Notre Dame Football: The Potential Cost of Playing Jeremiyah Love in Orange Bowl

The Fighting Irish star tailback has been banged up recently. Is he worth playing at less than 100%?

Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love (4) participates in a drill during a Notre Dame football practice at Irish Athletic Center on Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in South Bend. / MICHAEL CLUBB/SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Since Notre Dame's season finale win in Los Angeles against USC on November 30, star running back Jeremiyah Love hasn't been quite right.

He still dazzled with a 98-yard touchdown run in the first round of the College Football Playoff game against Indiana, while also battling a cold, but it was clear to see he was still not feeling quite right.

Fast-forward to Notre Dame's Sugar Bowl game against Georgia on January 2 and Love still was not feeling like himself after it appeared he tweaked the knee yet again during the win.

This forced him into a brace on the sidelines and him to leave the field limping after the win and left fans questioning his availability for the Orange Bowl matchup with Penn State and potentially beyond.

Some good and some bad for Notre Dame RB Jeremiyah Love at practice today.

He didn’t sit out any reps, but he took them all with the 2nd team and wore a fairly significant brace on his knee. He fiddled with that quite a bit.

4 days til the Orange Bowl.https://t.co/d0vGCN0LFs pic.twitter.com/EMTKq1GLyf

— Tyler Horka (@tbhorka) January 5, 2025

In the above video from Blue & Gold Illustrated's Tyler Horka, you can see the the brace on Love's right knee and the fairly noticeable limp. This has led to the debate online as to whether it truly makes sense for Notre Dame to put Love on the field against Penn State on January 9 in the Orange Bowl if he any less than 90% healthy.

Of course, in a perfect world, Notre Dame wants its best players to be out on the field helping it win and move on to the national championship game, I totally get that. However, the injury bug has bitten Notre Dame over, and over, and over again, yet, it keeps winning.

Much of the success can be attributed to the star tailback making game-changing plays, but can Notre Dame realistically get past Penn State and try to get Love healthy for the national championship game against the winner of Ohio State vs. Texas?

That's now how this works. There's zero thinking about anything but getting by Penn State.

There's no counting chickens before they hatch, but is it worth it to trot out Love if he is only at 50-60%? There are almost two weeks between the Orange Bowl and the CFP National Championship - the star of the attack at 75% or better might be a must to win it all.

If he is not able to go against the Nittany Lions, are Jadarian Price, Aneyas Williams and Riley Leonard enough for Notre Dame to get it done on the ground?

If it were up to me, I am waiting until the absolute last second possible to see if Love can go and use him sparingly.

He is too big of a game-wrecker to have on the sidelines, even if he is compromised. Of course, you don't want to make his injury worse, but his impact on the game in just a handful of games can mean the difference between the season ending and a national championship berth.

You know Love is going to do whatever it takes to get out there and take on Penn State - will the staff play him?