Notre Dame spent last season with a chip on its shoulder, and it wasn’t just the shoulder pads. Left out of the College Football Playoff despite winning ten straight games to close the year, the Irish have carried that frustration into the offseason. The problem? They lost their best offensive weapon.
Jeremiyah Love, the star running back who went third overall to the Arizona Cardinals in the NFL Draft, is gone. So is Jadarian Price, the other half of Notre Dame’s backfield punch. That leaves quarterback CJ Carr holding the keys to an offense that suddenly has to live through the air.
Carr handled that pressure last season as a redshirt freshman. He completed 66.6 percent of his passes for 2,741 yards with 24 touchdowns and just six interceptions. Those numbers quietly put him in the top tier of returning quarterbacks nationally. And according to FOX Sports analyst Joel Klatt, they put him at No. 5 in Klatt’s offseason quarterback rankings.
That’s not just a pat on the back. Klatt doesn’t hand out top-five spots to guys who haven’t earned it. Carr earned it with a season that showed accuracy, poise in the pocket, and an ability to avoid the kind of mistakes that kill drives and cost games. The Michigan native threw an interception once every 78 attempts. That’s elite-level decision-making for any quarterback, let alone a redshirt freshman.
Now the question is whether he can do more with less around him. Notre Dame’s running game won’t be the same without Love and Price, and defenses will adjust accordingly. More passing attempts will mean more chances for Carr to showcase his arm. It also means more opportunities for mistakes. But the buzz around Carr heading into the 2026 season suggests scouts believe he’s built for that load.
There’s been NFL Draft chatter around Carr since the end of last season. Arch Manning and Dante Moore are the consensus top two quarterback prospects in the upcoming class, but Carr has worked his way into that next tier. Some evaluators actually put him at the top of that second group, which would put him in the mix for a top-10 pick next spring. That kind of projection comes with expectations. Carr will have to prove it on Saturdays before any of it becomes real on draft night.
Fortunately for him, Notre Dame is expected to be one of the best teams in the country again. Marcus Freeman has built a roster that can win games even while rebuilding the run game. But make no mistake — this season belongs to Carr. If he plays like the No. 5 quarterback in the country, the Irish will be in the playoff conversation again. If he plays better than that, he’ll be in the conversation for the first quarterback taken off the board.
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