Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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16 OCT. 15, 2022 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY PATRICK ENGEL M arcus Freeman uttered some form of the word "finish" 1 2 t i m e s i n h i s 1 1- m i n - ute press conference after Notre Dame's 21-10 loss to Ohio State in Week 1, including four uses in his 60-second opening statement. The Irish let a 10-7 halftime lead slip away against the No. 2 team in the country that game, and the inability to push across the finish line or score any points in the second half rankled him. "We have to learn how to finish," Freeman repeated. Three weeks later, though, it didn't leave his mouth once after a 45-32 win over North Carolina. Not because Notre Dame mastered finishing — it slipped a couple times toward the end of the game — but because he learned amid an 0-2 start his message of finishing was misplaced, if not outright wrong. "Finishing" was replaced with "bet- ter" and "execution" and "prepara- tion" in Freeman's postgame remarks after that win over the Tar Heels. He said some variation of preparation four times in one answer. Better — as in get- ting better, being better — twice came out five times in a response. Freeman's postgame themes have shifted through the first month. That feeling-out process of what to say and what buttons to push looked and sounded like a first-time head coach trying to find the right grip of the steer- ing wheel. Eventually, he landed on a more process-driven emphasis than a results-focused one. Based on Notre Dame's recent turnaround, it's likely to stick around. "For him, his whole message has been execution," graduate student guard Jar- rett Patterson said. "Really just one play, one life. Don't worry about what happened previously, what happened in practice yesterday or what's going to happen tomorrow. Focus on doing your job." Freeman knew he had to change his messaging after Notre Dame lost 26-21 to Marshall Sept. 10 because he had to act on his "challenge everything" man- tra. The Irish were 0-2 and had lost as a 20.5-point favorite, the kind of calamity that calls everything into question. First up for introspection in those spots? The head coach. A postmortem of 0-2 wasn't how Freeman wanted to learn on the job, but it was the reality he had to embrace. "Sometimes it takes failures to really evaluate how you're leading," Freeman said. "It shouldn't take that. But for me, after Marshall, I said, 'Hold on, let's re- ally, really look how I am as a leader and where I can improve.' It starts with the head coach and making sure you really improve as a leader." If there is any positive to starting 0-2, it's the trigger of a shock to the system so deep that no moment is left unevalu- ated. Make no mistake, it was a bad and inexcusable outcome. Notre Dame's championship goals were squashed when Marshall kneeled out the final seconds, and in that sense, the Irish's season was essentially over before fall weather had even arrived. It's not that Notre Dame didn't study itself during the season before. It just had the luxury of doing so after wins and the focus to keep pushing for more despite achieving the desired result most games. Losses like the Marshall game, though, ought to ensure no mis- takes are glossed over because the fi- nal product was satisfactory. If nothing MESSAGE CHANGE Head coach Marcus Freeman realized his emphasis on end results was misplaced and has switched his talking points "His whole message has been execution. Really just one play, one life. Don't worry about what happened previously, what happened in practice yesterday or what's going to happen tomorrow." GRADUATE STUDENT GUARD JARRETT PATTERSON ON FREEMAN'S EMPHASIS