Notre Dame wins thrilling Gator Bowl over South Carolina: Instant Takeaways

What was your favorite part of the thrilling win?

Notre Dame finished their first season under head coach Marcus Freeman with an incredibly memorable Gator Bowl victory over South Carolina.  45-38 sounds absurd enough to type out but the reality is the game featured a little bit of everything – good and bad.

Most importantly for the Irish, they finish the year with a win and 9-4 overall mark.  In a sense it was fitting how this game went, as it was somewhat symbolic of Notre Dame football over the past 13 months.

We’ll have plenty of post-game reaction following the thrilling victory here at Fighting Irish Wire.  Let’s start with a few instant takeaways from the 45-38 victory.