Notre Dame surprisingly a significant underdog to top college football powers based on latest shocking betting market trends
Notre Dame lands in an interesting spot on CFB metric
If you haven’t been following Bud Davis on X, he annually creates a CFB Market-Derived Team Tiers, which basically takes the Vegas odds and schedules for each team to develop a way to estimate the strength of every team. To dumb it down as much as possible, if each team were playing against an average team on the FBS level, who would win by the most?
Davis put out his 2025 version of that list, and Notre Dame came in as the fifth ranked team in the metric. The programs that were ahead of the Fighting Irish include Ohio State, Penn State, Oregon, and Clemson. It is, theoretically, a good place to start for Notre Dame.
For most fans, there will not be much of an argument for the Buckeyes being ahead of them. They are the defending National Champions, and defeated Notre Dame in order to do so. Ohio State is a program that has done a great job of recruiting and acquiring talent at a high level, so there should be a nice level of stability to continue building on.
Penn State coming in at No. 2 also wasn’t shocking based on their preseason hype. The Nittany Lions obviously have a ton of talent returning, especially after they were able to convince quarterback Drew Allar, running back Nicholas Singleton, and Dani Dennis-Sutton to return for another season. Here’s the problem, I’m not sure how these metrics take into account coaching decisions and blunders, something that James Franklin has gained a reputation for.
Oregon is another team that is understandable that high, but they are still replacing a lot of talent in one offseason. A team that is replacing their leading passer, rusher, receiver, top tight end, best two offensive lineman, three of your top four defensive linemen is a tough sell to talk about sustainability. Perhaps head coach Dan Lanning finds those answers quickly, but it’ll be interesting to watch.
Clemson being right in front of Notre Dame is fine. There is a ton of talent on both sides of the football, and they upgraded their defensive coordinator as well with Tom Allen. The expectations are high for the Tigers, but I am buying into it.
Regardless of any disagreements with Notre Dame being at No. 5, that spot won’t matter when the games officially kick off. The point is that the Fighting Irish are a very talented football team, and are considered one of the very best teams in college football. The part that is extremely interesting, and somewhat disappointing, is that the metric believes there is a sizeable separation between the Irish and the top four. They are the first team in the second tier of teams, which I disagree with.
This program under head coach Marcus Freeman continues to set the bar very high, and they have a chance to shock some more folks this fall.
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