Marcus Freeman, More Demanding Than Ever, Leads Notre Dame Into a Crossroads
“Hi, Jack!” Marcus Freeman is waving at a towheaded toddler walking behind his mother outside the Notre Dame football facility on a recent afternoon. Jack, the son of defensive backs coach Chris O’Leary, waves back at his dad’s boss.
Moments later, inside the building, Freeman walks into his office and finds the seats around his conference table filled by his own sprawling family: six kids and his wife, Joanna, are digging into Chick-fil-A box lunches. The brood is perfectly at home in the facility, and Freeman is perfectly fine with that.
The vibe around Freeman’s program is buoyantly family-oriented and player-friendly. The video of Freeman being engulfed by the Fighting Irish players after being named the head coach in December 2021 was a scene of unabashed affection. Amid the hyperintensity that permeates most high-level college football programs, there are lighter moments here that serve as reminders of the wider world outside blocking and tackling.
The 37-year-old head coach of the most storied of all programs comes across as—dare we say it—likably human.
Is that a good thing?
Of course it is from a larger standpoint. But viewed through the lens of the stereotypical, monomaniacal football coach, we have a discussion.
By his own admission, Urban Meyer sometimes was only vaguely aware of his own children during football season, much less knowing the names of his assistants’ kids. Meyer also won three national championships.
Nick Saban doesn’t exactly exude avuncular charm, drives his staff and players hard, and smiles once or twice per season. He’s also won seven nattys.
Notre Dame backers, like all fan bases, would prefer a coach who is a prince of a fellow during the week and a cold-blooded executioner on Saturdays. If only afforded one of those two seven days a week, they’d take the executioner. Their last coach, Brian Kelly, was known more for purple-faced rage than interpersonal warmth—but he left South Bend as the winningest coach in Notre Dame history.
Freeman opens his second year as head coach of the Fighting Irish on Saturday against Navy in Ireland. After a 9–4 debut season that did not define his long-term ability to do or not do the job, Freeman talked to Sports Illustrated about what he’s learned and changed year-over-year. Much of the discussion dealt with practice plans, biofeedback and other tangible preseason camp stuff.
The final question was more personal: “Are you meaner?”
“I don’t like that word, meaner,” Freeman responds. “I hope I’m more demanding. But I hope they say, as a person, ‘He hasn’t changed.’
“I love this staff. I love this football team. I want the standards to be met; I’m demanding about that, and I want a sense of urgency to correct our mistakes. But I tell [the coaching staff] all the time: I might be the leader, but we’re teammates. I hope they’d say, ‘He hasn’t changed as a person, but he’s demanding now.’”
Freeman’s first season hit some high points—a 21-point thumping of Clemson, plus authoritative wins over North Carolina and South Carolina. But it also featured dispiriting home losses to Marshall and the worst Stanford team in more than 15 years. A vital part of being a football head coach is making sure your team shows up every Saturday, and there were two glaring instances when the Irish did not in 2022.
After those games—particularly the Marshall loss, which dropped last year’s team to 0–2—Freeman torqued up his intensity with his team. There was less “player’s coach” dynamic going on at practice then.
Freeman’s tenure got off to a rocky start, but the Irish recovered to reach nine wins for the sixth consecutive season.
Gary A. Vasquez/USA TODAY Sports
The challenge now is to maintain the intensity all the time, to make it a default setting as opposed to a reaction to negative outcomes. Whether that stems from the kind of gut-churning aversion to defeat that drives many coaches to obsessive lengths, it’s a vital tool to have.
“We’ve got to have the urgency I maybe developed after some losses,” Freeman says. “You’ve got to have that same urgency now. You don’t want losses to be the reasons you fix mistakes. We’ve got to fix our issues in camp. I want us to have the urgency we had after a Marshall loss last year.”
The alchemy that goes into creating a great season has to include other ingredients beyond urgency, of course. Scheme is important, and to that end the Irish are breaking in a new offensive coordinator in Gerad Parker, promoted after Tommy Rees left for Alabama. Talent matters, and Notre Dame probably has its most talented quarterback since Brady Quinn in Wake Forest transfer Sam Hartman, who has thrown for 13,000 yards in his career.
But there is another element that Freeman wants to see from this year’s team: a hair-on-fire competitiveness coupled with confidence that elevates players to their highest level. At some point, the endless strategizing has to give way to in-game performance.
“You have to make sure your coaches give off the vibe of competitive spirit,” Freeman says. “There is a truly tactical aspect to playing the game of football. You have to be intelligent; you have to make sure your schemes are good enough to help you win. But I’ve challenged our players and our coaches—we’re going to be best when our great players play great. How do we get our best players to play great? If you have so many different schemes that they’re not playing fast, then your great players aren’t playing great.”
The schedule offers a softer entry this season than last, when Freeman’s regular-season debut was at Ohio State, his alma mater. This time around, the Irish open with Navy and then play their first FCS opponent in school history, HBCU Tennessee State. That’s followed with a tricky trip to North Carolina State, then a home game against Central Michigan. If Notre Dame can get through that stretch 4–0, the home game against Ohio State on Sept. 23 shapes up as a whopper.
If the 13th-ranked Irish hold up their end of the bargain, they could play three of the 10 biggest games of the year, one each month: No. 4 Ohio State in September, No. 6 USC in October and at No. 9 Clemson in November. Going 9–3 against that schedule would be a solid season. Winning 10 would produce more smiles. Winning 11 likely would put Notre Dame in the College Football Playoff race. Winning fewer than nine would have people wondering whether Freeman can maintain what Kelly built.
As if coaching in the shadow of Touchdown Jesus isn’t already enough of a burden on Freeman’s sturdy shoulders, these are critical times for Notre Dame’s very identity. Longtime athletic director Jack Swarbrick, who opted to hire Freeman without waiting several weeks to interview Luke Fickell after Cincinnati’s barrier-breaking playoff run in 2021, is stepping down in ’24. Meanwhile, the school’s NBC contract is coming due in ’25, with negotiations on a new deal likely to start next year under future AD Pete Bevacqua (former president of NBC Sports).
Swarbrick and Notre Dame president Father John Jenkins would like the school to remain a football independent for the remainder of time, as would a large percentage of the fan base. A more lucrative NBC deal would be vital to maintaining that status. While Notre Dame football is to a degree recession-proof, it would certainly help the school to enter into those TV negotiations with its signature program hitting on all cylinders. At the very least, the Irish don’t want to be backsliding into it.
If Notre Dame doesn’t command a new media-rights deal that keeps it financially competitive, would the school trigger the ultimate nationwide realignment earthquake by joining a conference? That remains to be seen.
But with the Irish holding a significant slice of the future makeup of college sports in their hands, Notre Dame football arguably takes on even greater significance than it usually does. And this season is an important one heading into an NBC contract year. All of that rests on the desk of a 37-year-old, second-year head coach.
Against that towering backdrop, the immensely likable Marcus Freeman is trying to run a family-oriented, player-centered football program. Accentuating that with a smidge of monomaniacal meanness might be a good career move.
