Notre Dame Ranks No. 5 In CBS Sport's Post-Spring Top 25

Now that spring has come to a close, it's time for major outlets to release their Post-Spring Top 25 rankings. CBS Sports is the latest to put out there post-spring rankings and it's definitely an interesting ranking to evaluate. Some teams are where we thought they'd be while others are incredibly too high. But you'll have that in rankings that get released over 120 days from the season starting.

CBS Sports had Notre Dame ranked as the No. 5 team in the country coming out of spring being the Texas Longhorns (No. 1), the Ohio State Buckeyes (No. 2), the Oregon Ducks (No. 3) and the Georgia Bulldogs (No. 4). Those teams were also ranked in the Top 10 in Irish Breakdown's Post-Spring Top 25 rankings. The rationale for CBS Sports for having the Irish inside of the Top 5 is different than what we had.

"We'll talk all summer about Notre Dame's "easy" schedule," Brandon Marcello of CBS Sports shared. "Critics will poke holes in the Irish's championship plans, fueled mostly by the PR hit they received for whining about their exclusion from the CFP and opting out of a bowl game in December. But don't let that cloud the true evaluation of the team's talent and a top-5 coaching staff."

We can all agree the level of talent on Notre Dame's roster and the status of their 'top-5 coaching staff' is becoming undeniable. That's something that can't be questioned heading into the season in my opinion. Their 'easy' schedule isn't even worth talking about at this point, especially considering CBS Sports ranked three of their opponents in their Post-Spring Top 25 including a Miami team that's ranked in the Top 10 and a BYU team ranked inside of the Top 20, which I think is too low.

The Irish don't have a schedule compared to Ohio State's or some teams in the SEC and I don't think there's any debating that. But we have to find the grey area between 'a gauntlet' and a 'cupcake' schedule because Notre Dame's is neither.