When Notre Dame played for the national championship in 2024 the Irish defense was a primary driver of that team’s success. That defense finished that season with the 2nd best defense in the country according to the FEI. Just 13 months after that season concluded the staff that built that defense is completely gone. Notre Dame will have a brand new staff, and second-year coordinator Chris Ash is now the grizzled veteran of the defensive staff.
Expectations for 2026 are extremely high for head coach Marcus Freeman and the Notre Dame defense. They are considered one of the favorites to win the national championship in 2026, but how well Freeman hired the new staff will go a very, very long way towards determining if that will be possible. This is an experienced staff, and all three have either been a head coach or a defensive coordinator in the past.
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Here are my thoughts on the new-look defensive staff:
Position: Defensive Line
The first hire of the offseason, Partridge came to Notre Dame after spending the two seasons prior with the Indianapolis Colts. Partridge was the defensive line coach and Co-DC at Pitt from 2018-23 (only the DL coach in 2017) and served as the head coach at Florida Atlantic from 2014-16. Partridge was the DL coach at Wisconsin from 2008-12, and was the Co-DC with the Badgers in 2011-12. His first stint at Pittsburgh was from 2003-07, where he coached defensive ends, linebackers and the defensive line in different seasons. Partridge played college football at Drake, where he was a four-year teammate of Ash. Partridge also worked with Ash at Wisconsin (2010-12) and Arkansas (2013).
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My Take: Partridge comes to Notre Dame with an elite reputation as a defensive line coach. That began when he developed All-American and first round NFL Draft pick JJ Watt at Wisconsin, but his reputation really took off at Pittsburgh. Not only did he churn out a number of NFL Draft picks, but Partridge helped turn Pittsburgh into one of the nation’s most disruptive defenses. From 2019-22, the Panthers ranked either first or second in sacks per game in each season. They also ranked 2nd in tackles for loss per game in 2020, 3rd in 2021 and 9th in 2019. It wasn’t just about rushing the quarterback, as the Panthers ranked 12th, 3rd, 6th and 8th in rush defense from 2019-22.
Whether or not Notre Dame can repeat that success will first be determined by Ash, and whether or not he wants to continue the aggressive, attacking style we saw in the last seven games or if he wants to revert back to the more passive, read-and-react, keep everything in front of you defense from the first four games. Notre Dame’s defensive line has become quite stout in recent seasons, but if Ash turns Patridge loose I can him having the ability to take this defensive line to another level. The talent is there for the Irish to have an elite defensive line, and Partridge has the reputation of a coach who can build that kind of unit.
Position: Linebackers/Run Game Coordinator
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The hiring of Jean-Mary was the final move of the defensive rebuild. He spent the two previous seasons as the Linebackers Coach and Run Game Coordinator at Michigan. Jean-Mary spent the 2021-23 seasons coaching Tennessee, where he played a key role in that team’s defensive turnaround. Jean-Mary spent the 2010-19 seasons working under former Notre Dame assistant coach Charlie Strong. Jean-Mary was the Linebackers Coach and Assistant Head Coach at Louisville (2010-13) and served as the Linebackers Coach and Recruiting Coordinator at Texas (2014-16). Jean-Mary was also the Defensive Coordinator and Linebackers Coach under Strong at South Florida (2017-19). Jean-Mary was a graduate assistant at South Carolina in 2001-02, where he worked for former Notre Dame head coach Lou Holtz.
My Take: The first thing that stood out to me about Jean-Mary was his tenure working under Strong. Whatever you think of Strong as a head coach, there’s no doubt he’s a strong defensive mind. He won two national titles as a defensive coordinator at Florida (2006, 2008) and obviously served as a DC for Holtz at South Carolina. Him seeing Jean-Mary as the kind of coach who he needed to take with him to three different stops tells me something. He also played a key role in a Tennessee defense that went from very poor to quite good by his third season.
Jean-Mary has a strong reputation as an assistant coach. Speaking with sources in the coaching world, Jean-Mary is a demanding assistant coach who values technical proficiency, playing smart and playing hard. His Michigan linebackers were very sound and productive. Consider that in 2025, the Wolverine linebackers combined for 29.5 TFL and 10 sacks, compared to just 25 TFL and 11.5 sacks for the Irish linebackers. Michigan’s linebackers averaged just 20 missed tackles per season at linebacker (PFF), while the Irish linebackers averaged 36.5 missed tackles. Anyone that watched Michigan also knows the talent level they had at linebacker wasn’t close to what Jean-Mary will have at Notre Dame.
Position: Secondary/Co-Defensive Coordinator
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Henry most recently served as the Defensive Coordinator and Secondary Coach at Illinois. He spent the two seasons prior (2021-22) just coaching the secondary for the Fighting Illini. He’s the youngest of the new hires and didn’t get into the coaching profession until being hired as a graduate assistant at Arkansas in 2014. He quickly rose up the rankings, serving as the Defensive Backs Coach for Ash at Rutgers in 2016, moving to NC State as the Safeties Coach in 2017, and then shifting to Cornerbacks for the Wolfpack in 2018-19. After coaching for a season at Vanderbilt (Cornerbacks, 2020), Henry then moved onto Illinois, where he spent the next five seasons before coming to Notre Dame.
My Take: No new coach has a bigger job in front of him than does Henry, who will be tasked with replacing Mike Mickens. There’s no debate about who has been the team’s best assistant coach in recent seasons. Mickens had developed into an elite position coach and recruiter, especially at cornerback. Freeman absolutely needed to make a big splash here, and I believe he did that with Henry. I like the fact he has experience as a coordinator, but no matter what his title is, his primary task is making sure Notre Dame once again puts an elite secondary on the field. He will need to build on the excellent foundation that Mickens established and make sure the Irish secondary keeps playing at a high level.
Henry has a proven track record in this department. He showed in 2021-22 that if he has big time talent he can absolutely develop an elite secondary. His 2022 secondary had three All Big Ten performers, and cornerback Devon Witherspoon earned Consensus All-American honors. Three members of that secondary got drafted in 2023, with Witherspoon going No. 5 overall, safety Quan Martin went in the second round and safety Sydney Brown went in the third round of the draft. He’ll need to repeat that level of success in 2026, as he inherits arguably the most talented returning secondary room in all of college football.
It’s hard to imagine Freeman having more success putting a staff together than what we saw this offseason, at least on paper. All three coaches come with a strong reputation and two of the three (Partridge, Henry) have experience with Ash. All three have served as defensive coordinators or head coaches, and all have strong reputations as recruiters and teachers. It looks great on paper. The next step is finding out if the trio can work well together, connect with the returning players, build trust in their respective rooms and be able to get the most out of their players. Ash will have the responsibility of making sure the defense is schemed well, the players are able to continue playing fast and aggressive (see the final seven games of the 2025 season), but the assistants will be tasked with making sure their players are well prepared both technically and schematically. If Ash is willing to remain aggressive and the new assistants are as good as I think they can be this defense should keep rolling.
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