ESPN’s FPI predicts the outcome of every game on Notre Dame’s 2026 schedule
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ESPN’s FPI believes that Notre Dame has a very good chance to avoid the controversy that left it out of last year’s College Football Playoff.
The Fighting Irish were stunned in 2025 when the Playoff committee left them out of the 12-team field, but if the FPI is any indication, the 2026 Irish will have no issues being 1 of those 12 teams that will battle for the national championship in December (and maybe January).
With star quarterback CJ Carr at the helm, Notre Dame wants to leave no doubt this time around, something Irish head coach Marcus Freeman pointed to last December amid the shocking absence of Notre Dame from the Playoff field. The Fighting Irish left some doubt last season, but ESPN’s Football Power Index currently has the 4th-ranked team in the country favored in every single game on its schedule.
That includes a Nov. 7 showdown in South Bend against bitter rival Miami, which has its own Playoff aspirations in 2026. The Irish currently have a 70.6% chance to outlast the Hurricanes in what shapes up as 1 of college football’s games of the year this fall. Here is the game-by-game listing of how the FPI believes things might go for the Irish in 2026:
- Sept 6: Wisconsin Badgers | 93.0% chance to win
- Sept 12: Rice Owls | 99.5% chance to win
- Sept 19: Michigan State Spartans | 96.8% chance to win
- Sept 26: Purdue Boilermakers | 95.6% chance to win
- Oct 3: North Carolina Tar Heels | 89.8% chance to win
- Oct 10: Stanford Cardinal | 98.4% chance to win
- Oct 17: BYU Cougars | 76.0% chance to win
- Oct 31: Navy Midshipmen | 96.7% chance to win
- Nov 7: Miami Hurricanes | 70.6% chance to win
- Nov 14: Boston College Eagles | 97.9% chance to win
- Nov 21: SMU Mustangs | 89.5% chance to win
- Nov 28: Syracuse Orange | 95.2% chance to win
The FPI’s implied win total for Notre Dame is 10.99 out of 12 games, and if that comes to fruition this fall then the Irish should be Playoff-bound this time, with no controversy to answer to and no regrets like they had last season. Notre Dame will open the 2026 season against Wisconsin at historic Lambeau Field in a neutral-site, primetime battle on the Sunday night of Labor Day Weekend, with kickoff at 7:30 p.m. ET (NBC) on Sept. 6.
Expectations are sky-high in South Bend for Notre Dame, as ESPN’s FPI showed. Here is what the Kalshi market is currently saying about the Fighting Irish’s chances to avoid last year’s disaster of falling short of the Playoff and qualify for the 12-team field this time:
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
