CFB National Championship Preview || Notre Dame vs Ohio State

Edition #225

The College Football National Championship game has always been great. Actually, maybe not in 2023, when the TCU Horned Frogs got smoked by the Georgia Bulldogs.

The 23-24 CFP National Championship was played with the Washington Huskies (Michael Penix Jr.) taking on the Michigan Wolverines (J.J. McCarthy). The final score in that game was 34-13 Michigan. This year, it’s the Ohio State Buckeyes taking on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. If you want to know what the CFP National Championship was like last year, take a look at the post below:

The game will take place at Mercedes Benz Stadium, and according to Bleacher Report, even though the ticket prices will be extremely expensive. The average purchase price is $2637 per ticket, which is 36% more than last year. According to TickPick, the game is on pace to be the most expensive ever.

The one and only good thing, though, is the fact that fans will be able to save on concessions because Mercedes-Benz Stadium plans to continue its "fan first" pricing when it comes to food and drinks. That means cheeseburgers and draft beers will be $5, french fries and hot dogs will be $3, and soda, pretzels, and popcorn will be $2. That’s not bad!

The game will be on ESPN and will stream on DirecTV, Fubo, YouTube TV, and more.

My prediction last year was off big time when the favored Huskies lost in the National Championship. This time, I’m still going to go with the favored team, Ohio State, because even with all Notre Dame has accomplished, the Buckeyes are the better team. Culture shows off big time, but W’s do too.

Now, if Notre Dame wants to prove me wrong, they need to shorten the game, use the play clock well, be smart with the ball, and work some quick plays.

The Notre Dame offense is more of a rush-heavy offense, averaging 200 yards rushing a game. Riley Leonard, a dual-threat quarterback, and superstar running back Jeremiyah Love have been crazy for teams to defend this season. Problem? Love is injured, and this basically means the rushing attack can’t function as well as it should.

Now, the Irish have an even better shot of winning if their 6-foot-1, 215-pound frame receiver named Jaden Greathouse continues to do amazing. If Leonard can get the ball out to him quick, the Irish may have a good chance to win the title.

For Ohio State, it’s obviously Jeremiah Smith. Through three playoff games, he has 14 catches for 293 yards and four touchdowns. Texas, though, deployed a literal bracket around Smith throughout the night, and it pretty much worked for them. Freeman will most likely not apply the same amount of pressure, especially after what he said about Jeremiah Smith, but if he does, then it still won’t matter because you still have Emeka Egbuka and Carnell Tate who will both be in line for a big day.

"He's a dynamic football player," Freeman said. "He's physically a big presence, but he can run, he can catch. So, you're going to have to do some different things to try and keep him off balance... But the other part of that is, we got good players too. We gotta do what we do. We're going to trust our guys to get the job done no matter what we call defensively."

So yeah, there you go. That's your CFP National Championship preview. Unfortunately, it looks like my CFB vs NFL piece is going to have to wait until late this year.