Cotton Bowl Preview: #2 Clemson faces #3 Notre Dame

I count myself as one of those fans who wanted to find Notre Dame in the playoffs once it started looking likely the Irish would make it. I even found myself conflicted when they had their tussle with Pitt. Normally I would have been completely behind the idea of Pittsburgh ruining their season, but part of me wanted the Irish to escape and make it to this stage. This certainly comes off as very arrogant, which I own, but I’ve felt very strongly that the Tigers match up very well with Notre Dame and the Irish are less scary an opener than Oklahoma or Ohio State would have been.