No. 3 Notre Dame, No. 9 Indiana take one last spin with 1-year QBs Kurtis Rourke and Riley Leonard

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti pored through the transfer portal last December, looking for a proven quarterback with a winning resume who could quickly become the cornerstone in another rebuilding project. Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman had a far simpler pitch to former Duke quarterback Riley Leonard — win a national championship and go down in Fighting Irish lore. Both coaches took big swings on their respective one-year hired guns and on Friday, they’ll reap the reward when Rourke leads the 10th-seeded Hoosiers against the seventh-seeded Fighting Irish in what looked like an impossible first-round College Football Playoff matchup all those months ago. “It just fuels us, knowing that we’re counted out and we’re the underdog and we always will be — at least for this year — so we can go in and play freely and that we’re capable of competing with anybody.” For Rourke, Leonard, Oregon quarterback Dillon Gabriel and Ohio State quarterback Will Howard, there won’t be a next year. One of the nation’s top rushing quarterbacks chose Notre Dame because of its tradition and the lure of leading one of college football’s blueblood programs to end a 36-year title drought, the longest since Notre Dame claimed its first title in 1924.