Notre Dame's offense shattered records last season. Now, with veteran leadership and enhanced speed, they aim for even greater consistency and explosive plays.
Last season, Notre Dame's offense set a record for yards per play (7.3) and a modern day scoring record in points per game (42.0) which was the highest since 1912. From that offense, the Irish return their starting quarterback, three offensive lineman, a running back who rotated in throughout the season, a pair of veteran receivers and a host of talent at tight end. They also return offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock who is headed into his third season at the helm.
With as good of a season as the Irish had in 2025 offensively, there's always room for improvement, and if you know anything about Notre Dame's confident offensive play-caller, there's always room to get better. This offseason, Denbrock has a clear goal in mind for this offense and it starts with a pair of objectives.
"I think it comes down to two things," Denbrock shared. "It comes down to consistency because it’s never going to be perfect. But it can be a lot more consistent and we can be a lot more consistent across the board. Consistent with details, consistent with understanding and consistent with doing our job better on any particular play. All that just leads to the numbers you’re talking about or the ability to push that envelope even higher. I think the floor we’re starting at compared to last year or the year before is already so much higher."
"The devil is in the details and it always is," Denbrock continued. "We’ve got to get way more consistent at the details and way more consistent at understanding why those details matter, especially in critical moments of the game, whether that’s third-and-short, which we’ve got to be way better at than we were a year ago. All those things can lead to really good stat lines but an offense that’s way more consistent leads to what we need to do to take the next step."
One thing Denbrock will have at his disposal this season is a veteran quarterback, CJ Carr, mixed with a plethora of skilled talent that has tremendous speed. Stretching the field horizontally and vertically will be an emphasis in this year's offense, and they have the personal to do it to a very high degree.
"I think you can always be faster but I do feel that we’ve upgraded our speed at a number of the skill positions," Denbrock stated. "I think you can tell that by practice today that it’s a different-looking group. It makes it more exciting, especially when you’ve got somebody who, whether he should or not, wants to push the ball vertically down the field and be aggressive."
Carr was not shy around letting it fly on the first day of spring practice. Like we saw last season, the Michigan native has a willingness to push the ball down the field; he has a gunslinger mentality which I absolutely love about the ascending redshirt sophomore. Carr's performance on day one of spring didn't come as a surprise in the slightest to his veteran offensive coordinator.
"He’s been chomping at the bit for three weeks to throw the ball, and I knew exactly what was going to happen today when the ball came out," Denbrock said jokingly. "That ball was going down the field no matter what, no matter how deep the safety was or anything else, he was going to launch. I got a chuckle out of that on the sidelines because I knew what was coming."
Notre Dame is poised for a special season in 2026. They're one of the preseason favorites to win the national title, one of only two teams projected to go undefeated in the P4 level and have a returning Heisman hopeful at quarterback. This offense could lead the way to their 12th national title, and this unit has the pieces to get that done.
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