Notre Dame will play two prime-time home games in 2017. Both the Georgia (Sept. 9) and the USC (Oct. 21) contests will kick off at 7:30 p.m. ET on NBC, per Notre Dame’s schedule announcement Thursday. The complete 2017, 2018 and 2019 schedules are listed at the bottom of this post.
Of the seven Irish home games this season, only one other will deviate from a standard 3:30 p.m. ET kick. The Miami (Ohio) game scheduled for Sept. 30 will start at 5 p.m. ET and be broadcast on NBC Sports Network. Why? According to the Notre Dame release, the time and television slot will “enable the contest to be televised on NBCSN between a NASCAR event and Presidents Cup golf action.”
The NASCAR XFINITY Series does indeed have a race scheduled for 3 p.m. ET at the Dover International Speedway in Delaware, and it is not much of a logical leap to think NBC will take advantage of the Presidents Cup being stateside only once every four years and air the Cup on its primary channel.
Road game time slots and broadcast channels all remain to be determined, and many may stay that way until only a week or two before each kick.
As has been known for some time now, there will be no Shamrock Series in 2017 with Notre Dame instead opting to showcase the newly-completed Campus Crossroads project. The release refers to this as a “one-year break.” When discussing the following two seasons’ slates—neither of which has a Shamrock Series game scheduled yet—the release adds, “One home game in either 2018 or 2019 may be relocated to an off-campus site as part of Notre Dame’s Shamrock Series scheduling initiative.”
Perhaps this syntax-nik is parsing those words too closely, but it says either/or, and does not include a reference to both.
Vanderbilt will fill the previously-open slot in the 2018 Irish schedule, visiting Notre Dame Stadium on Sept. 15 to complete a three-game Irish homestand to start that season.
The 2018 home schedule includes notable opponents Michigan, Stanford and Florida State. The flipside of that shows itself in the 2019 schedule, when Notre Dame is set to travel to Louisville, Georgia, Michigan and Stanford.
2017 NOTRE DAME SCHEDULE
Sept. 2 – Temple – 3:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Sept. 9 – Georgia – 7:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Sept. 16 – at Boston College – TBD – TBD
Sept. 23 – at Michigan State – TBD – TBD
Sept. 30 – Miami (Ohio) – 5 p.m. ET – NBCSN
Oct. 7 – at North Carolina – TBD – TBD
Oct. 14 – BYE
Oct. 21 – USC – 7:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Oct. 28 – NC State – 3:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Nov. 4 – Wake Forest – 3:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Nov. 11 – at Miami (FL) – TBD – TBD
Nov. 18 – Navy – 3:30 p.m. ET – NBC
Nov. 25 – at Stanford – TBD – TBD
2018 NOTRE DAME SCHEDULE
Sept. 1 – Michigan
Sept. 8 – Ball State
Sept. 15 – Vanderbilt
Sept. 22 – at Wake Forest
Sept. 29 – Stanford
Oct. 6 – at Virginia Tech
Oct. 13 – Pittsburgh
Oct. 20 – BYE
Oct. 27 – at Navy in San Diego
Nov. 3 – at Northwestern
Nov. 10 – Florida State
Nov. 17 – Syracuse
Nov. 24 – at USC
2019 NOTRE DAME SCHEDULE
Sept. 2 – at Louisville
Sept. 7 – BYE
Sept. 14 – New Mexico
Sept. 21 – at Georgia
Sept. 28 – Virginia
Oct. 5 – Bowling Green
Oct. 12 – USC
Oct. 19 – BYE
Oct. 26 – at Michigan
Nov. 2 – Virginia Tech
Nov. 9 – at Duke
Nov. 16 – Navy
Nov. 23 – Boston College
Nov. 30 – at Stanford