Category: Notre Dame

Midweek Irish recruiting update, offers out to ’21 and ’22 prospects

Notre Dame has been busy offering prospects from the ’21 and ’22 recruiting classes.

It has been a busy week for Brian Kelly and his staff on the recruiting trail. There have been numerous offers heading out to a variety of different prospects. The majority of offers have been for the rising junior class, but also to rising sophomores as well.

Coming off of his offer last week, junior Texas DE David Abaira will make a visit to South Bend this weekend, getting an opportunity to visit the campus along with more face time with the coaches, specifically Defensive Line coach Mike Elston and Defensive Coordinator Clark Lea. Abaira checks in at six-foot-four and has a solid offer list which includes Oklahoma, Baylor, Utah, Texas A&M among others.

Over to the other side of the ball where Offensive Line coach Jeff Quinn offered a scholarship to Virginia OT Tristan Leigh. Leigh is six-foot-five and tipping the scales at 275, which is impressive size for a high school junior. The battle to win Leigh commitment won’t be easy, as he reports offers from Alabama, Clemson, LSU, Ohio State, and plenty of others. Leigh is just coming off a visit to Clemson, his second one in the past 4 months, so it may be hard to wrestle him away from Dabo Swinney and the Tigers.

Ohio athlete Devonta Smith was offered this morning as well, currently projected to the defensive side of the ball, but could potentially end up splitting out wide as well. At an even six-feet tall and weighing 185 pounds, the body type for an elite corner is there. Schools from across the country are trying to secure Smith’s commitment as Oklahoma, Penn State, Louisville and West Virginia are some of his reported offers.

Moving to the 2022 class, the Irish went out west and offered Ephesians Prysock of California. The sophomore safety stands at six-foot-three and weighing a solid 170 pounds is being recruited primarily by his would be position coach, Terry Joseph, and at this early juncture Prysock is building an impressive offer list. He has USC, LSU, Florida along with the Irish all chasing him down at this early stage in his recruitment.

Joseph was busy offering 2022 California safety recruits, as another offer went out to Kamari Ramsey. The impressive underclassmen is an even six-feet and already 190 pounds, has early offers from Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Oregon, and USC. At this early junction in Ramsey’s recruitment he is already looking like a top prospect.

It’s great to see the Irish get in early with multiple prospects in the upcoming 2021 and 2022 classes. Establishing early relationships with recruits will be big keys to their commitments and hopefully for Brian Kelly and the Irish the early offers pay off.

Fighting Irish’s Football Facilities ranked among best in nation

Notre Dame’s football facilities ranked among the best in the country

There are many reason’s why a recruit may want to commit to your school, wither it be tradition, playing time, culture, proximity to home, a certain coach, a myriad of reasons. One big reason could be facilities and just recently, as they do every year, 247Sports ranked the best facilities among college football programs.

Although there is nothing overly gaudy about Notre Dame’s facilities, they still ranked 14th overall nationally and Brad Crawford had a glowing review of what Brian Kelly and the Irish offer to their players:

“Notre Dame’s simplistic look had quite a dazzling facelift prior to the 2017 season with a new-look locker room for players. The Irish stopped short of bucking tradition however and still walk down the steps to touch the iconic “Play Like A Champion Today” message before heading out to the field. Notre Dame’s new 111,400-square-foot Irish Indoor Athletics Center, which will serve as an indoor practice facility for the football and men’s and women’s soccer programs, opened in July 2019.”

Teams are always upgrading their locker rooms, indoor facilities, pretty much everything, and to be at the cutting edge to “keeping up with the Jones” is always a pricey endeavor. Earlier last year the Irish updated their indoor facilities and released this video for fans to get an inside look at the new digs.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rfmw7dL6mK4&w=1143&h=643]

Although you mainly see the Fighting Irish performing on Saturday’s, the majority of time the athletes spend are inside the facilities, so making sure everything is state of the art is very important for the future of the program. Just three years ago the locker room was updated and it’s clearly appealing for recruits and current players to be comfortable with their surroundings as they spend 3-5 years roaming around the facilities.

An explanation for RB Tyree’s drop inside yesterday’s recruit rankings update

A detailed explanation as to why RB Chris Tyree dropped significantly in the recent recruiting update.

Yesterday 247Sports released their final update to the 247 best high school prospects in the country. For Fighting Irish fans to see RB Chris Tyree take a huge fall from 61st nationally, all the way down to 137th was difficult. It was a tough pill to swallow seeing one of the best prospects in Brian Kelly’s class take such a large tumble.

Thankfully, the experts at 247Sports weren’t shy about why they dropped Tyree so far in their final rankings. National Analyst Charles Power was blunt with his assessment saying that Tyree’s “output is on the low end among the backs who are in and just outside the top 100.” Power wasn’t all negative his assessment of Tyree explaining that “we’re still high on Tyree’s skill set and expect him to be an impact player for the Irish, but we’d like to see a little more sustained consistency on the field throughout high school for a top 50-100 back with his physical skill set.”

