Notre Dame wrapped up its fall camp on Friday with a 100 play scimmage. Marcus Freeman then went and took questions from the media, and the single biggest takeaway from that presser is that this Notre Dame football team is DEEP.
Notre Dame had a handful of starting positions up for grabs before camp started, and those are still not filled up with a starters name next to them as we roll onto Wisconsin prep. Well… not publicly anyway.
Notre Dame has done a great job of keeping so much of what it’s doing
and wants to do away from the public’s eye that it’s hard to really lock in on “who won” this spot. Ask Marcus Freeman about a position group and a battle within that group for a starting role, and he’ll give multiple names with praise. In the past, I think Freeman (and definitely his predecessors) would do this to hedge their bets a little bit. With Notre Dame’s 2026 roster, however, it really probably a case that they’re deep enough to send a number of players out onto the field regardless of depth chart position.
According to Marcus, Notre Dame’s two deepest position groups are at defensive tackle and linebacker — and he’s not wrong. There’s also little pressure to get the “ones right” when they will likely have a heavy rotation at both spots.
“I would probably say two of them. One would be the defensive tackle position. We’re deep with a lot of guys that will play, a lot of guys that can start. It’s great competition, and those guys really had a good camp. And the linebackers, when you have four guys that have all started. We have four guys, and any one of those guys can be on the field at any time. And so when you talk about true depth, those two positions stick out to me. But the D-tackle position, you’re really almost three deep of guys that can go in a game and play.”
THIS is where we are now at Notre Dame under Marcus Freeman. Having CJ Carr back for a second year as QB1 certainly helps that perception a great deal, but the honest truth is that the talent aquisition from HS recruiting and the transfer portal during Freeman’s tenure has brought us to this moment (the moment in which I’m fully comfortable in him name dropping half the roster in a press conference).
