GREEN BAY – The Green Bay Notre Dame football team started training camp this year with the goal of winning the WIAA Division 3 state championship.

Many agreed it had a good chance. The Wisconsin Football Coaches Association voted Notre Dame No. 1 in the D3 rankings in August and never had a reason to knock them out of the top spot.

Three months after all the lofty expectations were set, the Tritons are one win away from fulfilling them in dominating fashion. One victory from pulling off a perfect season for the second time since the program joined the WIAA in 2000 and the first since going 14-0 in 2003.

Notre Dame (13-0) will play Waukesha Catholic Memorial (11-2) in the D3 state title game at 10 a.m. Friday at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison.

The teams met in the D3 championship in 2015 and 2016, with the Tritons winning the first game and the Crusaders taking the rematch.

“Obviously, we have had a really good year,” Notre Dame coach Michael Rader said. “We are pretty proud of everything we have accomplished so far.”’

Notre Dame made an early statement with a 16-13 win in Week 1 over a Kaukauna team that was considered one of the best in D2. It also captured a second straight Fox River Classic Conference-South championship with a 28-21 win at Menasha in Week 6.

The road to Madison had a different look than past years, at least come playoff time.

Rader pointed out all four teams Notre Dame faced in the postseason — Pewaukee, Port Washington, Grafton and La Crosse Logan — were programs his team had never played.

The Tritons mostly were in control during all four. They won each game by at least 20 points, although the 41-21 victory over Logan on Friday still was within seven points midway through the third quarter before the Tritons scored 13 unanswered.

Notre Dame’s running game has been dominant and gets most of the attention, but its defense has yet to allow more than 21 points in any contest this season and has permitted 14 or fewer in 11 of the 13 games.

University of Notre Dame recruit James Flanigan switched to defensive end from linebacker and was named the FRCC-South defensive lineman of the year and the co-offensive player of the year.

He has 52 tackles, 11 sacks, and three forced fumbles while also leading the team in receiving with 609 yards and 11 TDs as a tight end.

Fellow senior Charlie Hornacek also is a dual threat. He has 60 total tackles and a team-high six interceptions along with 25 catches for 393 yards and five scores.

Flanigan and Hornacek are two of six Notre Dame defenders who were all-conference selections this season, including senior defensive end Asa Poister, senior linebacker Abe Augustine, senior defensive back Jack Collins and sophomore defensive lineman Richie Flanigan.

“Yeah, the defense has played very well,” Rader said. “We have been fortunate that we have had a couple games go really well. In the playoffs it obviously gets tougher, and we have let up a little bit here and there. But they just keep working. They keep flying around. We know that defense wins championships, and they take that as a badge of honor.”

Catholic Memorial focused on stopping Notre Dame rushing attack

Rader has been on the Notre Dame coaching staff since 1998 and the head coach since 2017.

He’s been the offensive play caller during his time with the Tritons, and he always has loved to run the ball.

Perhaps it’s because he was an offensive lineman at the University of Wisconsin — the 1992 Notre Dame graduate was part of Barry Alvarez’s third recruiting class — and was on the team during an era when it featured some top running backs and future NFL players in Brent Moss, Terrell Fletcher and Ron Dayne.

His offensive lines during his time at Notre Dame seem to have embraced the same style of smashmouth football.

“They like to win,” Rader said. “If running is what it takes to win, they are glad to do that. I tell the kids all the time, I’m a former Wisconsin Badger offensive lineman, so running is in my nature. I learned back in the day that running is how you can win games, especially at the high school level. There are lots of cool offenses out there that can do it differently, but maybe it’s in my DNA that we are going to run the ball. I try to share that with the guys as much as I can. One of the kids does have my DNA, because he’s my kid (Andrew).

“But it’s fun to see those guys flourish the way that I like the game to go.”

Catholic Memorial’s Bill Young has coached for more than 50 years. He became the third coach in state history last year to win 400 games and has won five WIAA state titles.

Like everyone else, he knows exactly what the Tritons plan to do Friday against his defense.

It’s up to Young and his coaches to help limit the damage Notre Dame running back Christian Collins does to their team.

The Crusaders have been gashed on the ground at times during the playoffs.

Reedsburg piled up 404 yards and averaged 7 yards per carry in the second round. Wisconsin Lutheran had 271 yards and averaged 6.6 yards in a semifinal.

Catholic Memorial has allowed 1,007 yards, 5.6 yards per carry and eight TDs on 180 rushing attempts during the postseason.

It now faces arguably the best running back in the state in Collins, who will become the first player to win back-to-back state rushing crowns since Westby’s Steve Hougum in 1985-86. He runs behind a line that features three senior standouts in Poister, Andrew Rader and Carson VandenHouten and a standout fullback in Jackson Whitehouse.

“He will be a first-team all-state player,” Young said of Collins. “They have got great length, great size. Physical fullback. Collins is a nightmare to try to defend against. They are a big, C-gap power football team. Get to it many ways.

“We have been playing really well. We had a hiccup against Reedsburg. We know we are the underdog coming into this game, no doubt about it. … We have got to play our best game of the year. You are never going to stop a great running back like that. You try to keep him in check. He combines not only being super physical at the point of attack, but yet, his ability to bust out long runs. He’s an outstanding player.”

Just how outstanding?

Collins has rushed for 300 or more yards in four of the last five games and became the seventh player in state history with 6,000 career rushing yards after he put up 339 yards and five touchdowns against Logan.

He has 2,676 yards this season despite missing two games, which is the 15th best single-season performance in state history.

It’s the second-best by any area running back after he surpassed former Ashwaubenon star Dan White, who had 2,664 yards in 1996. Only Pulaski’s Dylan Hendricks (2,831 yards in 2018) has done better, although that might change by the end of this week.

Notre Dame has produced several high-profile running backs the past 25 years.

Walter Doss won the state rushing title in 2000 with 2,271 yards.

Kenzie Yewman and Andy Dalton were two of the biggest reasons Notre Dame won the state title in 2003 after the duo combined to rush for 2,835 yards.

Nate Ihlenfeldt rushed for 4,016 yards and 61 TDs during his two seasons as the starting running back in 2015 and 2016 before walking on at the University of Washington and finishing his career at St. Norbert College.

The list of great Notre Dame runners is long, but somewhere near the top must be Collins.

Just don’t expect Rader to compare his pupils or pit them against each other when asked where Collins fits among the Notre Dame elite.

“I’m not going to go and try to answer that,” Rader said. “They are all special in their own way. Right now, Christian is doing a really good job for us. We have been fortunate to have a couple of those kids around practice, specifically Nate Ihlenfeldt, to go and share some wisdom over the years. I think Christian is just proud to be the next one in that line.”

Notre Dame has inched closer to another state championship in the past few years, going from the second round in 2021, the quarterfinals in 2022, the semifinals in 2023 to the state title game this season.

It’s now time to finish the job.

“Every year, you start the year wondering who is going to step up into the roles that have been vacated by the guys who have graduated,” Rader said. “This year, these guys, a couple of them got to contribute as sophomores and understood what it took to get to that level. Last year, more guys were contributing.

“This year, we started off the first three or four games, all the challenges that we were having were guys that had not played significant roles yet. They have been able to lean on the guys a little bit, specifically Collins, Flanigan and Hornacek, that know, ‘Hey, this is what it takes to achieve the end goal.’ It’s really been a joy to watch that progression for all the kids.”