Subscribe
Follow Us
A week after pulling off a gutsy victory on the road in the season opener against Texas A&M, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish suffered a brutal 16-14 defeat to unranked Northern Illinois at home.
Many college observers had looked at the Notre Dame schedule after the win over the Aggies and contended that Freeman and his team had an excellent chance to win all of their remaining games. While that may have been a bit of a reach on a schedule that includes Louisville, Florida State and USC, it appeared Notre Dame would be favored in all of its remaining games.
Placekicker Kanon Woodill kicked a 35-yard field goal with 31 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter, and that proved to be the winning margin when Cade Haberman blocked a 62-yard field goal attempt from Notre Dame's Mitch Jeter on the final play of the game.
Woodill also kicked two other field goals — 42 and 21 yards — for the Huskies. Northern Illinois moved to 2-0 with the victory while the Fighting Irish slipped to 1-1.
Notre Dame's hard-core fans, known as the Subway Alumni, reacted to the defeat to Northern Illinois with quite a bit of anger. Freeman understands that the fans are clearly upset that the Fighting Irish couldn't come up with a similar effort to the one they had against Texas A&M, but he thinks he can help the team get on track.
“I’m not going into hiding,” Freeman said after the game, per Irish Sports Daily. “I’m going to work to get it fixed. We've been here before.”
Article Continues Below
Fighting Irish have had some problems at home
Playing at Notre Dame Stadium used to be a brutal assignment for most opponents not ranked with the elite teams in the nation. However, the Fighting Irish failed to come through with the win against Northern Illinois despite going into the game as 28-point favorites. They also lost to Stanford in 2022 as 16-point home favorites and Marshall in the same season as 20-point home favorites.
Notre Dame struggled quite a bit to put together a cohesive offense against the Huskies. Quarterback Riley Leonard was not sharp in leading the attack. He completed 20 of 32 passes for 163 yards and he did not throw a touchdown pass. However, he did throw two interceptions, including one that Amariyun Knighten returned 33 yards to midfield with 5:55 to play.
That was the key play for Northern Illinois because it set up Woodill's game-winning field goal. Northern Illinois got a lift from quarterback Ethan Hampton, who completed 10 of 19 passes for 198 yard with an 83-yard touchdown pass to running back Antario Brown. In addition to that big play, Brown had 20 carries for 99 yards.
