the season. But then, isn't luck what the Irish are supposed to be all about?

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Comments

[Corwyn]

Why is Notre Dame scheduling UMass?

For a program that prides itself on only ever playing not-just-FBS, but *strictly* MAJOR CONFERENCE foes, that should be embarrassing!