Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM MARCH 2025 35 doesn't call Golden the "Godfather" of the Notre Dame defense for noth- ing, after all. Even the members of his unit who can't legally buy themselves an adult beverage yet, the ones who are roughly one-third of his age, under- stand where he's been and why he's so good at what he does. Penn State tight end. Cup of coffee in the NFL with the New England Pa- triots. High school offensive coordina- tor. Half a dozen college teams worked for, including two as a head coach. Two NFL teams worked for, including one that went to the Super Bowl with him on staff in the Cincinnati Bengals. Golden speaks, you listen. Do as he tells you to, and you'll do well. "Everything runs through him and he gets us right," Shuler said. ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE Just like it became customary to check in on Sunday mornings to see where Notre Dame's defense ranked in national statistics, poring through game logs of the country's best players to find out which of them had scored a touchdown in every game they'd played in was quite a fun task. Fighting Irish sophomore running back Jeremiyah Love was always one of them. The last one standing in that regard, in fact. Love got into the end zone at least once in each of Notre Dame's first 13 games this season. The first time he did not was against Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. He re-injured his knee in that matchup and missed most of the sec- ond half. A week and a half later, he had one of the scores of the year for his own highlight reel and, given the magnitude of the moment in the Orange Bowl, one of the scores of the year in the entire context of college football, period. That's just what Love does. He rises up to any occasion. He's an embodiment of the Notre Dame program in that way. "It speaks volumes to the heart he has," head coach Marcus Freeman said after the Orange Bowl. "He gave everything he had to this place. He did not have to play today. Nobody would have batted an eye. But he put team in front of himself and how he felt, and we've got a whole bunch of guys like that in that locker room, and that's why we're in this position." You know a guy's good when you're not really sure which play of his to pick as your favorite. For instance, maybe it's the go-ahead touchdown in the final minutes of the season opener at Texas A&M. Maybe it's the record-breaking 98-yard touchdown to open the scoring in the first round of the College Football Playoff versus Indiana. That's probably the winner for most. Love was ill with the flu for that one, by the way. But if you're a sucker for insane athletic feats like popular comedian and Notre Dame super fan Shane Gillis, it's gotta be one of Love' many hurdles over the top of defenders who clearly underestimated what he's capable of. He had another one of those against Penn State. Sometimes they go for minimal gains like that one. Sometimes they go for touchdowns like the ones against Northern Illinois and Army. Sometimes they circulate the web with authority and leave watchers abso- lutely astounded like the one against USC. We've gotten this far without rattling off his full-season statistics. Love is much more than his numbers, but even those are mesmerizing — 163 carries, 1,125 yards, 6.9 yards per carry, 17 rush- ing touchdowns; plus 28 catches, 237 yards and 2 receiving scores. "I'm nicked up, but I love my broth- ers," Love said. "I'm going to go out there and do what I got to do no matter how I'm feeling, if I'm sick or whatever, and they'll do the same for me." ✦ Sophomore running back Jeremiyah Love was the only FBS player to have scored a rushing touchdown in every regular season game this season. He finished the season with 163 carries, 1,125 yards, 6.9 yards per carry and 17 rushing touchdowns. PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER