From bizarre hire to the best defensive coordinator in college football, Al Golden has done miraculous things for the Notre Dame defense
Thinking back to when head coach Marcus Freeman was promoted by Notre Dame after serving as defensive coordinator, he made some intriguing hires. One of them was current defensive coordinator Al Golden, who was a bit of a surprise to Irish fans at the time. Not because he wasn’t a tremendous coach, but because of […]
Thinking back to when head coach Marcus Freeman was promoted by Notre Dame after serving as defensive coordinator, he made some intriguing hires. One of them was current defensive coordinator Al Golden, who was a bit of a surprise to Irish fans at the time. Not because he wasn’t a tremendous coach, but because of the path he took to get to South Bend.
Wait, the Al Golden who was the head coach of Temple and Miami? The one who is coaching linebackers for the Cincinnati Bengals now? Those were some questions that were asked regularly. For the first time in nearly 20 years, Golden was returning to serve as a defensive coordinator on the college level, something he hadn’t done since doing so with the Virginia Cavaliers in 2005.
It seemed like a high risk-high reward at the time, and there were some mixed results early on. During his first season in 2022 with the Irish, the defense allowed 23 points per game and 329.2 total yards of offense. Neither is an awful number, but definitely not what the Notre Dame program was used to under Mike Elko, Clark Lea and Coach Freeman consecutively.
After that first year, there were some Irish fans who would have been completely okay with Coach Golden moving on to different pastures. Less than two years later, he has morphed this Irish defense into one of the elite units in all of college football. At this point, he should be among the front runners for the Broyles Award, which is given to the best assistant coach in college football.
The improvements we have seen with this defense over the last couple of years have been incredible. Coming into the team’s 51-14 victory over Navy this weekend, the team was allowing 11.9 points per game on the season. That’s an improvement over 2023, where the team had already improved to 15.9 points per game. The 2024 figure ranked No. 5 in college football heading into the game against Navy.
The yardage total allowed improvements have been even more dramatic. Over the last two seasons, that figure is at 276.3 and 279 yards respectively. Not only are opposing offenses scoring more, but teams are having a much more difficult time moving the ball in general. The defense is also averaging a full turnover per game more in 2024 than it did in 2022 as well.
When you dig into some of the more advanced metrics, what Coach Golden has been able to accomplish has been even more impressive. So far this season, the defense has been allowing opponents to score 16.5 less points per game than their respective season averages. That included giving up just 14 points to the Midshipmen, who were averaging 44.8 points per game coming into that matchup, an astounding 30.8 points below their average.
What Golden has done with this defensive unit is almost unbelievable. From a surprising initial hire to arguably the best defensive coordinator in college football; what a ride.
