Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman told ESPN earlier this week that the Fighting Irish fell to Northern Illinois in a massive upset because his team believed the hype it generated after a tough win at Texas A&M.
This author had that same thought the instant NIU blocked a second Mitch Jeter field-goal attempt to seal the Huskies’ win.
After beating the Aggies in a hostile environment on the road in the season opener, Notre Dame was being penciled in for a home game in the first round of the College Football Playoff. College players are human and can’t fully isolate themselves from media, whether it’s the news media or social media.
Not only that, but this Notre Dame squad has some relatively inexperienced players at key positions. That’s a recipe for players to start believing that they’ll roll out of bed and win, especially against an unheralded team like NIU.
It’s also a recipe for the Irish to underestimate an opponent. The Huskies might be a contender for the MAC championship — they are now ranked in the AP Top 25 after beating Notre Dame.
“This is the first time in my three years as a head coach that we have won the big game early in the season,” Freeman said. “Two losses to Ohio State and then all of a sudden, we win and everybody says, ‘Hey, you’re going to the playoff. You’ve got an easy schedule.’ We all hear it, and I think we started to believe that.”
“There is a physical approach to preparing for a game, and I think physically we prepared the right way,” he said, “but there’s also a mental approach and a mindset that you have to have every single week, and I think that’s where we failed.”
It’s good that Freeman is aware of the problem and the part it played in one of the worst losses in program history. Now it has to get fixed — or Notre Dame will find itself outside the playoff looking in. And Freeman might find himself unemployed.
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