Marcus Freeman admitted after the game Saturday that he got frustrated at times with the play of Notre Dame’s defense versus Purdue. But on Monday, the Irish head coach was doubling down on his program and his belief in his coaches and players.

Notre Dame is off to a historically bad start defensively in 2025. The 98 points given up through three games are the 2nd most in school history, behind the 102 points given up in 2007 when Notre Dame finished 3-9. Compounding the problem is that Notre Dame’s defense was one of the nation’s best last season under Al Golden and the biggest reason the Irish made it all the way to the national championship game.

Chris Ash has coached just three games as Notre Dame’s defensive coordinator but Monday marked already the 2nd time Freeman has been asked whether he would consider taking over play calling duties himself from the new Irish DC.

Freeman’s answer? A more than 3 minute, passionate declaration that he would not.

“If I thought it was a call, if I thought we weren’t calling the game the right way — trust me, I know the definition of insanity–if that was the case, you gotta do what’s best with your program,” Freeman began. “But that’s not to me, the issue when I’m evaluating our defensive play. It’s not what we’re calling at this time or why we’re calling it. It’s, why aren’t we executing? Me saying I’m gonna call the defense means, it’s a call. If I’m gonna call the defense, it’s based on a call. We’re not calling the right calls. I don’t believe that’s true.”

Freeman said they have to get their players to execute at a better level and play with the right fundamentals. From the top of the program down, Freeman says each person must take accountability and not point fingers at anyone else. The Irish head coach says there are just two options when things get tough: fight or flight. Blaming others, saying a coach made a bad call or a player or teammate made a mistake is flight mode. Fight mode is having the confidence to repeat a call and saying you will get this one the next time. Fight mode is a coach saying we are calling the same thing again because he knows the player will get it right the next time. Fight mode is a coach realizing a player’s technique wasn’t right and getting it correcting rather than blaming the player.

“Everybody’s gotta be bought in—everybody’s gotta believe that we have the answers,” Freeman said to close out his answer. “It’s not a person. It’s not, ‘Marcus Freeman should be calling the defense.’ We have the answers. We gotta all buy in and execute this the right way. And that starts with leadership. That starts from the top down. That’s my job but also Chris Ash’s job. It’s our coaches’ job on down to our players. You have to create the buy-in to what we’re doing and the ownership of it. If we get that, we’ll get it corrected with urgency. If we don’t, if we do this, ‘It’s your fault, you shouldn’t have called that, Coach,’ then it’s gonna be bad. I know our culture ain’t gonna let that happen.”

Notre Dame will need it’s defense to step up this week as they go against Arkansas quarterback Taylen Green and his dual threat attack. The Razorbacks have what Freeman called a top 5 offense.

The urgency to get the Irish defense fixed is high as a result, especially for one that reportedly was dominating the Irish offense in preseason camp.

“I think our defense in fall camp was really executing at a high level,” Freeman said. “No matter what we were calling, they were doing a good job. I think as you look at the first two opponents, I think not having some of the guys that were playing with the ones out there at crucial positions can affect because it’s not saying the guys in there are not good enough, it’s saying, hey, it affects how you call it or what you want to call.”

Notre Dame’s secondary has been held back with guys out. Star cornerback Leonard Moore rolled his ankle vs Texas A&M and the Aggies scored a touchdown while he was out. He returned to the game and played well the rest of the way before missing the Purdue game to recover. Moore is questionable for Saturday at Arkansas. Corner Christian Gray has played in all three games but has appeared to be hampered by an upper body injury that has affected his play. Nickel Devonta Smith was injured pregame during A&M and has missed the last two games. He too is questionable again this week. Safety and captain Adon Shuler missed the end of the Texas A&M game and the 1st half of the Purdue game because of an ejection for targeting. In their place have been a lot of young guys. Karson Hobbs saw a lot of time at nickel against Miami & A&M but struggled. He did not play against Purdue. Freshman Dallas Golden started at nickel versus Purdue. Freshman Mark Zachary started at cornerback against Purdue after struggling in limited action in the first two games. With Shuler out at safety for the 1st half against Purdue, Tae Johnson started in his place alongside transfer Jalen Storman. Johnson will start alongside Shuler at Arkansas.

“You got a couple guys that are in new positions that haven’t played, that are going through the natural growing pains of playing big time college ball,” Freeman explained. “And we have to live with that, we have live with them. We’re never OK with a loss of a game or a loss on a play, like it’s not OK, but we have understand great things take time. You learn from being exposed sometimes. You learn from that and that goes for our defense period, not even a player. I remember when I was the defense coordinator here, those first two games were rough, right? And there’s heat, right? And it’s hot in that chair. But as I said earlier, you got one of two options. You double down on what you believe and you get the people you’re leading to believe in what you’re doing or you point fingers. I know the result of both.”

Freeman said the defensive staff meeting on Sunday wasn’t a comfortable one and he didn’t want it to be comfortable.

“We got one or two options as I told them, we’re gonna do this and get our guys better and believe in what we’re doing or we’ll separate,” Freeman continued. “And if we separate, it’s not going to be good for anybody. It’s not.”

Freeman believes if the coaches do the right things and stay together, that will trickle down to the players.

Notre Dame and Arkansas will battle for the first time ever Saturday at Noon in Fayetteville.