QB Sam Hartman, offensive line progress will highlight next week’s Notre Dame Blue-Gold Game

Notre Dame will conclude spring practices in 11 days with the annual Blue-Gold Game (April 22 at 2 ET, exclusively on Peacock). As that day nears, the only chance for the world to get a look at the Irish until they take the field in Dublin (138 days), excitement will focus on Notre Dame’s offense, now led by Wake Forest transfer quarterback Sam Hartman.

New Irish offensive coordinator Gerad Parker and head coach Marcus Freeman will continue to insist Hartman is engaged in a starting competition with rising junior Tyler Buchner, but make no mistake about it, Hartman will start for Notre Dame against Navy no matter how he fares in next week’s intrasquad scrimmage.

That excitement will be understandable leading into next week. Unavoidable, in fact. But it should be tempered, as any success in the Blue-Gold Game comes at the expense of the other side of the ball, and any offensive failure could instead be viewed as a defensive improvement. These are the dichotomies of any intrasquad scrimmage.

For today, let’s consider the most important offensive possibilities …

Hartman shows off with an efficient first half featuring at least one downfield completion.

For all Drew Pyne mustered to push Notre Dame to eight wins in his 10 starts last fall, he struggled to combine efficiency with downfield success. Statistically, he averaged 8.0 yards per attempt — a number that surprisingly rises to 8.11 if removing his 89 passes to star tight end Michael Mayer — a strong average overall. But it was boosted by short passes turning into significant gains and an overall completion percentage of 64.6 percent, not by deep shots down the field.

Anecdotally, the three longest passing plays of Notre Dame’s 2022 — to Logan Diggs (75