To close out the 2023-24 college football season, Notre Dame will be taking on Oregon State at the Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl in El Paso, TX on Dec. 29. This is a disappointing draw for the Irish. Before Georgia lost to Alabama in the SEC Championship game, Notre Dame was projected to play LSU and former head coach , Brian Kelly, in the Reliaquest Bowl in Tampa, FL. Such a match-up would have drawn much national attention.

 The Sun Bowl will be a chance for the Irish to showcase their potential and returning talent that fans will see next year. With certain players sitting out, choosing to follow their NFL dreams, the Irish will have to insert some players into the line-up that were not impactful during the regular season. While this may worry some Irish fans, as a win would mean that the Irish have completed another 10-win season, Oregon State will be without their starting quarterback, DJ Uiagalelei, who entered the transfer portal. This should be a massive advantage for the Irish as the Beavers will also be without their head coach, Jonathan Smith, who recently took the head coaching job at Michigan State. Amazingly, Oregon State’s backup quarterback, Aidan Chiles, will also be unavailable for the game as he entered the portal as well. This means the Beavers will be forced to start their third-string  quarterback against the Irish. Those factors will leave the Beavers severely depleted, and give the Irish a much better chance to win.

Despite all the factors that will be affecting each team, it will be a Top 20 matchup with the Irish currently ranked #16 and the Beavers coming in at #19 in the penultimate CFP poll. These rankings definitely come with the assumption of a fully healthy and complete roster and neither team will have that come game day. The Beavers are only eight and a half point underdogs at the moment. Irish fans may see this as an unreasonably low number but they must take into account that most of the starting wide receivers will not be available and the leading rusher for the Irish, Audric Estime, may not play in El Paso. Notably, the one distinct advantage for the Irish will be if quarterback Sam Hartman plays. While Hartman has indicated that he will play, there have been rumors that he may change his mind and opt not to play in the Sun Bowl. While nothing is official yet, Hartman not playing will leave the Irish with two very inexperienced quarterbacks, Steve Angeli and Kenny Minchey. They have both had limited playing time this year, none seemingly enough to take on a struggling Oregon State team. In the coming days and weeks player opt-outs will become public and fans will have a better idea as to what the roster may look like for the Irish.

Looking ahead to 2024, before the bowl game was announced, Notre Dame football was making headlines surrounding the coaching staff and the transfer portal. The news started with the announcement that the Irish were parting ways with wide receivers coach, Chansi Stuckey. In a matter of days after that announcement, three young wide receivers in addition to graduate transfer Chris Tyree, entered their names into the transfer portal. While it created much suspicion about whether this was in response to the Stuckey decision or something that they had already been considering, the loss of four receivers will be damaging not only for the bowl game but also to next year’s roster and depth at that position. The Irish will need to find a way to add talent to replace that which was lost through the transfer portal. If Notre Dame plays its cards right, they could make some big moves in the portal themselves to pick up critical experience for next year’s roster.

The Irish have already been successful in the portal picking up two commitments this week. First, Kris Mitchell, a key wide receiver from Florida International University. He will add some experience to a now young wide receiver core. To go along with that on the defensive side of the ball, the Irish picked up Jordan Clark, a linebacker out of Arizona State who will also help repair the holes left by graduating or otherwise departed players. Looking at players remaining in the portal, a huge pick up for the Irish could be Will Sheppard, a wide receiver from Vanderbilt. While he may be a tough catch as he already has a lot of interest from other schools and has not been directly linked to the Irish, Sheppard would be a great pick up for the Irish because of his experience coming from an SEC school. It doesn’t seem that he wants to leave the SEC, but if Marcus Freeman and the coaching staff make this big move, Sheppard could become a big time name for the Irish. Riley Leonard is the most likely portal commitment. The former starting quarterback at Duke entered his name into the portal and has been strongly linked to the Irish. While Leonard started off hot this season, an ankle injury at the end of the game against Notre Dame slowed him down. He was not as effective for the remainder of the season. Leonard would bring a dual-threat presence to the Irish, something that has been lacking since Ian Book’s departure. He struggles with passing accuracy and that would negatively affect Notre Dame’s passing game if not developed. Whether or not the Irish are successful in the transfer portal with Sheppard and Leonard, specifically, it is vital this offseason that Notre Dame makes good use of the transfer portal to rebuild not only the wide receiver position but anywhere veteran leadership and experience will be needed.  Transfer portal success and a Sun Bowl victory will have Irish fans saying, “They’re gr-r-reat!”