Speaking of Michigan's future, it brings up to my mind a general thought in which I think that I differ from consensus IE thinking.
I'm very Machiavellian about Notre Dame football's future success. We have a great coach and a forward looking set of systems and philosophy. All we need are the athletic studs to be trained up to execute the winning ideas. My observation about end-of-season rankings and bowls is, if you already have a name program [we, of course do], then shades of evaluating strength of schedule essentially goes in the trash bin if you just win your games. Consistent winning of your games several years in a row, with a few powers on the schedule, is enough to get you into the BCS everytime, and, if you're Notre Dame [not Boise State] into the NC game when things break right.
The bottom line of this reasoning is, I root against our major RECRUITING opponents almost every game they play. For instance, I DIDN'T want Michigan to luck out again and beat Northwestern last week. The more losses they get, the more recruits we beat them out for. Same with other scheduled opponents like Stanford, USC, Miami, but also non-scheduled recruiting opponents like Bama, FSU, FL, OSU, PSU, Texas, etc. When those teams go down, we go up in recruiting potential.
So, I hope that all teams of that nature have 6-6 years, not because of the current year but because I am greedy for the young supermen to come here rather than there. Current seasons take care of themselves on the field.
Plus, on Michigan in particular, I have an irrational pleasure about passing them up for leading winning percentage of all time[ which we've either just done or are about to if they lose another couple].
