SOUTH BEND, Ind. — We’re less than a month away from one of the most interesting spring practices in recent Notre Dame history. The Irish are expected to do more than make the College Football Playoff this season; they’ve got a chance to win it. One of the top quarterbacks in college football plays in South Bend. The defense should be loaded. And there are more than 30 new faces on the roster.

You’ve got questions about all that, plus future schedules and what I’d change in college football when I’m running the sport.

Let’s get started.

How healthy is Notre Dame going into spring practice, and is Charles Jagusah available? — Tim S.

Part of coach Marcus Freeman’s news conference before spring ball includes appearances by head trainer Rob Hunt and strength coach Loren Landow. That’s scheduled for March 18. Hunt had several updates when he spoke to the media before spring practice last season. However, the Irish were a wounded program then, coming off a four-game postseason run to the national championship game. This year, Hunt will have fewer.

However, it appears Jagusah may not be ready after last summer’s broken arm, which required a follow-up surgery later in the season. It’s been a frustrating last couple of years for the 2023 four-star prospect, but the hunch is he won’t make a full return until camp.

Bigger picture, a source close to the program told me this week that Notre Dame looks more like a team coming off summer conditioning than one preparing for spring ball. The staff believes it took maximum advantage of last season’s abrupt conclusion in terms of training and planning. Last season’s CFP snub might have set the mission to “leave no doubt,” as Freeman put it, but the biggest benefit to the team might have been not playing in a minor bowl game: The roster got a full extra month to recover and thus an earlier start on getting ready for next season.

What do you think is the total payroll for Notre Dame football, and is it in the top tier? — Retill7

My educated guess is that the football roster’s value is just north of $30 million. And my hunch is that figure puts Notre Dame squarely in the top 10 nationally.

Give us your best guess at who will be the second and third running backs behind Aneyas Williams. Which of the incoming freshmen do you expect to see a lot of snaps this fall? — Jonathan F.

This feels like a year where RB2 and RB3 in Week 1 against Wisconsin might not be RB2 and RB3 during the CFP. But let’s give spring practice at least a couple of weeks before slotting Nolan James Jr., Kedren Young, Jonaz Walton and Javian Osborne into roles. Notre Dame doesn’t need any of them to be great. And it’s worth remembering that running backs don’t always hit the ground in full stride. Kyren Williams, Audric Estime and Jeremiyah Love were bit players as freshmen. Jadarian Price missed his entire first season due to injury.

As far as the freshman class, I’ve already heard good things about receiver Kaydon Finley, defensive end Rodney Dunham and the first-year group of offensive linemen. Dunham would have the biggest opportunity to play, but Notre Dame didn’t sign Keon Keeley out of the portal to sit, plus there’s Boubacar Traore and Bryce Young ahead of him.

This might be a strange freshman class because, as talented as the group appears on paper, there are not a ton of opportunities in the depth chart for real snaps this fall. The defense returns 12 of its top 14 players in terms of snaps played. The offense returns eight of its top 14, but no freshman made a serious impact on that side of the ball last year.

Two years ago, Notre Dame ranked fourth nationally in true freshman snaps played, per Pro Football Focus. And that means those freshmen are still here as juniors. It’s going to take a freshman beating out multiple veterans for a first-year player to make a huge impact this season. Could Joey O’Brien chase down Luke Talich for the third safety spot? Could Khary Adams jump Mark Zackery IV at cornerback?

Whichever freshman leads Notre Dame in snaps played this season will do it because he forced the issue, not because there was a gaping hole on the roster.

In the Spirit of Lent, what is one thing that Marcus Freeman needs to give up, and what is one thing Marcus Freeman needs to add for this upcoming season to go where we want it to go? — Tae K.

Congratulations on the most on-brand question from a Notre Dame reader this week, Tae. It’s up there with last year’s reader suggestion that Notre Dame was waiting to unveil Chris Ash until the Wednesday after Mardi Gras.

Not sure if this is giving something up for Lent or something Freeman needs to add, but the biggest adjustment needed is getting a more accurate read on the team during preseason camp. Every season, there’s been something the staff suspected to be true in camp that was proven false in September. Whether that was Tyler Buchner as the starting quarterback in Freeman’s first season or the defense’s preparedness last season after a strong August, it just doesn’t feel like there’s enough correlation between preseason camp and the actual season.

