Billy Hull: Notre Dame quitting bowl season a disgrace to fans

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We all have life lessons we learned from our parents, right ?

Work hard. Know the difference between right and wrong. Think before you speak. Never give up.

I’ve tried to use those lessons in every aspect of my life, but apparently I missed the one that says when you don’t get your way, quit and go home.

That’s what the Notre Dame football program did after correctly being left out of the 12-team College Football Playoff that was revealed on Sunday.

The Not-So-Fighting Irish were the first team left out of the field after they were jumped by Miami in the final rankings.

Both teams finished the season 10-2 and had similar ratings when it came to quality wins, strength of schedule, etc, etc. The one, kind of important detail worth mentioning, is Miami defeated Notre Dame, 27-24.

Notre Dame doesn’t have an argument to be in the 12-team field. The only thing worth crying about is that it was tricked into believing it would get in over Miami because that is how they had been ranked all season.

That I can understand, but it speaks more to the level of incompetence the committee, headed by Hunter Yurachek, the director of athletics at college football powerhouse Arkansas, has shown throughout the entire process.

It isn’t a reason for making the 12-team field.

Having 12 teams in a college football playoff is stupid. Having five SEC teams in a playoff is stupid. Teams not good enough to make their conference championships games have no business playing for a national championship, but this is an argument for another day.

Notre Dame’s reaction to not making the playoff is to pull out of the Pop-Tarts Bowl, which would have been a fun showdown against Brigham Young.

This is a BYU team, mind you, that isn’t quitting on its season even though it also only lost twice and both losses came against Big 12 champion Texas Tech, including in a conference title game.

Dare I say the Cougars actually have a better argument to make the playoff than Notre Lame ?

Notre Dame can whine and complain all it wants, but here’s an idea to help your cause : Get over yourself and join a conference.

There is nobody else to blame when your schedule includes wins over the worst two teams in the ACC, the worst team in the Big Ten and the worst team in the SEC. Sorry, those don’t count as quality wins.

Depriving a bunch of teenagers and young men a week of bowl game experiences because you’re salty about a ranking that determined a 12th team to make a college football playoff is such a bad look.

Other schools have declined bowl bids, and while I’m not a fan of that either, I can understand a program going through a major coaching change and unsure of how many student-athletes will be available to play because of the transfer portal deciding not to add another game to a season.

But a 10-2 Notre Dame team turning down what would have been likely the best non-playoff bowl game of the season because it didn’t qualify for a tournament it didn’t belong in anyway, is absurd.

In the statement the school posted to social media, it said, “We appreciate all the support from our families and fans, and we’re hoping to bring the 12th national title to South Bend in 2026.”

No you don’t.

You took away a holiday experience for your fans to travel for one more game this season because you’re throwing a temper tantrum.

Fans are fans and want to watch their team play games. In college football, you only get 12 or 13 days out of 365 in a year to watch your favorite school in the regular season. That’s not a lot.

Now, instead of watching their team play again, Notre Dame fans will have go back to doing the one other thing they do best besides complaining : reliving their last national championship on YouTube, which came in 1988, almost 40 years ago.

Shame on you, Notre Dame. You didn’t deserve a spot in the CFP anyway. Taking out your frustration by depriving your fan base of another game is the perfect example of everything that is wrong with college football in 2025.———Reach Billy Hull at bhull @staradvertiser.com.

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