Chris Ash on Notre Dame’s Defense in Year Two: “A Completely Different Deal”

Notre Dame defensive coordinator Chris Ash met with reporters at the close of fall camp, a week out from the opener against Wisconsin at Lambeau Field last week. He was asked how much more comfortable he is with his personnel now than he was a year ago, when he was still in his first months on the job after replacing Al Golden.

“Yeah, I mean it’s a completely different deal,” Ash said. “I mean I know the players that have been here a lot better – you know what their strengths and weaknesses are and what I think we can do well, and we just have a lot of work still to do. But we’re just in a different spot at this point this year than we were at this point last year.”

A Different Spot Entering September

The Irish expect a different September than the one they had in 2025. Ash said when he got the job that he did not plan to change much of what Golden had built. The adjustment still showed. Texas A&M came to South Bend with a middling offense and drove the field for the winning score in the final minute, and while a missed holding call sprung the touchdown, the drive itself was the problem. The defense did not settle in until the end of September. By December, it was as good as any unit in the country.

Armel Mukam, asked directly what Ash has done this offseason to keep the sluggish start from repeating, arrived at the same place from the other side of the meeting room.

“I think just more buy-in for the whole defense,” Mukam said. “You know, we met more on the system. I think the guys are understanding more what Coach Ash wants out of us. So, yeah, I think the guys are just more bought in. You know, we have more walkthroughs, more meeting times, and I think it’s going to make a difference this year.”

A Roster Ash Knows Better

What Ash knows better this year is a roster that has largely stayed together. Drayk Bowen put up 67 tackles, 4.5 tackles for loss, 3.5 sacks, and three pass breakups last season. Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa had 48 tackles, 7.5 tackles for loss, three sacks, and an interception. Adon Shuler led the group with 52 tackles and added two interceptions for 46 return yards. Leonard Moore picked off five passes and broke up seven more. Boubacar Traore’s 37 tackles came with 10 tackles for loss and 6.5 sacks, and Bryce Young added 20 tackles, two sacks, and three balls knocked away at the line. Ash has game wreckers all three levels back after spending last August still figuring out what each of them did best.

“We have a bunch of really good players out there that we’re just excited to have out there, and they’re really a joy to be around every single day,” Ash said. “They work hard. They’re a really tight-knit group, and they have a lot of fun doing what they’re doing. That’s just the team in general, but defensively these guys have been around playing with each other for a long time.”

A New Voice Up Front

Up front, Charlie Partridge took over the defensive line after coaching the position with the Colts. Ash was asked how that group has grown over camp.

“I would say the chemistry of the group has been exceptional. They really have bonded together,” Ash said. “I think the players and Coach Partridge have invested a lot of time to get to know each other. That was really important in this whole process with basically a new defensive staff, with all of them. But they’ve really taken to his coaching, and, you know, he’s taken to them as players and being his own group.”

Armel Mukam, who entered the portal and came back, pointed to Partridge as part of the reason he returned.

Wisconsin’s Unknowns

Familiarity with his own roster does nothing for Ash on the other side of the ball. Wisconsin has turned over a large portion of its roster, and Ash acknowledged there is only so much film that helps.

“That’s probably the biggest thing there,” Ash said. “They’ve got a bunch of new players that, you know, it’s just a different team, a different offense, and it’s going to be a game of adjustments once we get to the stadium, once we get to game day, and the game starts and we figure out exactly what they’re going to do. But they’ve got good coaches. They’ve got a good scheme. They know what they’re doing.”

A coordinator who knows what his players can handle can ask more of them in real time, and players who have sat through the extra install can absorb it. What Notre Dame has to prove at Lambeau is that all of it holds up when Wisconsin makes the game a live problem to solve, with Bowen, Viliamu-Asa, Shuler, Moore, Traore, and Young on the field to solve it. Whether the extra year of familiarity actually changes September is a question that starts getting answered a week from now.