Let's talk about the defense fellows because this is a much different kind of conversation.

There's a lot more veteran players that we could talk about here in this conversation.

But I think this side of the ball, even more so than on offense, your success hinges on the players we're going to talk about today.

And there are some veteran players at Notre Dame that have opportunities to be really big

difference makers for Notre Dame and haven't been so far for different reasons for each guy.

But if this group of veterans that we're going to talk about today can step up and really take their games to that next level, then I think this football team is really going to be dangerous.

And a lot of the conversation is going to be focused on the front seven.

And I'm going to call an audible a little bit here as well, guys, but I'm going to start off inside.

I want to go inside and talk

about guys who literally have their last chance to make an impact of Notre Dame.

And that's Gabriel, Rubio, and Jason Onion. I think they kind of go together. The reasons

they haven't really been difference makers are for different reasons. Part of it is for both

of them is health. Gabriel's had a tough time being

healthy for entire seasons. Even he's a big strong kid. He hasn't been a guy. He's been a very

steady, stout stuffer, but not a playmaker for the most part. He goes into a season where now

he's the guy being counted on to be a strong

difference maker type of player.

His difference making is not going to look like Riley Mills.

It won't look like Howard Cross.

It's more so like you can't run at him anymore.

I mean, and then he'll make some plays.

Jason Onye was not the highly ranked recruit that Gabriel was, but Vince, you and I talked about him a long time ago and started talking about him. And he was a guy that we talked about early on when this channel launched. That's how long Jason's been committed in their name. He committed as a junior. This is a young man that we've always said, raw needs a lot of work, but the upside was enormous.

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