Syracuse Added to ’14-17 Schedules

Syracuse announced three “home” games to be played in the new Giants Stadium for the 2014-2016 seasons with Notre Dame as the opponent in two of the contests. Notre Dame will travel to East Rutherford, NJ in 2014 and 2016 while the Orange will make the trip to South Bend in 2015 and 2017.

The schedule has been a hot topic for Notre Dame fans this off-season with the effects of Kevin White’s 7-4-1 philosophy finally being realized in 2009. Fans have been upset with a slate of games which features few marquee opponents for 2009 and 2010.

Tuesday’s news that Notre Dame has added four games against Syracuse won’t do much to temper the dissent amongst the fans unless the Orange are able to turn things around under new head coach Doug Marrone.

With the games being played in the new Giants Stadium, Notre Dame will get a pair of games at a large venue in a major market. The new Giants Stadium is set to hold 82,500 people and is set to open for football in 2010.

In recent weeks its been reported that athletic director Jack Swarbrick might not be as married to the idea of a 7-4-1 schedule as his predecessor. Could these games be a middle ground or sorts? Notre Dame will get two showcase games in the biggest TV market in the country in a traditional home-home agreement as opposed to a neutral site setting.

Notre Dame and Syracuse have played 6 times – the most recent being last season’s numbing 24-23 Notre Dame loss on senior day. The loss cast major doubt into Charlie Weis’s job security much the way Syracuse’s 38-12 victory over Notre Dame did to former coach Tyrone Willingham’s job security in the 2003 season finale in the Carier Dome.

Over the last four meetings in this series, Syracuse owns a 3-1 record against Notre Dame with the lone Irish win coming during Charlie Weis’s first season on the sidelines in South Bend – a 34-10 Notre Dame victory.

Notre Dame had an 11-0 record at the old Giants Stadium including wins over Navy in 2004 and Maryland in 2002. The most famous Notre Dame game to take place at the old stadium was the 1995 Army game in which Ivory Covington sealed a Notre Dame victory with a tackle inside the one yard-line on a two point conversion attempt that wold have knocked Notre Dame out of the Orange Bowl. Maryland, however, was the only ranked opponent the Irish faced in the 11 games at the old stadium.

This series is potentially a replacement for the UConn series which appears to be less likely based on recent reports that UConn did not want to play all of their home games in the series at either Gillette Stadium or Giants Stadium.