Notre Dame football has a massive top-10 matchup on the horizon.

Head coach Marcus Freeman and the No. 2 Fighting Irish travel to Provo on Saturday night to take on Kalani Sitake and the No. 8 BYU Cougars, with College GameDay in town for the occasion. Notre Dame enters at 6-0, and there is a lot of excitement around the program.

The two teams have plenty in common. Both love to run the football, both are physical on the offensive and defensive lines, and both play tremendous defense. BYU’s defense ranks among the best in college football, and its offense has plenty of good players.

After digging into the numbers, though, I feel confident that defensive coordinator Chris Ash and the Notre Dame defense have a chance to make a real statement this weekend.

Notre Dame’s defensive numbers are elite

Notre Dame ranks third in the entire FBS in scoring defense, allowing only 11 points per game.

Pass defense has been a constant under Freeman. The secondary featured guys like Benjamin Morrison and Xavier Watts in the past, and it now has Leonard Moore, Luke Talich, Adon Shuler, and DJ McKinney. That group is allowing only 155.8 passing yards per game.

The run defense has been even better. Notre Dame is allowing only 58.3 rushing yards per game and 2.1 yards per carry. Sacks and loss yardage are taken out of that rushing total, so some context is needed. Regardless, the run defense has been stellar over the last two years, especially this season.

That has been the biggest improvement under Ash. When Al Golden ran the defense, Notre Dame would give up some yardage on the ground but hyper-focused on stopping the pass and creating turnovers. That was Golden’s ideology.

Ash is much more balanced as a defensive coordinator. He has his flaws, and I still prefer Golden in terms of defensive structure. Ash, however, clearly prioritizes stopping the run, and it shows.

The context makes those numbers even more impressive

Those numbers are awesome in a vacuum. They look even better when you consider who has been missing.

Linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa missed the first couple of games while recovering from an ACL tear, and he was out last week with a thumb injury. He is not on the injury report, which is great news. If you ask me, he is one of the best linebackers in college football.

Moore missed last week with a concussion. He appears likely to return for this matchup. Brauntae Johnson has barely played after suffering an injury early in the season, and he is not expected to play against BYU. Talich also missed a game, and starting defensive tackle Jason Onye has been out the last few games.

Onye is listed as questionable. I think it’s likely we see at least some of him, even if he isn’t handling a full workload.

Mixing him back in alongside Francis Brewu, Tionne Gray, Armel Mukam, Sean Sevillano, and Elijah Hughes would make the interior even deeper. Mukam has been playing well, Sevillano has taken a step, and Hughes is simply a good defensive tackle who doesn’t get talked about enough.

Notre Dame did a lot of its dirty work with several of its best defenders sidelined. Now the Irish are mostly healthy outside of Johnson.

BYU presents a different type of test

That doesn’t mean Notre Dame has made it. On paper, the Irish defense is tremendous, but it has to back that up on the field, and this is its biggest test.

There is some legitimacy to critics pointing out that Notre Dame put up these numbers against Purdue, Michigan State, and Wisconsin. BYU is a different caliber of football team, with a better offensive line and a different style of offense. There’s a reason the Cougars are averaging well over 200 rushing yards per game.

Even though BYU is without running back LJ Martin, it still has other talented running backs. Quarterback Bear Bachmeier also showed last week that he can run the football, and he is a dynamic dual-threat option.

The Cougars have weapons in the passing game, too. Wide receiver Legend Glasker is a talented pass catcher. Kyler Casper was a highly regarded recruit who originally signed with Oregon a few years ago. Tight end Walker Lyons was a big-time prospect who went to USC after his LDS mission.

Notre Dame will be tested on the outside a bit more than usual. Containing the quarterback run game will be a priority, and getting Moore back would be huge in that department.

The verdict

Notre Dame has things to worry about, but I think the defense is up for the challenge. The numbers, the context of who has been missing, and the injury returns all point in the same direction.

I expect Notre Dame to put together a tremendous defensive performance, even on the road in Provo. We will know just how good this unit is Saturday night.