Notre Dame Football: Spartans Victory Not the End of Fighting Irish's Season

No team wants to start the season off with a loss, and they certainly don't want to begin the year with three straight, which is exactly why the Notre Dame Fighting Irish are feeling a ton of pressure heading into their Week 3 game against the Michigan State Spartans.

Should they lose, the Fighting Irish will be at 0-3, and while their season may appear to be done, that just isn't the case.

The Fighting Irish lost a heart-breaker to Michigan last week, but they can only blame themselves for the outcome of the game. Head coach Brian Kelly made the right choice to start Tommy Rees, but he's still feeling the heat because the Fighting Irish can't find a way to win. 

They have the benefit of hosting the No. 15 Spartans, and while home-field advantage will help, it's up to the players to step up and deliver the much-needed victory. 

However, stopping junior running back Edwin Baker and senior quarterback Kirk Cousins won't be an easy task. Expect another close game for the Fighting Irish, which is something Kelly won't be pleased with.

Notre Dame needs a win more than any other team in the country right now, but if they don't get it, then all hope is not lost.

After Michigan State, the only tough opponents the Fighting Irish have to deal with are the USC Trojans and the Stanford Cardinal.

The season finale is against the Cardinal, and that really should be their only loss over the rest of the season. That would mean that after the Michigan State game, the Fighting Irish will win the next eight games. 

The Fighting Irish shouldn't have any trouble in games against Pittsburgh, Purdue, Air Force, Navy, Wake Forest, Maryland and Boston College.

I do think they'll beat the Trojans because it's a home game and USC hasn't looked overly impressive thus far.

So if the Spartans do hand the Fighting Irish their third loss of the year, Notre Dame fans shouldn't call it quits because the season can be salvaged.

Going 8-4 is obviously not where Notre Dame expected to be this year, but it isn't a terrible season by any means, especially when you factor in how the season began. 

It's not like the Fighting Irish are a bad team. They've put up a ton of offense, but really they've made mental errors that Kelly has to try and fix.

He told reporters recently that he knows his team has done well and he's remaining optimistic about the rest of the season.

Per the Chicago Tribune: 

"

I did tell [the team] this: I said, 'I really believe that you haven't won a game yet, but you haven't been beaten.' Last year we were beaten,'Kelly said. We've really had a hand at beating ourselves, and that's the big difference. If we do not beat ourselves, we have a chance to be the kind of football team that we all believe that we can be.

You stay the course, Kelly said. I know that sounds cliché, but when you're building a football program, not just a team, you have to be consistent with your approach, and I believe in my approach. I believe in the things that I've seen tangibly occur in my tenure of 21 years of being a head football coach. 

"

It's been a rough start for the Fighting Irish, but no matter what the outcome of the game is this weekend, the season is far from over. 

The rest of the schedule is very winnable, but the key for Notre Dame will be forgetting their past and focusing on the future. They can't get discouraged if they're 0-3, and it's up to Kelly to make sure that doesn't happen. 

The Spartans aren't as good as their No. 15 ranking suggests, which is why this will be a good game.

Whether or not Fighting Irish fans can handle another late-game thriller remains to be seen, but one thing's for sure, Notre Dame's season is not over if they fall to 0-3.