Comparing Notre Dame and Ohio State's Rosters Entering the National Championship
Ohio State has a distinct talent advantage over Notre Dame - particularly on defense
The 2024 college football season comes down to Ohio State and Notre Dame facing off in Atlanta. The Buckeyes were supposed to be here with the 2nd-best preseason championship odds, while the Fighting Irish are the surprise of the season coming into the year with +2000 odds to win the national championship. One of the reasons behind the two teams’ differing expectations is the recruiting talent present on their rosters. Notre Dame took a more national approach to high school recruiting and relied slightly less on the transfer portal, but Ohio State has managed to accumulate more talent overall especially on defense. While it is unclear which strategy is better in a vacuum, the particular distribution of the talent on either team’s roster clearly gives Ohio State the advantage in this matchup.
The main geographic difference between the two program’s rosters is how spread out their rosters are. Notre Dame is truly a national team. They have multiple scholarship players from 20 different states without a single state having double digits. The Fighting Irish have more scholarship players from St. Louis (4) than they do Atlanta (3). The Buckeyes are very much not. Only 21 states are represented among Ohio State’s scholarship players, and 3 states (Ohio, Georgia, and New Jersey) compromise over 50% of their scholarship players (46/90).
Notre Dame’s roster strategy was to get as many talented players from anywhere in everywhere in America, while Ohio State’s was to get the best players it could from its home state as well as several other populous and talented states. But how did these players arrive on their rosters, and how talented do the recruiting outlets think they are?
Ohio State’s roster has taken advantage of the transfer portal slightly more than Notre Dame. They have 12 scholarship transfer players, 6 of which were significant contributors at some point this season (Davison Igbinosun, Quinshon Judkins, Caleb Downs, Will Howard, Seth McLaughlin, and Josh Simmons). The Fighting Irish have 9 scholarship transfer players, with 5 of them being significant contributors in 2024 (Jordan Clark, Rod Heard, Beaux Collins, Riley Leonard, and Mitch Jeter). It’s worthwhile to note that both programs’ starting QBs this season were offseason portal additions.
The differences in their transfer portal additions are significant, but small. Both of these rosters are overwhelmingly functions of high school recruiting with each having at least 85% of their roster composed of prep players they recruited. The more significant difference is the amount of talent on their rosters. Ohio State’s 77.8% blue chip ratio dwarfs Notre Dame’s 62.0%, but where exactly does this talent difference manifest?
Ohio State possess alarmingly more talent than Notre Dame on the defensive side of the ball. No Notre Dame defensive position group is made up of more than 60% blue chip. The least talented Ohio State defensive group (linebackers) is made up of 81.8% blue chips. This is not necessarily obvious when comparing on field results - no one would claim Ohio State’s linebackers are world beaters - but indicates a general athleticism advantage the Buckeyes have on defense. For example, the average Ohio State scholarship defensive lineman is nearly 15 pounds heavier on average than their Notre Dame counterparts (270 vs 257).
The offensive side of the ball is also slightly less balanced than it appears on paper. The offensive lines are roughly evenly matched, especially after accounting for OSU’s injuries, but Notre Dame’s skill position talent is inefficiently distributed. They possess 8 blue chip wide receivers, however only two of those (Jaden Greathouse and Beaux Collins) are significant threats to contribute this season. They have an incredible group of RBs and TEs with a combined 11 blue chips, but it is vanishingly unlikely that they’ll have more than 3 on the field together at any given time. This significantly limits their ability to generate any semblance of a passing attack against the talented Buckeyes secondary.
If Notre Dame can successfully run the ball against its entire schedule including Georgia and Penn State, then the Fighting Irish should have no concerns on their ability to pound the rock against the Buckeyes. However, with their considerable lack of receiver and secondary talent against Ohio State’s exceptionally talented counterparts, it seems unlikely that the Irish will be able to keep up when the ball is in the air. It could end up being a long night for the Irish if Ohio State can build an early lead on some passing explosives.