Notre Dame Football: 3 reasons the Irish will beat No. 25 Louisville

Saturday will be Notre Dame football’s second consecutive game on the road and against Top 25 opposition. Thus, the Golden Domers will once again be put to the test in a hostile environment.

However, I believe the Irish will rise to the challenge and cage the Cardinals.

Here are three reasons the Irish will win.

3. The Irish offense will rebound after back-to-back subpar performances

Over the past two weeks, Notre Dame’s scoring output has been a meager 17.5 points per game.  Yes, this was against two top 20 programs in Ohio State and Duke, respectively. However, the performances were still rather pedestrian, especially compared to the 46 points per game output that the squad was producing in the first four weeks of the season.

With that said, I’m expecting Sam Hartman and Co. to recover its scintillating form Saturday night against Louisville en route to lighting up the Papa John’s Stadium scoreboard. Hartman will have two of his top receiving targets back for this game in Jayden Thomas and Jaden Greathouse.  The added talent and depth at the wide receiver position should help open up the passing game for Hartman, something that was obviously missing last week against Duke.

Thankfully for the Irish though, tight end Mitchell Evans came up aces with a career-high 134 receiving yards, and as a result, the Irish snuck past the pesky Blue Devils.

In addition, the offensive line will re-establish itself as a Joe Moore Award contender, enabling Notre Dame’s stable of running backs to rack up yardage, and clock, throughout the game.  Included in this group of tailbacks is the highly touted Audric Estime. Just earlier this week, Mel Kiper Jr. ranked Estime as his top NFL craft-eligible running back. This is high praise from Kiper Jr., the guru of the gridiron, and deservedly so.

Estime, the talented Haitian-American from Nyack, N.Y., has rumbled for 672 yards and seven touchdowns on a dominant 7.1 yards per carry through the first half of this season. Thus, look for the dancing bear, Estime, to scamper his way to another 100-plus yards against the Cardinals.