The College Football Playoff is down to the final two teams as Notre Dame and Ohio State are set up for a heavyweight clash on Jan. 20 in Atlanta for the national title. Both teams have battled through adversity of difficult games both during the regular season and in this CFP, and now they are the last two standing.
With Notre Dame's win over Penn State in the CFP semifinals at the Orange Bowl on Thursday night, head coach Marcus Freeman became the first Black head coach to earn a spot in an FBS national championship game. To add to the states, the game will be played on Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Jan. 20. After Notre Dame clinched its spot, Freeman addressed playing on such a historic day, per Matt Fortuna of The Inside Zone.
“As far as playing in the national championship game on MLK Day, to me, the attention should be on MLK Day, and what he did for our country, and the progress he made for equal rights and progress for all people,” the Notre Dame head coach said, per Fortuna. “The courage he had as an individual to stand for what he believes in. And that was with his words and his actions. And so Martin Luther King Day is about celebrating that man and the impacts he's made on our country.”
Freeman's perspective is refreshing before such a big game, and it's great to see him acknowledging such an important day.
This Notre Dame football team has its work cut out for it if it wants to bring home its first national title in nearly 40 years. Ohio State is playing the best football in the country right now and has one of the most talented rosters in college football. Notre Dame is banged up on both sides of the ball, so it will need to have everyone stop up in order to pull off the upset in the title game.