Notre Dame vs. Purdue: Irish Will Use Purdue as Springboard to Respectable Bowl

It is all well and good to pretend that Saturday's game between Notre Dame and Purdue is a storied rivalry game, but it is merely a means for the Irish to get back into the good graces of voters. 

If you are looking for a gritty match that will come down to the wire, only to be saved by last-second heroics, look elsewhere. 

There is one thing that has me confident the Notre Dame Fighting Irish will one day be a 10- or 11-game winner. They get to pick and choose their schedules. 

You are about to see a fine Brian Kelly era. The couch finally has the team and prestige to build a team good enough to surpass an independent's schedule. 

That sentiment is exactly why games like Purdue will soon be treated with frustration by fans of other conferences. 

Notre Dame is simply a better team on both sides of the ball. The one thing that the Boilermakers will notice from the outset is that this is a far different level of defense from anything they have seen from Southeast Missouri or Rice, who they lost to. 

Notre Dame gets the perfect gift on Saturday: an emotional rivalry game that voters will be fooled into thinking was more important than it was. 

The Irish should control this game from start to finish. I have confidence that Tommy Rees will continue to pick apart defenses. 

A win won't solve the BCS or Top 25 problems for Notre Dame. Only a continued streak of wins can do that. However, a win over Purdue starts the dominoes of goodwill to fall. 

While the Irish find themselves in an unlikely place after two initial losses, they still own their destiny. With a win over the Boilermakers, the train gets firmly back on the tracks. 

The victory should be a rousing one that supporters can trumpet as a sign that the program is once again strong. Whether that is true remains to be seen in the rest of the schedule. But the good fortune is there for the taking. Notre Dame can still get to a prestigious bowl, and that is truly something worth noting.