Notre Dame Football: 5 biggest overreactions from 2017 regular season

1. The regular season finish puts a damper on the year

When you’re a program like Notre Dame, more is expected of you. The Fighting Irish are consistently thought to be a Top 25 team, but after a season like 2016, the word disappointing gets tossed around quite a bit.

In any given season for Notre Dame, anything less than 10 wins is considered a disappointing year. So with Notre Dame racing out to an 8-1 start and a top-five ranking, the finish to the season had some fans screaming “disappointment” to describe the season.

That wasn’t the case as Notre Dame exceeded all expectations in 2017 given the type of year the Irish had the season before. They improved by five wins and became serious national title contenders.

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Notre Dame had the exact opposite of a disappointing season so even if you’re one of those fans who is still upset about the 1-2 finish in the final three games, realize that Brian Kelly won nine games with a young team coming off a horrid season. Anything more than seven wins would have been a pleasant surprise.