Coaching connections add intrigue to No. 4 Notre Dame's season opener with Wisconsin

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman played for Luke Fickell at Ohio State and coached on his staff at Cincinnati.

Fickell, whose Wisconsin team faces No. 4 Notre Dame on Sunday night, says he isn’t surprised at the way Freeman has developed into one of college football’s top head coaches in the years since they worked together.

“The ones who have the most success like Marcus has are ones who create an identity for themselves, not just where they’ve been, whether it’s his time with us at Cincinnati or his time at Ohio State or his time under (former Ohio State coach) Jim Tressel,” Fickell said Monday.

Freeman had Fickell as his position coach while playing linebacker at Ohio State from 2004-08. Freeman worked for Fickell at Cincinnati from 2017-20 as a linebackers coach and defensive coordinator.

“I’ve got a lot of respect for him,” Freeman said. “I wouldn’t be in this position without the investment he made in me.”

Their two programs are in very different positions as Fickell and Freeman get ready to face off at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Freeman has posted a combined 24-4 record with one College Football Playoff championship game appearance at Notre Dame over the last two seasons. Notre Dame has one of the nation's top quarterbacks in CJ Carr and three preseason Associated Press All-America defensive players in first-team cornerback Leonard Moore, second-team linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa and safety Brauntae Johnson.

Wisconsin is coming off a 4-8 finish in 2025 after going 5-7 in 2024, which snapped a streak of 22 consecutive winning seasons.

The Badgers' recent slide has made Fickell a popular figure on preseason lists of coaches on the hot seat as he enters his fourth year on the job.

Although Notre Dame enters this week as a three-touchdown favorite, Freeman isn’t taking anything for granted. Wisconsin added 27 transfers from other Bowl Subdivision programs and might not bear much resemblance to the team that struggled the last two seasons.

Freeman also already lost to Fickell once since leaving Cincinnati.

Cincinnati’s run to a 2021 playoff berth under Fickell included a 24-13 victory at Notre Dame when Freeman was the Irish’s defensive coordinator on Brian Kelly’s staff. Freeman took over Notre Dame’s program when Kelly left for LSU at the end of the 2021 regular season.

Freeman explained how his experience with Fickell helped shape him as a coach.

“There’s traits that every coach I’ve had a player, as a coach, that I have in me,” Freeman said. “When I think about Luke Fickell, I think about a tireless worker, I think about the demands that he has for his players, his coaches. And the mindset of, ‘This is the way we’re going to play. This is who we are. This is our identity, and we’re committed to it.’ “

The coaching connections between these two teams aren’t limited to Fickell and Freeman.

Notre Dame offensive line coach Joe Rudolph was Wisconsin’s offensive coordinator under former Badgers coach Paul Chryst from 2015-20 and remained on that staff as offensive line coach in 2021.

Irish offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock, quarterbacks coach Gino Guidugli and wide receivers coach Mike Brown were all part of Fickell’s Cincinnati staff during that 2021 playoff season.

“It’s not just Marcus that we’ve got a long history with,” Fickell said. “There’s a lot of guys over there that in particular we’ve got great relationships with, and had great relationships with. Like I’ve always said, I wouldn’t be sitting here today if it wasn’t for not just (Freeman), but a lot of those guys over on that staff.”

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