ESPN Announces Major News For Notre Dame’s 2019 Season

EAST LANSING, MI – SEPTEMBER 23: Head coach Brian Kelly of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish watches the warm ups prior to the start of the game against the Michigan State Spartans at Spartan Stadium on September 23, 2017 in East Lansing, Michigan. (Photo by Leon Halip/Getty Images)ESPN and the ACC are launching the ACC Network ahead of next football season, and the league is ready to leverage its Notre Dame affiliation to aid the new channel.Notre Dame is on ESPN right now, facing Clemson in the College Football Playoff semifinal at the Cotton Bowl.Any Notre Dame game is certain to draw a strong rating. There’s a reason for the team’s lucrative deal with NBC for its home games.As part of its arrangement with the ACC, Notre Dame plays five league opponents per year, while maintaining its technical football independence.Next year, the Fighting Irish open at Louisville, and host Virginia, Virginia Tech, and rival Boston College.On November 9, Brian Kelly’s club travels down to Duke.Moments before the Notre Dame football game against Clemson, ESPN announced that the game at Duke will be on ACC Network.From the ACCN Twitter account:Mark your calendars! On November 9, @NDFootball vs. @DukeFOOTBALL will air exclusively on ACC Network. pic.twitter.com/vROGdf2OSJ— ACCN (@accnetwork) December 29, 2018Conference networks have been something of a mixed bag for college leagues. The Big Ten and SEC have done well, but the Pac-12 Network is a disaster, and ESPN’s Longhorn Network partnership with Texas is barely relevant.There are concerns about the ACC Network, as many of the fan bases aren’t as die hard as those in the Big Ten and SEC, but landing even one Notre Dame road game per year will be huge if the ACCN can do it consistently.