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Notre Dame's New Chapter Faces Early Test Against No. 10 Miami

A battle of experienced versus inexperienced at the quarterback position highlights the Top 10 primetime battle on Sunday night.


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Photo by Notre Dame Athletics


Marcus Freeman has established that 2025 is a new chapter for the Notre Dame Football program. While the success of the 2024 season displayed the Irish’s potential, Sunday night’s matchup will kickstart whether Notre Dame can continue to elevate. They will be entering Hard Rock Stadium to face-off against No. 10 Miami under-the-lights in a primetime Top 10 matchup.

 

These are the biggest factors heading into the Week One matchup.

Staying On-Script & Avoiding 3rd & Long

Everyone in the stadium tomorrow night will know that CJ Carr will be making his first college football start. Miami will likely load the box, and the Irish will be forced to make plays through the air. While Mike Denbrock has admitted he might take some chances with Carr downfield, the veteran offensive coordinator simply has to keep Carr ahead of the chains and give him some easy reads early on.

 

Involving Jeremiyah Love will certainly be at the forefront of the offensive gameplan, but it should be interesting to see the different ways the Irish will utilize him. Running backs coach Ja’Juan Seider has admitted getting Jeremiyah Love around 18-25 touches in big games would be great. An increased workload for the Heisman hopeful would be especially important for the Irish for a back who only averaged 10 rushes per game a season ago.

 

The attempt to use Jordan Faison on wide receiver screens or Eli Raridon coming across the field could be easy completions to settle Carr into the game early on. If Carr starts clicking early, then we could see the redshirt freshman quarterback looking downfield to Malachi Fields. However, early on, especially in the first half, I’d expect a run-heavy gameplan mixed with simple pre-snap reads for Carr to get his feet under him.


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Carson Beck's Connection With His Receivers

On the other side of the ball, the biggest question mark will be Carson Beck’s performance. In my opinion, the fact that Beck has missed out on spring practice will be a bigger factor than most people let on.


Last season, Irish fans saw the growing pains Riley Leonard had as a thrower after not having the spring to establish and fortify his connection with his weapons on the outside. While Beck is coming into Miami with a more prestigious passing background, he is also coming off a more impactful injury than Leonard suffered in terms of throwing the football. The elbow injury for Beck, that was suffered in a Hail Mary attempt in the SEC championship game, is one that may be extremely impactful for Beck mentally, especially as he navigates in the pocket.


It would also be one thing if Beck had a reliable option returning to Miami this season, yet the Hurricanes lost their top six wide receivers from a year ago. Even though the Hurricanes restocked their passing attack through the transfer portal, the fact that there is limited continuity in terms of less practice time is a cause for concern for the Hurricanes. If you couple that with the fact that the Hurricanes are facing one of the most talented secondaries in the nation, I'd give a slight edge to the Notre Dame defense.


The cause for concern for the Irish would be the chess match between defensive coordinator Chris Ash and Miami OC Shannon Dawson. It will be a difficult matchup for Ash in his first game in the DC role at Notre Dame, but he has plenty of talent in all three levels of the defense to help him out.


Electric Returners Highlight Special Teams

While both Miami and Notre Dame feature new kickers, Bert Auburn and Noah Burnette respectively, the kick returners for each team might be the biggest X-factor in special teams.


Notre Dame has already stated Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price could very well be the two kickoff returners for the Irish, enlisting their two most electric options. For Miami, their addition of Keelan Marion from BYU was a big one for their receiving corp, but also because he was the CBS Sports First Team All-American Kickoff Returner in 2024.


While the new kickers may be the biggest scape goats at the end of the night, these returners have the explosiveness to make a drastic impact on this Top 10 game.

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