Notre Dame vs The SEC In Latest Bowl Projections

Notre Dame was off this weekend, which meant the Irish could avoid some of the chaos that happened to other Top 25 teams. The results this weekend shook up the bowl projections, and that included Notre Dame. There were some very intriguing matchups in the latest batch of bowl projections.

The most intriguing matchup is the Fighting Irish against LSU in the ReliaQuest Bowl. This is the projection from both Mark Schlabach of ESPN and CollegeFootballNews.com.

Notre Dame and LSU have met four times in bowl games, with the first coming back in 1997, a game LSU won 27-9. The Tigers beat Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl following the 2006 season as well. Notre Dame beat LSU 31-28 in the 2014 Music City Bowl and 21-17 in the 2017 Citrus Bowl.

That's not the intriguing part of the matchup. Of course, the intriguing part would be the Marcus Freeman vs. Brian Kelly aspect of that potential matchup. Kelly was Notre Dame's head coach from 2010 to 2021 before leaving for LSU. His last defensive coordinator was Freeman, who replaced him as head coach.

Kyle Bonagura of ESPN has the Fighting Irish projected to face Florida in the Gator Bowl. Notre Dame beat South Carolina in the Gator Bowl a season ago. The Irish have not faced Florida since beating the Gators by a 39-28 score in the Sugar Bowl following the 1991 season. That was the only time Notre Dame and Florida have played each other in football.

Bill Bender of Sporting News projects Notre Dame to face Utah in the Holiday Bowl. The Irish and Utes have played just once, with Notre Dame winning that game by a 28-3 score back in 2010. Notre Dame has never played in the Holiday Bowl.

Jerry Palm of CBS Sports and Athlon Sports both project Notre Dame to the Pop Tarts Bowl. Palm has Notre Dame slated to face Kansas while Athlon has them projected to play Kansas State.

Notre Dame holds a 4-1-1 all-time record over Kansas, but the teams have never faced each other in a bowl game. The last meeting was a 48-13 win by Notre Dame back in 1999.

Notre Dame has never faced Kansas State.

The Pop Tarts Bowl has had many names over the years. Most recently it was the Camping World Bowl, the Russell Athletic Bowl and the Champs Sports Bowl. Notre Dame placed in the Champs Sports Bowl after the 2011 season and beat Iowa State in the Camping World Bowl in 2019.

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