Notre Dame has won two straight basketball games. This is only the third time this season that this has happened. On Wednesday, they’ll go for three straight, a new season high.
There’s a line in Major League II, from manager Lou Brown, which goes like this:
“Ok, we won a game yesterday. If we win today, it’s called ‘two in a row.’ And if we win again tomorrow, it’s called a ‘winning streak.’”
Was James Gammon’s character right?
It’s never safe to trust Hollywood when it comes to accurate representations of sports. Ted Lasso had some great moments, but there’s a reason some soccer fans hate it. The Major League franchise, though comedic, was better than most sports movies in its depiction of the world of baseball, most notably with the Big Balls Dance. But was it right on this?
Wikipedia says yes. “A winning streak…is an uninterrupted sequence of success in games or competitions, commonly measured by at least three wins that are uninterrupted by losses or ties.” But, again, there’s a but. After that sentence, an editor has inserted a “citation needed” tag. It is the opinion of that sentence’s author that a winning streak must be three games. Good luck nailing that down as fact.
In recent decades, “Streak” has become a column on the standings of a number of sports. Major League Baseball, the NBA, the NHL, and the NFL all include it as a data point. Can a team’s “streak” be one win or two wins or one loss or two losses without said team being on a winning or a losing streak?
Overall, it’s arbitrary. You can call two wins a streak. You can call one loss a streak, if you’re willing to be aggressive. Some will quarrel and say it needs to be three games with the same result in a row, but it’s all arbitrary. It’s a matter of opinion.
So: I say we give Notre Dame credit for a two-game winning streak, their third of the year. I also say we make clear that we would like them to beat Louisville on Wednesday and make the point moot.
The Golden Years
Multiple outlets are reporting that Al Golden has signed a four-year extension to stay on as Notre Dame’s defensive coordinator, with further reporting indicating that the size of the contract is similar to that given to Mike Denbrock: Something like $2.25 million per season. We don’t know every coordinator’s salary, and we don’t know whether the $2.25M is all salary for Golden and Denbrock or if there’s a signing bonus, external pay, etc. Regardless, Notre Dame has two of the highest-paid coordinators in college football, and each has a four-year contract.
The four-year contracts don’t mean these coaches will stay for four years. There are buyouts, and if each continues to do their job well (or as well as Denbrock did it at LSU), each will continue to see their name come up for head coaching positions elsewhere and NFL jobs in the same position. In college football, every contract can be a one-year contract.
This is a commitment, though, from Notre Dame to its football program. Notre Dame has gained the services of arguably the two best assistant coaches in the country, each for a price similar to the reported NIL cost of a starting quarterback at the power conference level.
It’s a good thing to prioritize.
Quick(er) Hitters
The 2024 football schedule is finally complete, with Notre Dame adding a game against Army the weekend before Thanksgiving at Yankee Stadium. It will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Four Horsemen game. This is a dangerous thing, playing a service academy on the East Coast a week before a potential playoff play-in game against USC in Los Angeles. I think that means the Irish should just make sure to be 11–0 coming out of the Bronx.
Safeties coach Chris O’Leary took the same job with the Los Angeles Chargers. It’s unclear if Marcus Freeman will bring in somebody new or move other assistants around to cover the safety position. It’s definitely a loss—look at what O’Leary did with Kyle Hamilton and Xavier Watts—but it’s hard to know how big a loss it is.
In another piece of football news, Notre Dame landed four-star offensive tackle Owen Strebig and three-star receiver Elijah Burress in the class of 2025. Burress is the son of Plaxico Burress. On the 247 composite, Strebig becomes the fourth-highest rated recruit in Notre Dame’s class. Taken as a pair, the two slightly raise Notre Dame’s average recruit rating, but it remains 13th in the country and only expected to slightly rise as other classes fill out.
In soccer, Leah Klenke has been selected to the U.S. U20 team for a training camp this month in Colombia. I do not know what this means for her chances of playing in the U20 Women’s World Cup, but a cool honor regardless.
The Roundup
Since we last met, the men’s basketball team lost to Duke but then pulled away late from both Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech, pulling one game clear of the Yellow Jackets and Louisville for last place in the ACC. The turnovers that have plagued the team—especially young Markus Burton, who’s been asked to do a ton—were notably absent. Braeden Shrewsberry continues to shoot over 40% from three in ACC play even after missing a lot against GT. The team is off this weekend.
The women’s basketball team sandwiched losses to Louisville and NC State around a two-overtime win in Tallahassee. The Irish are safely in the NCAA Tournament, but the ACC regular season title has slipped out of reach, with Notre Dame in a tie for sixth. The women won’t play again until Monday.
Notre Dame baseball won its opener at Rice, 3–1. They’ll continue the series today and tomorrow. The Irish were picked to finish sixth in the Atlantic Division in the ACC preseason coaches poll, only ahead of Boston College.
The softball team is off to a 5–2 start headlined by wins over Central Arkansas and Liberty (the losses came to South Alabama and a ranked Utah team). They’ve got Samford and North Florida today in Jacksonville, and then Mercer tomorrow before heading to California next weekend for more neutral-site games.
In hockey, the Irish were swept by Wisconsin up in Madison last weekend but beat Minnesota 6–1 in the opener of this weekend’s two-game set in South Bend. Only three games remain in the season, and the Irish might need to win all three to have any sort of chance at making the NCAA Tournament. At the moment, it appears the top 14 teams in the NCAA’s Pairwise Comparisons system will be in line for at-large bids. Entering tonight, Notre Dame is 21st.
Both lacrosse teams’ seasons are underway, with the men beating Cleveland State 25–3 on Wednesday and the women 3–0 after a big upset yesterday of top-ranked Northwestern. The women host Butler tomorrow afternoon. The men play on the road against Marquette. As we like to reiterate, there are a lot more Division I programs in women’s lacrosse than men’s.
Some portion of the swimming and diving teams is in Columbus for an Ohio State invitational this weekend. The ACC championships are coming up this week.
Notre Dame sent athletes to track and field invitationals last weekend in Boston and Chicago. The programs are hosting the Alex Wilson Invitational today. We’ll revisit the national indoor qualifying situation after this weekend’s meet.
The men’s tennis team lost at Michigan last weekend before beating Auburn and Toledo at home. They host Illinois and Chicago State today. The women’s team lost at Wisconsin before beating DePaul at home. They’ll host Butler and UIC tomorrow. Julia Andreach and Nibi Ghosh are still undefeated in singles play on the young season, but neither was in the ITA’s top 125 nationally when it was last updated a week and a half ago.
The women’s golf team finished seventh out of thirteen teams at an invitational hosted by FAU early last week. They’ll be in action again tomorrow and Monday at an invitational hosted by Michigan State in Sarasota.
The fencing team is idle this weekend, though some athletes might be competing at the USA Fencing Junior Championships.
Housekeeping
We’re still planning to post these on Fridays on weeks we don’t get to them on Mondays. Apologies for this week’s delay. In the interests of setting realistic expectations: You will likely continue to see these housekeeping messages for the foreseeable future. We are still, more than five years into The Barking Crow’s existence, trying to figure out a content process that consistently works. I suspect this is not a quality we’ll shed easily.
To that end: We’ll be back on Monday. Or on Friday. Or whenever we get to it next.
