Blame the curious religious clash on the Hanukkah hangover, but I can’t help but liken Notre Dame’s swift acceptance of a Pinstripe Bowl bid to the manner in which I bear a seventh-night pair of socks or a Borders gift certificate that was bought in 2010 and snatched from the coupon drawer at the last minute: dutifully and respectfully, because, hey, it might come in handy. Obviously, a clash against a 6-6 Rutgers team in Yankee Stadium will do wonders for Notre Dame’s media presence in New York City, a market in which it is clearly lagging. And shouldn’t Notre Dame be happy to play in a midtier bowl after an 8-4 season? After all, the Fighting Irish's future coupling with the ACC may be a “friends with benefits” thing clearly tilted in their favor, but every now and again, you have to do something to make the lesser party feel like the relationship is “real”; being a mostly unranked, 8-4 team in the Pinstripe Bowl is about comparable to a movie/dinner date.
In any other year, this would be a huge capitulation, but it came and went with less fanfare than Wyoming hiring a coach from a state less populous than itself. Which leads to one of the most sneaky-weird stories of the 2013 season: I don’t get to say this very often about Notre Dame, so I’ll relish this: The Irish deserve better. This goes against the past two decades of Notre Dame bowl performance, which includes an approximate 296-13 scoring deficit in BCS bowls. But this 8-4 team somehow brings a stronger annual sales pitch than any of the 10-2 Notre Dame squads have: This team's schedule means more.
The Irish are the only squad in the country that beat Michigan State. They lost a close one to Stanford, but beat the Cardinal's Pac-12 title game opponent, Arizona State. BYU is a quality win. USC and Navy are nice résumé boosters. Aside from losing to an especially nondescript Pitt team, respectable defeats against Oklahoma and a still-motivated Michigan team are the Fighting Irish’s lone pockmarks.
This might be the only underrated Notre Dame team ever.
No less than five days ago, we were dealing with the distinct possibility of Central Florida and Northern Illinois or Fresno State occupying the spot usually earmarked for Notre Dame: that of a suspect squad with an inflated record about to get blown out in the biggest BCS mismatch. But more than in most years, Notre Dame deserves Notre Dame's spot this year. That's not to say the Irish should have taken Alabama's place or could avoid surrendering 60 points to Baylor. Check out the Pinstripe Bowl, though, and you'll be watching something similar to the newly "vegan" Jay Z showing up to a restaurant with Beyoncé draped in head-to-toe leather: It's an attempt to lose some of the unsightly baggage and connect with the common man, but we know damn well this is only a temporary phase they're enduring through gritted teeth.