SOUTH BEND — Statistically, a team doesn’t gain a win during a bye week.

But in the ever-changing landscape of college football chaos, No. 11 Notre Dame (4-1) sure seemed to win with an aptly timed break from the gridiron.

As five teams ranked inside the top-11 of the Associated Press Top 25 Poll lost last week, four to unranked opponents, the Irish sat by watching the mayhem around them. The finger pointing at Notre Dame in Week 2’s shocking home loss to Northern Illinois was reversed.

Add the slippage by those teams in the latest Top 25 poll and the 5-0 start by future opponents in both Army and Navy (the first time each has done so since 1945), and it’s hard not to see a path for the Irish to take advantage of a golden opportunity off a bye week.

“Our focus of the bye week was No. 1, we have to improve as a team and that’s improving our fundamentals, improving the tactical execution of what we’re doing and improve on some of the unforced errors that we’ve committed during the game,” Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said at his weekly press conference.

Freeman and the Irish will host rival Stanford (2-3) at Notre Dame Stadium for an afternoon kick Saturday. The Cardinal have suffered back-to-back losses at the hands of its new Atlantic Coast Conference foes, dropping a 40-14 decision at Clemson and a 31-7 home loss to Virginia Tech.

In his short head coaching career in South Bend, if Freeman has been sharp on the sideline, it’s been off an idle week. The head coach is 3-0 in those instances, including a 2022 neutral site 28-20 win over No. 18 BYU in 2022 and home blowouts of ACC foes Pitt (58-7) and Wake Forest (45-7) last season.

Notre Dame won its second game over a ranked opponent this season two weeks ago in a 31-24 win over then No. 15 Louisville. The Irish and Cardinals turned the ball over twice each, a snag on the overall improved look of the Irish offense against a strong Louisville defense.

“We’ve really looked at and evaluated how do we get rid of the lows?” Freeman said. “That’s the challenge. When I think of lows, I think of the turnovers, negative yardage plays on offense, defensively, continuing to eliminate some of the big plays and stopping the run. We really attacked a lot of those issues during the bye week.”

Quarterback Riley Leonard was sharp with the attack through the air. The QB finished 17-of-23 for 163 yards and two touchdowns. Leonards’ legs also contributed, running for 52 yards and a touchdown off 13 carries.

Through five games, Leonard has been extremely productive running the ball. Among FBS signal callers, he’s fourth in rushing touchdowns (seven) and fifth in rushing yards (374).

“I thought he did a really good job of decision making,” Freeman said. “Two weeks ago, I said we have to continue to focus on our move-the-pocket throws, which I think he did a better job at.

“He’s a threat with the ball in his hands. He gives our offense a chance to have success running the ball, so we have to utilize his legs and have to utilize his ability to run the ball but also understand you don’t want your quarterback getting hurt.”

Freeman noted during the week off, the team did only go through preparations for Stanford and its offense which has showed itself to be pesky against Notre Dame, but it also began working on triple-option defense. The Irish play Navy at MetLife Stadium in three weeks. They’ll also face Army at Yankee Stadium nearly a month after the showdown with the Midshipmen.

With Stanford on the docket this week, Freeman isn’t forgetting what the Cardinal have shown in the most recent matchups with the Irish.

“Well, I have a lot of respect for (head coach Troy Taylor) as an offensive play caller,” Freeman said. “If you look back last year when we played them, we knew they were a unique offense in terms of what they did. You’ll see a lot of stress put on a defense based off motions and shifts and formations.”

Stanford upset Notre Dame in South Bend in Freeman’s first season with a 16-14 win. Last year, the Fighting Irish were 56-23 winners over a three-win Cardinal group. The Irish stomped for just under 400 yards on the ground but turned the ball over four times.

INJURY UPDATE

The vyper position in the Notre Dame defense continues to take its hits as freshmen Boubacar Traore was announced as out for the season with a torn left ACL in the win over Louisville. He had been productive with three sacks on the season, leading all FBS freshmen after Week 4.

Jordan Botelho also shined at the position before his season-ending injury at Purdue. Both Traore and Botelho had been the most productive names on the Irish defense outside its elite secondary.

With the hole in Al Golden’s defensive line unit, Junior Tuihalamaka is the first name listed on Notre Dame’s two-deep. R.J. Oben, Bryce Young and Loghan Thomas were all names, as well as Tuihalamaka’s, Freeman spoke about as possible players to step up.

Currently, ND is sixth in team passing efficiency defense and 19th in total defense.

ASSOCIATED PRESS COLLEGE FOOTBALL TOP 25

1. Texas (5-0) – vs. No. 18 Oklahoma

2. Ohio State (5-0) – at No. 3 Oregon

3. Oregon (5-0) – vs. No. 2 Ohio State

4. Penn State (5-0) – at Southern Cal

5. Georgia (4-1) – vs. Mississippi State

6. Miami (FL) (6-0) – idle

7. Alabama (4-1) – vs. South Carolina

8. Tennessee (4-1) – vs. Florida

9. Ole Miss (5-1) – at No. 12 LSU

10. Clemson (4-1) – at Wake Forest

11. Iowa State (5-0) – at West Virginia

11. Notre Dame (4-1) – vs. Stanford

13. LSU (4-1) – vs. No. 9 Ole Miss

14. BYU (5-0) – vs. Arizona

15. Texas A&M (5-1) – idle

16. Utah (4-1) – at Arizona State

17. Boise State (4-1) – at Hawai’i

18. Kansas State (4-1) – at Colorado

18. Indiana (6-0) – idle

18. Oklahoma (4-1) – vs. No. 1 Texas

21. Missouri (4-1) – at UMass

22. Pittsburgh (5-0) – vs. California

23. Illinois (4-1) – vs. Purdue

24. Michigan (4-2) – idle

25. SMU (5-1) – idle

Receiving votes: Southern Cal (98), Nebraska (51), Navy (43), Army (33), Vanderbilt (26), Arkansas (17), Washington State (8), Iowa (8), Texas Tech (7), Syracuse (6), Washington (4), Louisville (4), Colorado (3), Kentucky (1)