Marcus Freeman’s punt trickery for Notre Dame bamboozled Georgia into taking a costly penalty
Marcus Freeman made quite the gamble with this late play between Notre Dame and Georgia. But, as the saying goes, fortune certainly favors the bold.
During the late moments of Thursday’s Sugar Bowl, Notre Dame held a 23-10 lead with a little under eight minutes remaining in the fourth quarter. Backed up at their own 18-yard-line and facing a fourth and one, Freeman seemingly opted to take what was the safe route by punting the ball to Georgia, with the Bulldogs needing two scores to take the lead.
However, after Notre Dame’s punt team was on the field, Freeman subbed them out in a fire drill maneuver and put on the Fighting Irish offense instead to go for it! Georgia then changed up their defense to match, but in all the confusion, were drawn offside on the play, giving Notre Dame a key first down to continue the drive.
georgia offside penalty pic.twitter.com/zZjErheIKk
— ◇ (@H00DH3R0) January 3, 2025
Not only was Freeman’s move a gutsy and unexpected one, Notre Dame ended up taking over five minutes off the clock after the new set of downs. Talk about a brilliant play call to confuse Georgia’s defense enough to make them forget about the obvious offside bait and effectively seal the win for Notre Dame by running off so much additional clock.