Marcus Freeman didn’t care if the players in his room now were there or not, two years ago. He would make sure they still felt his pain. He has not forgotten the burnt ashes of his first season as Notre Dame’s head coach,

“Notre Dame’s trip to the Rose Bowl to play Stanford on January 6th, 1925, that was the first time Knute Rockne had been to the West Coast, and he and his family basically fell in love with it,” says Jim Lefebvre, author of “Coach for a Nation” and “Loyal Sons.”

Notre Dame appears to be Playoff-bound after finishing off USC to clinch an 11-1 regular season on Saturday night.