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Notre Dame’s Opponents: Clemson tempts fate, preserves allure of the ‘implicit’

Brian Kelly misses the same things this season as most Notre Dame fans do. The Irish head coach just spends less time thinking about what was supposed to be.

“There is a little bit of a loss when you don’t see USC or Stanford on your schedule or Michigan or a Big 10 school,” Kelly said Monday. “You don’t think too much about it. It lasts probably one coffee or one slice of pizza, then you’re back to work.”

Of course, this season that work is ACC-focused, and without having to worry about facing Arkansas for the first time ever or Western Michigan for the first time in a decade or Wisconsin for the first time since Ara Parseghian’s first game, Notre Dame has faced all but one of its remaining opponents within the last four years, the exception being this Saturday (3:30 ET; ABC) at Georgia Tech, whom the Irish have not faced since 2015.