Why is Marcus Freeman joining ESPN College Gameday for the National Championship Game?

Here comes the national championship game between the Indiana Hoosiers and Miami Hurricanes.

It’s been a wild ride for Notre Dame fans over the last month and a half, but as wild as that ride has been for fans — it had to be wilder for head coach Marcus Freeman. Through it all, very little has been said by Freeman publicly concerning the playoff snub. He was asked about it during the most recent press conference, and his answers says a lot about where he and Notre Dame are right now — as oppossed to (maybe) a month ago.

“I think a lot of the authentic emotions and reactions are captured on the follow doc, Here Come the Irish. You can see the disappointment, the confusion, but as we look at that moment a month plus later, it was obviously disappointing, but you have to move forward and that’s what we’ve done as a program. That’s what I’ve done as a leader, and as I reminded the group on our team meeting on Sunday, it’s our responsibility to make sure we leave no doubt.”

“Moving forward, we can’t blame it on somebody else. Although I may be confused about some of the criteria and the committee’s rankings and all those different things, it’s our job as we move forward to make sure we leave no doubt.” 

So we’re moving forward and looking ahead to 2026 — but Freeman is going to help close out 2025?

But why? Plenty of Notre Dame fans have asked this question today. Why is Marcus Freeman agreeing to help a broadcast show of a company that, flat out, sunk its teeth deep into the neck of Notre Dame leading up the the final rankings and immediately after?

Because Marcus Freeman is doing exactly what he should do — he’s following his own lead. He’s moving on.

Regardless of how RIGHT we may be about the entire playoff thing (and to be clear, this is about Alabama and the SEC and NOT Miami) and opting out of a bowl, the Irish did take a fairly sizable public relations hit. Notre Dame had built up a fairly sizeable amount of goodwill after the 2024 playoff run, and the vibes around the country were pretty fair.

That is decidedly not the case right now.

So who else do you entrust the task of evening things back up a bit? Marcus Freeman — of course. I think his appearance on ESPN’s College Gameday as a guest analyst will give him the opportunity to NOT rehash or litigate the actions and conseqiences over the past month, but to show everyone around the country that Notre Dame is past this and ready to move on. Perhaps there’s no better way to move on than to be part of the final act of the season by paying respect to both Miami and Indiana. One of those two programs is going to be the national champion, but both deserve a tip of the cap for being there in the first place.

That’s why he’s there — because this is the last game of the college football season, and we need to prepare to move on to next season with some dignity and class. We’ll argue about all of the other noise later.