14 days until Notre Dame football: How many field goals will the Irish make in 2023?

BlueandGold.com will release a countdown article highlighting a significant Fighting Irish football statistic every day until the 2023 Notre Dame season opener against Navy in Dublin, Ireland, on Aug. 26. Today, there are 14 days until the Fighting Irish and Midshipmen kick off at Aviva Stadium.

Apparently, the best teams in the nation don’t just score touchdowns. They settle for quite a few field goals, too.

Michigan tied NC State for the most field goal makes in the country in 2022 with 29 on the Wolverines’ way to qualifying for the College Football Playoff for the second year in a row. Georgia, meanwhile, made 27 en route to the Bulldogs’ second consecutive national championship.

Other CFP participants TCU made 18 and Ohio State made 17.

Notre Dame finished behind all four of those teams with a count of 14, the program’s lowest total since matching that mark with 14 in 2017. Fourteen field goals ranked tied for 64th nationally.

Arkansas State transfer Blake Grupe made 14-of-19 attempts in his lone season in South Bend. The Fighting Irish have another graduate transfer who will only kick in blue and gold threads for one season; Spencer Shrader of South Florida.

An Indianapolis native, Shrader should feel comfortable kicking in his home state even though he spent the last five seasons at USF. As a Bull, Shrader made all 95 of his extra points and was 28-of-41 on field goal tries.

If Notre Dame is to make more than 14 field goals in 2023, though, the Irish will be putting Shrader in a spot he is unfamiliar with. His single season high for field goal attempts is 13, twice. He attempted that many in each of the last two seasons. In 2021, Shrader made 11 field goals. Last year, he made nine.

Shrader seems to feel comfortable in his new surroundings. When media has been at practice to watch him kick, Shrader has made 50-plus yarders with ease multiple times. He told the media this week he believes he can make 62 to 63 yarders on “any given day.” He said his personal best on a standard three-step kick was 75 yards — in hurricane winds in Florida.

Perhaps Shrader will step into the brisk South Bend winds waiting for him in October and November and set a new in-game record. His current mark for the longest field goal connection of his career is 52 yards against Temple in 2021. Last year, his season-long was 49 yards at Florida.

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