Notre Dame Football: Irish ranked #5 for 2022 season by ESPN’s CFB FPI

There are still a handful of spring games to be played across the country — including Notre Dame’s Blue-Gold Game — but the offseason has definitely arrived with rankings, odds, and projections for 2022. ESPN released their College Football Power Index, and Notre Dame comes in at #5.

You can make of these rankings what you will, but based on what was released, the Irish will face 3 teams ranked in the top 25; #2 Ohio State Buckeyes, #4 Clemson Tigers, #22 North Carolina Tar Heels.

Despite the solid ranking of Notre Dame at #5, I personally find this list to be kind of bullshit. Clemson at #4 is a little bit of a headscratcher as we can only guess if Dabo will get things turned around from last year — and with a new staff. Still... we can find a lot of holes with most teams (including Notre Dame) so we should probably just take this exercise in advanced stats as just that — an exercise.

I do find it to be a lot of fun that the Pittsburgh Panthers (#9) are ranked ahead of the Texas A&M Aggies (#14), and the USC Trojans are at a balmy #37. ESPN’s Texas Longhorns ass-kissing... continues.