After an abysmal 4-8 season, the Notre Dame football program was, in some ways, entrenched in a rebuild. Head Coach Brian Kelly re-vamped his coaching staff with some of the best assistant coaches in the country and began the efforts to bring Notre Dame back to where it was following the 2011-2012 season when they competed for a National Championship.
Today, the Irish are back to where they were following that blowout loss to the Alabama Crimson Tide: Close, but not quite good enough.
Certainly, the Irish have exceeded expectations, if your expectations for them were relatively low following a 4-8 season.