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The No. 12 Notre Dame Fighting Irish improved to 3-0 on the season with a 27-13 victory over the Purdue Boilermakers on Saturday. Brian Kelly’s group did enough offensively to down their in-state foes by two touchdowns and defensively, they held Purdue to just 57 yards rushing.
So what does this victory mean for the Fighting Irish in the larger scheme of the College Football Playoff? Well, it’s not something that’s going to vault them up near the top of the list of contenders, but it’s a step in the right direction.
ND had a very chaotic week to start the regular season. They were taken to overtime by what’s turning out to be an awful Florida State team on Labor Day before narrowly avoiding an upset against Toledo five days later. Purdue is their first win where they handled a lesser opponent for the duration of the game and for Notre Dame, playoff consideration hinges on your ability to put opponents down in impressive manners.
The Irish have a lot of work to do over the next several weeks to climb closer to the theoretical four-spot, but there’s a couple of opportunities to really build their resume coming up. They travel to Camp Randall to meet No. 18 Wisconsin next week before returning home for a showdown with No. 8 Cincinnati.