Three biggest Notre Dame football strengths after spring practice

We learned a lot about the Notre Dame football team throughout 15 practices of spring ball. That includes what it does best.

Here are what Blue & Gold believes are Notre Dame’s biggest strengths entering the 2024 season.

3. Quarterback depth

When you need to play 16 games to win a national championship, odds are you’re going to need more than one capable quarterback. Those odds are greater when your projected starter has dealt with a seemingly non-stop onslaught of lower-body injuries for the better part of the past seven months.

At the moment, it looks like the Irish have four.

While the Irish didn’t see much from senior Duke transfer Riley Leonard in spring ball, they know what they have in him. They have a pretty good idea of who junior Steve Angeli is, and his play this spring reinforced it. Angeli is, at worst, someone Notre Dame would be very comfortable with as a spot starter. He could be more than that if given an opportunity.

The bigger question marks were sophomore Kenny Minchey and freshman CJ Carr, and both — especially Carr — showed signs of being starting-caliber signal-callers as soon as this season.

Minchey is fun to watch, if a little prone to mistakes at this stage. You’ll live with those, though, because he makes up for it by making plays, He has a super-dynamic, lively arm and he can break off huge yardage with his legs. Click here, here or here to read Blue & Gold’s thoughts on Carr, and these are just from Tuesday.

This quarterback room is a luxury very few teams have. That will remain true, albeit not to the same extent, if one of them enters the transfer portal within the next week.

2. Explosive playmakers

Some of the names on the Irish who come to mind here: Jeremiyah Love, Jadarian Price, Kris Mitchell, Jaden Greathouse, Jordan Faison and Jayden Harrison. Two of those players are newcomers, while the four others are expected to take on larger roles this season than they had last year. They should make the 2024 Irish much faster and more explosive than the 2023 version.

These players are unproven, either at the power-conference level (Mitchell and Harrison), as a featured player (Love, Price and Greathouse) or over a full season (Faison). But Notre Dame had to have left spring ball with a lot of confidence in that group. It also has an offensive coordinator in Mike Denbrock who knows how to harness their explosiveness and turn it into big plays.

Combine those seven with some reliable possession targets in Beaux Collins, Jayden Thomas (when healthy) and Mitchell Evans (also when healthy), and the Irish have an exciting core group of weapons. They still carry the “unproven” tag, but it got easier and easier to believe in them as spring ball moved along.

1. Pass defense

One could split pass rush and pass coverage into two separate strengths. Both would make the top three. But this article would cover fewer bases if it did that, and both the rush and the coverage are working toward the same goal.

Starting up front, Notre Dame has countless ways to get to the quarterback. Are you really strong at offensive tackle? Fine. Howard Cross III and Rylie Mills might be the best interior pass rush duo in the country. Do you protect well up the middle? Look out for RJ Oben, Jordan Botleho, Boubacar Traore, Jaylen Sneed, Drayk Bowen, Jaiden Ausberry and Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa off the edge. They all ripped their way to quarterbacks several times in spring ball.

Any of the aforementioned linebackers can rush from any position, which makes them even scarier to deal with. You could also find yourself with a defensive back bearing down on you. Notre Dame is comfortable enough in Year 3 of Al Golden‘s system that the crafty defensive coordinator can throw whatever he likes at opposing quarterbacks.

On the back end, junior cornerback Benjamin Morrison is one of the best cover corners in the country. Graduate safety Xavier Watts was the best ballhawk in the nation last season. Adon Shuler, Jaden Mickey, Christian Gray and Jordan Clark looked like they’ll be more than capable of filling in the rest this spring.

Bottom line: Passing on Notre Dame is going to be a mine field in 2024.

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