Daily latest news

 Notre Dame's Coach Still Struggling to Win the Easy Games

Notre Dame's head coach, Marcus Freeman, is still having trouble winning the games he's supposed to win. This is something that's very important for a coach at a big-time college football school like Notre Dame

.

It's not always easy to win these games, even for the best teams. Look at Oregon and Penn State, both ranked in the top 10, who lost to unexpected opponents.

Freeman can now add Saturday's loss to Northern Illinois, a team that was expected to lose by a lot, to his list of surprising defeats. This loss comes after he lost to Marshall and Stanford in previous years.

"We've been here before," Freeman said to reporters after the game.

But this loss is worse. It's Freeman's third year as coach, and he's getting older. Being inexperienced is no longer an excuse.

"It's our job as coaches to make sure our players are ready to play. I've always said that how well we play is a result of how well we prepare," he said.

Notre Dame was ranked fifth before the game and was coming off a good win against Texas A&M. They looked like they had a good chance to make the College Football Playoff.

They scored a touchdown on their first drive but only scored one more touchdown the rest of the game. Notre Dame's new quarterback, Riley Leonard, couldn't help the team score more points. He threw a bad interception that gave Northern Illinois a good chance to win.

Even though Notre Dame got some help from the referees, they couldn't win the game. Northern Illinois played better than Notre Dame in many ways.

Freeman was hired to replace Brian Kelly, who left Notre Dame to coach at LSU. Freeman was seen as a better coach than Kelly because he was more connected to the players and fans.

Kelly won many games at Notre Dame but was never very popular with the fans. It took Kelly a few years to figure out how to win at Notre Dame. He lost a lot of games early on to teams that weren't very good.

But Kelly eventually figured it out and won seven straight seasons with 10 or more wins. He also made the College Football Playoff twice. People criticized Kelly for not being able to win the biggest games, but he was good at winning the games he was supposed to win.

Winning the games you're supposed to win is not the most exciting thing for a college football coach, but it's important for keeping the fans happy.