Notre Dame edged past Penn State in a thrilling Orange Bowl matchup on Thursday, securing a spot in the national championship game—and seemingly addressing critics from the college football world.
The Fighting Irish clinched the 27-24 victory by turning a late-game interception into a decisive 41-yard field goal. Demonstrating grit and determination, Notre Dame overcame a 10-point first-half deficit and later rallied again to erase a seven-point gap in the fourth quarter.
Following the win, the team celebrated on social media, posting a video on X of players rejoicing in the locker room, set to the fitting anthem “Ain’t It Fun” by Paramore.
The video featured a notable excerpt of Paramore’s song with lyrics stating, “Ain’t it fun?/Living in the real world/Ain’t it good?/Being all alone,” sparking speculation among fans that it was a subtle jab at critics of Notre Dame’s decision to remain independent and not align with a conference.
One prominent critic happened to be across the field on Thursday. Before the Orange Bowl, Penn State head coach James Franklin voiced his belief that all schools should participate in conferences.
“It should be consistent across college football,” Franklin stated. “This is no knock at [Freeman] or Notre Dame, but I think everybody should be in a conference. Everybody should play a conference championship game, or nobody should. The number of conference games should also be the same across the board.”
However, criticisms of Notre Dame for avoiding conferences—and by extension, conference championship games—seem to have lost weight this season.
“Looks like Notre Dame doesn’t need to play in a conference, a conference championship game, or get a first-round bye to walk hand in hand with Touchdown Jesus all the way to the National Championship game,” wrote former NFL quarterback and analyst Robert Griffin III in a post on X.