This year’s schedule should give Notre Dame more of a grace period to work through issues on Saturday … but that seemed to be the case two years ago, and it ended with Riley Leonard chucking the ball up for grabs against Northern Illinois. How Notre Dame adjusts its offseason to better prepare for the actual season is arguably the biggest fix for Freeman to make this spring and summer.

The good news? Under Freeman, the staff has pivoted quickly to correct preseason misreads. Even the offensive line shuffle of two years ago felt like a miss that Notre Dame eventually got right. But the Irish shouldn’t have to correct issues that they can get right the first time.

Any chatter on Notre Dame-Texas being canceled? The athletic director said they’re committed to the Michigan and Ohio State series, but that’s it. They’ve already canceled a series with Arizona State, without penalty due to a clause in the contract relating to SEC schedule expansion. Do we know if that clause also exists in their contract with Notre Dame? — Jake D.

No chatter.

I don’t know whether there’s language in the Notre Dame-Texas contract to give the Longhorns an out because of the SEC expanding its schedule to nine games. This deal was signed back in November 2024, when the nine-game conference schedule was under discussion. You’d think this kind of language would be in the deal.

You noted the Michigan and Ohio State contracts, but Texas is on the back half of those deals when the Buckeyes and Wolverines come to Austin. It would be bananas to opt out of a marquee opponent coming to you, especially after you’ve already done the heavy lifting of playing on the road … and winning in Ann Arbor. If any school can work a marquee opponent into its schedule while playing the SEC, it should be Texas because of its annual neutral-site game against Oklahoma. The Longhorns don’t have the five-home/four-away or four-home/five-away issues of everybody else outside of Florida and Georgia, which play another annual neutral-site game.

If Texas beats Ohio State in Austin, the Longhorns are going 10-2 (at worst) and walking into the College Football Playoff. In other words, they would benefit from playing (and winning) a high-profile nonconference game, the kind of thing that seems to get lost on some college football coaches. Here’s looking at you, Lincoln Riley.

Still, it’s standard practice for these contracts to have outs. For example, the Clemson-Notre Dame series can have games canceled by either school at no cost if it’s done more than four years in advance. The cancellation fee rises to $1 million if the games are dropped less than four years in advance, then rises again to $3 million if the games are cancelled within two years of kickoff. The language in the Notre Dame-Florida contract sets the penalty at $2 million if the game is cancelled less than two years out. Undoubtedly, the Notre Dame-Texas contract has similar language.

But my hunch is Texas will make the College Football Playoff this year and suddenly become a lot less concerned about its future schedules being too strong. We’re living in a weird time of cowardly college football coaches thinking that just making the CFP represents a good season, even if/when the field expands. They’re in for a rude awakening.

The point of college football is to make collective memories. Notre Dame-Texas does that. Notre Dame-Texas A&M does that. Notre Dame-USC does that. It’s sad when the people running the sport don’t grasp that.

You’re now the commissioner of college football. In your role, what three changes would you make to improve the game? This could be related to schedules, season timeline, game rules, playoff size, NIL, transfers or anything you would want to change. — David C.

1. Fix the calendar. The regular season begins the week before Labor Day, moving up by a week. Conference championship games are eliminated. The 16-team College Football Playoff begins the week after Thanksgiving with eight on-campus games, followed by four on-campus quarterfinals the next week and neutral-site semifinals the week following, usually the weekend before Christmas. The national championship game is played at the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1 every year. The portal opens after the game, with national signing day returning to the first Wednesday in February.

2. Fix the portal, but leave NIL alone. I’m realistic. We’re not going to solve the money issues in college football. But getting a handle on the transfer portal can help the money part of the sport make at least a little bit more sense. Players can still transfer, but they’re no longer immediately eligible. Any non-graduate transfer has to sit out the following season but does not lose a year of eligibility. Their earning potential is the same. But there’s less incentive to tamper.

3. Nationalize officiating. Instead of crews with conference affiliations, the Power 4 conferences band together to form a singular pool of football officials to call all games between the schools, including Notre Dame. There’s enough money to offer more training and more pay for the best officials, better incentivizing performance. And after every game, there’s a pool reporter who can interview the referee should there be a controversial call.