For both the Notre Dame Fighting Irish and the Michigan Wolverines, there is no dipping your toe into the cold water of the 2018 college football season pool and then slowly getting your whole body used to the temperature difference. Both of these traditional upper Midwestern powers have to dive right in and deal with the shock.
Under the lights in South Bend Saturday night, it’s one of the weekend’s most highly anticipated match-ups, if not THE biggest game of kickoff weekend.
Kickoff/TV info: Saturday Sept 1, NBC, 630 pm Cst
Line: Michigan -1
Michigan Wolverines Preview:
At his weekly news conference Monday, Jim Harbaugh disclosed that wide receiver Tarik Black will be out several weeks due to a foot fracture. Although he will be out for some time, there is still a chance he comes back this season.
For the first time in the Harbaugh era at Michigan, they have a legitimate quarterback. Ole Miss transfer Shea Patterson (go here for a lot more on him) was the No. 4 overall prospect and No. 1 QB in the Class of 2015 when he came out of high school.
Coach Harbaugh on QB Shea Patterson #GoBlue pic.twitter.com/75tz9y8wxM
— Michigan Football (@UMichFootball) August 27, 2018
The real stars of this Michigan team though are linebacker Devin Bush (who was named first team All-American by the AP) and DE Rashan Gary (who was named to the second team, and is the Wolverines’ player with the highest draft stock- check out where we have Patterson, Gary and Bush in our latest mock draft at this link).
Although Michigan is ranked lower than Notre Dame this preseason, and playing on the road, they are very slight favorites in this one. *puzzled look emoji*
Seriously though, expectations are beyond sky high in Ann Arbor this summer; even by their lofty standards.
Thus far, Harbaugh has not come remotely close to living up to the hype which accompanied his hire and overkilled media coverage. To be fair though, who could live up to this ridiculous amount of hype, and how? You’d need at least one, but probably two national championship to produce the goods commensurate to this level of hoopla and media circus.
It’s definitely high time Michigan start moving towards that brass ring, and he all starts Labor Day weekend.
Notre Dame Fighting Irish Preview:
For a full in depth preview of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, breaking down every position, follow this link to our ND season preview.
Notre Dame offensive coordinator Chip Long was asked at ND Media Day about how having an opponent of this magnitude right out of the gates affects training camp.
“I think it changes the mindset of our players, because there’s a whole lot more sense of urgency,” Long responded.
“You can’t have a bad day- cuz they’re not. I think it helps motivate our players when you’re really at this part of fall camp, when it’s the last week of camp and school starts and you get into your game prep, they have a little more bounce to their step and competitiveness.
With guard Alex Bars and center Sam Mustipher named second team preseason All-American by the AP, the biggest strength of this Fighting Irish team is, just like last season, the offensive line. Of course, last year’s OL was once-in-a-lifetime legendary. They put two guys into the top ten of the NFL Draft and took home the Joe Moore award (nation’s best OL group).
Look at the size of the award:
On the other side of the ball, the Irish have major stars in each position group. Cornerback Julian Love was named second team preseason AP while linebacker Drue Tranquill and defensive tackle Jerry Tillery have major NFL Draft stock.
Of course, this being the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, everyone wants to talk about the quarterback, in extreme detail, all the time. That’s why you really need to read this story we did on Brandon Wimbush, in which he explains why he’s off social media for the time being.
This will be Wimbush’s first time he’s faced Michigan, and he said QB coach/former Notre Dame signal caller Tommy Rees “speaks highly of the game.”
“It’s going to be similar to Texas in 2015, it’s night time, we run out of the tunnel under the lights, so I’m excited for the atmosphere, and to show everyone what this team has been doing for the last six or seven months.”
Prediction: Notre Dame Fighting Irish 28, Michigan Wolverines 20
2018 College Football Season Previews
#12 Notre Dame Northern Illinois Northwestern Purdue #11 Michigan State
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, is currently a regular contributor to SB Nation, WGN CLTV and Chicago Now.
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