To be perfectly honest, I don’t know if I am emotionally ready for the 2026 college football season. Despite not attending the school or even being Catholic, I’ve been a Notre Dame Fighting Irish fan my entire life, and I’m still not over the first two games of last season.
The Irish started the 2025 campaign with back-to-back, heart-wrenching, last-second losses, first to the Miami Hurricanes and then to the Texas A&M Aggies. After their 0-2 start, the Irish dominated their remaining 10 games, including a 56-13 humiliation of the Arkansas Razorbacks. The Irish beat the Southeastern Conference Razorbacks so badly that the school fired its head coach literally the next day.
But Arkansas would get its revenge.
When the season began, Arkansas Athletic Director Hunter Yurachek was just a member of the College Football Playoff Selection Committee, the body responsible for selecting the 12 teams that make the College Football Playoff each year. But Baylor Athletic Director Mack Rhoades stepped down as the committee’s chairman last November, meaning that when it was time to choose between the Alabama Crimson Tide, Brigham Young University Cougars, and Notre Dame Fighting Irish, Yurachek — the same man whose team Notre Dame had humiliated earlier in the season — was in charge of the process. And Yurachek used his power to make a very public case for Alabama and against the Irish.
Yurachek flat-out told committee members to go back and watch Notre Dame’s loss to Miami, the first game of the season, before they voted on who made the playoffs “because it was so far back.” Never mind that the game was freshman quarterback CJ Carr’s first-ever college game, or that Alabama was blown out by Florida State, a team that ended up going 5-7, that same weekend. Yurachek instructed committee members only to watch Notre Dame’s 27-24 loss, not Alabama’s much worse 31-17 loss. And it worked. Alabama got in. Notre Dame didn’t.
It is hard to trust a sport as corrupt as college football, an institution where Yurachek, after his blatant bias against Notre Dame, was allowed to remain chairman of the playoff committee and will again help select playoff teams this year. But now Notre Dame knows to leave no doubt. The Irish are going to be a hungry team with something to prove, one hoping to get revenge against Yurachek and the corrupt SEC in the playoffs.
Now, on to this year’s best college football names by position:
Offense
QB Stephen Cannon (Texas Tech)
RB Turbo Richard (Indiana)
WR Da’Realyst Clark (Kent State)
WR Stonka Burnside (Memphis)
WR Legend Lyons (Montana)
TE Rocky Beers (Oklahoma)
OL King Large (Missouri State)
OL Hannes Hammer (Virginia Tech)
OL Hudson Parliament (Iowa)
OL Rhino Tapa’atoutai (Arizona)
OL Tree Babalade (South Carolina)
Defense
DL Legend Journey (California)
DL Fatutoa Henry (Alabama)
DL Stone Chaney (Memphis)
DL Divine Love Onochie (North Texas)
LB Tank King (Texas A&M)
LB Prayer Young-Blackgoat (Arizona State)
LB Sirr Bible (San Jose State)
DB Chance Gamble (Georgia Southern)
DB King Mack (NC State)
DB Pluto Surratt (NC State)
DB Boogie Johnson (Mississippi State)