Riley Leonard passed for a touchdown, Jayden Harrison returned a kickoff 98 yards for a score, and Notre Dame’s defense made it hold up in a 23-10 victory over No. 2 Georgia in the Sugar Bowl that sends the third-ranked Fighting Irish into the semifinals of the College Football Playoff.

It had been three-plus decades – 31 years to be exact – since Notre Dame last won a major New Year’s bowl. In 1994, Notre Dame beat Texas A&M in the old Cotton Bowl for what it thought would give it a share of the national championship. It didn’t. Florida State won it.

It's taken decades of near misses and maybes, but the narrative on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish is finally changing. For the last 30 years of football, the bo