Nick Saban spent years making life miserable for Notre Dame, but on Wednesday he gave the Irish something else to roll their eyes at.
At SEC Media Days kickoff, the former Alabama coach said, “I actually think we should play 12 games against the Power 5. That's it.
Because it's a business & people want to see those games,” a stance that lands a little differently when you look back at how his final Alabama schedules were built. That last Crimson Tide team lined up against Middle Tennessee, South Florida and Chattanooga.
The year before that, Alabama’s non-conference slate included Utah State, UL Monroe and Austin Peay. The message was loud; the consistency was not.
While Saban was making headlines for that comment, Notre Dame got a more useful kind of news on the injury front.
Linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa, who went down with a knee injury in Notre Dame’s second-to-last game of last season and has been rehabbing ever since, missed spring practice but is trending in the right direction. Marcus Freeman said earlier this week that Viliamu-Asa is progressing well, though he still won’t be at full strength when fall camp opens: “He won’t be full go. He’ll be return to play.”
There was even better news for freshman safety Joey O’Brien. He injured his ankle during this year’s spring game, and after some concern that he could miss the start of fall camp, Freeman said the safety will be “ready” when the Irish begin official preparations for the 2026 season.
Elsewhere around the program, Notre Dame women’s basketball may already have another freshman worth watching closely. Jacy Abii is drawing Jackie Young comparisons during summer workouts, with the praise centering on how much she can do on the floor: "She’s so gifted in so many different areas...She can do so many things well."
And down in Florida, new Gators head coach Jon Sumrall took a different tone than some of his SEC peers. He made it clear he won’t spend time complaining about the 9-game conference schedule or the strength of schedule in his first season, saying, “We're going to play anybody anywhere anytime. I'm not going to whine and complain about being an SEC head football coach.”
In Other News...
Notre Dame Freshman Buzz Now Carries One Major Concern
Freshman safety Joey OBrien has already given Notre Dame fans a glimpse of why he arrived with so much buzz, and the early summer attention around him only grew after an ankle injury in the spring Blue & Gold game. The highly rated recruit had a hospital photo circulating later in the summer, which naturally sparked some concern, but the bigger picture around his transition to South Bend has remained positive as he prepares to settle in on defense.
Marcus Freeman has helped calm the noise by indicating there is no current worry about OBriens return, a reassuring update for a player who stood out on both sides of the ball in high school before being penciled in as a defensive piece for the Irish. What still matters now is how quickly he can get back into the rhythm of camp work, because for a freshman with his profile, even a brief interruption can shape how soon he pushes into the conversation on defense. [Read more 🡒]
Notre Dame Just Teased The Kind Of Opponent Fans Have Missed
Notre Dames basketball scheduling conversation has a little extra juice whenever old Big East memories come up, and Mike Farrelly helped stir that pot by revisiting the idea of adding a familiar heavyweight back to the calendar. The associate head coach pointed to Connecticut as a program with real historical ties to the Irish, the kind of opponent that brings back the edge and atmosphere that made those matchups stand out in the first place.
There is also a natural fit in the backdrop of a showcase setting like Madison Square Garden, where a game between these two programs would carry the sort of energy fans still remember. The series has enough history and enough recent success on the UConn side to make the idea appealing, and the possibility of seeing the schools meet again feels like the sort of scheduling note that could linger for a while before anything becomes official. [Read more 🡒]