Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of the Irish Breakdown podcast brought brought to you by Fandul. Happy Tuesday, everybody. It is almost New Year's Eve. I just got used to type in 25 at the end of all of the dates on the top of all my notes. I have to get ready to start typing 26. So these years are starting to roll by a little bit quicker, man. Welcome to being old, Trevor. Welcome to be an old.

Thank you.

Happy to be here. Exactly how it goes, man.

Man, is it December already? I just learned that. Well, I'll show you, but at least you're not like, man, I just learned how to start doing that on my checkbook. That's normally what old people really do. It's when I just finally got used to doing that on my checkbook. like oh wait they wait, they still do that? No worries, man. No worries. But folks, we have another really exciting show coming

your way today. We're going to start this off. Part one, there's been a lot of talk since the

regular season's been over for Notre Dame after the playoff snub and after the decision to sit

out of the bowl game. Ben talks about should Notre Dame join a conference and what should their schedules

look like?

There's just this notion that Notre Dame schedules and future schedules are considered weak

because it's not a part of a conference.

We're going to have a conversation about that and share our thoughts and talk about why

that is what it is, why we do or do not think Notre Dame should go in a certain direction.

And then in part two of today's show, we're going to be talking about the college football playoffs. The quarterfinal start tomorrow when Ohio State takes on Miami, New Year's Eve, kickoff is at 8 p.m. But then obviously the three games on New Year's Day. So a lot of fun things to talk about today here, Brian. But where we're going to start, obviously, this is Irish Breakdown. We're talking from a Notre Dame standpoint. Like I said, a lot of conversation around Notre Dame, even though they're not playing in a bowl game, you would think that they're gearing up for it with how much conversations going on around South Bend. So lots to talk about today here for Notre Dame. Yeah, and, you know, I just felt it was important for us to have a conversation about

Notre Dame and the schedule and just big picture because there is a lot of conversation going

around about, you know, join a conference, join a conference and really just a lot of

faulty flawed logic.

And you're even starting to see some Notre Dame fans start to talk about this. And where this topic kind of came from is there was a post on the message board yesterday that talked about how Notre Dame needs to join a conference. And it was, I'm not trying to take a shot at the poster. I won't say the person's name because I'm not trying to call that person individually because he's not alone in thinking this. It was very flawed logic. And what you're

seeing is, is you're starting to see a chunk of Notre Dame fans. And I don't know this guy's age,

but I think you're definitely seeing it more in the younger generation where they're kind of falling

for the talking points. They're falling for the narratives. They're allowing themselves to kind to be bullied into this conversation of, well, you know, we can't make the playoff if this, this, this, or this happens. Well, look, now we know we can't lose two games in a season are going to be left out. Well, yeah, that's true this year. But do you think Notre Dame would have been left out last year with this schedule when you look at the three lost teams they were going against three lost teams that lost games in the regular season? And the answer is like, no, they wouldn't have. It's a unique year. If they would have had last years, if they would have had this record, the record they had last year this year, then they're fine. And at the end of the day, it's like, look, Notre Dame still controls their own destiny, no matter how much people want to cry about, they don't. And,

and that's just the facts, because if Notre Dame handles their business on the field,

they're going to be in the playoffs. And there's nothing the committee can do about it

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