Why Ohio State is better than most of Swinney’s top 10

#2: Notre Dame

The next team that Dabo alleged was better than Ohio State was the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. It makes sense as to why Dabo would have Notre Dame so highly ranked. They split the two meetings in the regular-season series.

This means that Notre Dame was the only loss that Clemson took on the year. Saying that Notre Dame was not a quality team would make his team look much worse as they lost to them and Notre Dame was one of Clemson’s few quality wins on the year.

However, Notre Dame looks to be the fraud team of the playoffs. They were decimated by the Tigers in the ACC championship game. Also, their best win of the year came against Clemson in which the Tigers were forced to play their backup quarterback.

Even with Clemson playing their backup, the game still went to double overtime. Once Clemson could face them with Trevor Lawrence, it flipped into a rout by Clemson.

Notre Dame made the playoffs and will be playing against the Alabama Crimson Tide in the Rose Bowl.

In terms of comparing them to Ohio State, the AP poll had the Buckeyes ranked higher. Notre Dame had the 13th ranked strength of schedule compared to Ohio States’ 67th. Notre Dame also had a superior strength of record. However, Ohio State has the edge in game control, FPI rating, and FPI rank.

Notre Dame looked atrocious in their championship game against Clemson. They seemed to have no way to advance the ball on offense and didn’t have a solution for Trevor Lawrence. It is likely that they will have even more trouble with Alabama in the first round of the playoffs.