Marcus Freeman had an obvious place to point when he sat down for his postgame news conference in Provo on Saturday night. Notre Dame had just lost 28-24 at BYU, its 16-game winning streak was over, and the final throw to Jaden Greathouse had drawn no flag despite contact that a network rules analyst later said warranted one. The first question he got was about that last play.
“I know people are going to look for me to put blame on somebody else. That’s not what we do around here. We own it,” Freeman said.
Freeman walked through the final call without complaint: Notre Dame expected BYU to stay in the coverage it had shown on the previous snap, and the Cougars changed it, so the Irish checked into a play meant to beat pressure from the field side, and it failed.
“We made a call thinking they were possibly going to be in the last coverage they were in to play before,” Freeman said.
Later that night, the Big 12 acknowledged that replay officials had incorrectly cleared that final play with time still on the clock, which means Notre Dame was owed one more snap. Freeman never raised the clock in his press conference, and he offered no explanation of the missing pass interference flag either.
Everything #NotreDame coach Marcus Freeman said after the BYU game
“I know people are going to look for me to put blame on somebody else. That’s not what we do around here. We own it.” — Marcus Freeman
https://t.co/6NXnNSTPHj https://t.co/gbpvDwN09n
— Eric Hansen (@EHansenND) October 18, 2026
Why Freeman kept pointing to the end of the first half
Notre Dame drove to the BYU 5 in the closing seconds of the first half, and CJ Carr fumbled while trying to spike the ball. BYU linebacker Isaiah Glasker recovered, and the Cougars took a 21-10 lead into the locker room.
“It’s a crucial, crucial play. That again, I’ve never seen it happen with us. Obviously, maybe it just happened at other places, but we can’t allow that to happen,” Freeman said.
“We can’t allow a play like that to end the half with zero points when you have the ball inside the plus-5,” he added.
Notre Dame lost by four; a field goal on that possession alone would have sent the Irish into their final drive needing three points instead of a touchdown, assuming the rest of the night played out the same way, and it is the clearest case for Freeman’s argument that the result was decided well before the last whistle.
Freeman held his players to the same line, starting with Carr, who finished 27 of 49 for 261 yards. Freeman said preparation was not the problem, adding he could not yet say if the missed big plays fell on Carr, his receivers or both.
“But if you’re looking for us to blame [that for] him not being full-go because he didn’t play last week, that’s an excuse,” Freeman said.
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