Barton Simmons, the National Director of Scouting, didn’t go into as much detail but gave a similar explanation as to why Tyree dropped as “we felt there were other guys that had a more complete skill-set as a true running back. When you compare the production of Tyree to most of the other guys we put him up against, we really felt that it was hard to give a smaller, less-productive back the nod over some of the others that we believe in.”

Simmons does still believe that Tyree will be a solid player, “Don’t get me wrong, we still like him a lot as a player, but we believe he’s more limited than some of the others.” What makes me wonder is what kind of limitations Simmons is talking about. He does not go further into his evaluation and only time will tell what kind of player Tyree ends up as while wearing Blue and Gold.

Irish commit Mayer becomes a 5-Star in final 247Sports recruit rankings update

With 247Sports final rankings being released this afternoon, the Irish faithful will be happy to see yet another 5-Star on the way to South Bend. Michael Mayer, the committed 6’4″ 232-pound tight end has been elevated into the upper-echelon of high …

With 247Sports final rankings being released this afternoon, the Irish faithful will be happy to see yet another 5-Star on the way to South Bend. Michael Mayer, the committed 6’4” 232-pound tight end has been elevated into the upper-echelon of high school prospects. Mayer jumped from his previous rankings of 69th overall in the country to inside the top 32, now sitting as the 23rd best prospect in the nation.

The 247Sports collective group of analysists had some very good things to say about the talented tight end. National Director of Scouting Barton Simmons said Mayer “is such a complete player” and his explanation for making Mayer a 5-Star was that “When you consider the season Mayer had as the Gatorade Player of the Year in Kentucky and add that to his obvious physical traits and his standout performances in every major event he’s attended, five-star seemed obvious” Steve Wiltfong, National Director of Recruiting sees Mayer as “an instant impact player” who could replace the productivity of NFL early-entry TE Cole Kmet.

With the updated rankings Brian Kelly’s 2020 recruiting class took a little hit, as they dropped from #14 nationally to #16. It isn’t much of a move, but what was a bit concerning was multiple Irish commits dropped in the rankings. Aside from Mayer, WR Jordan Johnson was the only other commit to move up, while everyone else dropped, with RB Chris Tyree dropping the most, down 76 spots.

 

TE Michael Mayer – 23, up 46

OT Tosh Baker – 56, down 12

WR Jordan Johnson – 61, up 2

ILB Jordan Botelho – 64, down 21

RB Chris Tyree – 137, down 76

OT Michael Carmondy – 148, down 39

Book’s odds among best with chance to take home the Heisman

Notre Dame’s QB Book’s odd among the best to take home college football most prestigious award.

Las Vegas is referred as the city that never sleeps and they were at it again, with Westgate’s Superbook updating their 2020 Heisman odds 7 months prior to the start of the season. It should not come as a surprise to see Irish QB Ian Book having the 4th best odds, 20/1, to win college footballs highest honor.

Last years winner, national champion QB Joe Burrow from LSU, has exhausted his eligibility, but two of the other four quarterback that were represented in the College Football Playoff return, Ohio State’s Justin Fields and Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence, top the list with 4/1 odds. Newcomer Spencer Rattler having the second-best odds after backing up Oklahoma’s graduating senior Jalen Hurts is behind them at 12/1.

Obviously, the Irish have to battle Clemson and Lawrence on November 7th in South Bend, with RB Travis Etienne having the same odds as Book to win the trophy. Notre Dame will also face USC’s QB Kedon Slovis, who checks in right behind Book with 25/1 odds. The favorites don’t always win the trophy, but the Irish having to face 4 of the heavier favorites in the regular season will provide a tough test for Brian Kelly and crew this coming season.

One Notre Dame star projected among the top 32 players in 2020

One Irish star ranked among the nations elite.

As one season ends and another is on the verge of beginning, there is always a time to look ahead at which collegiate stars could dominate this level and make their move to the next. CBS Sports Barrett Sallee did just that a few days ago, ranking the top 32 NFL draft eligible NCAA stars. Sallee made it know that his list was not in any way a very early 2021 NFL mock draft or a “big board”, rather a collection of the best players who could move on to the next level next year.

There was only one Fighting Irish on Sallee’s list, offensive tackle Liam Eichenberg, who landed just outside the top 10 best projected players in the NCAA for next year at 11. Sallee had some very high praise for the Notre Dame lineman saying:

“The Fighting Irish have become known for churning out great offensive linemen, and Eichenberg is the next in line to make a splash in the NFL Draft. He’ll be an anchor of one of the best offensive lines in the country in 2020.”

It is very well known that the Irish will return all 5 starters on the offensive line, along with QB Ian Book, while having to replace the rest of the offensive talent. Games a won in the trenches and with Eichenberg and Tommy Kraemer leading the charge, the Irish have a leg up on the competition.

Speaking of their opponents for next year, Sallee also ranked numerous players on the upcoming schedule that Notre Dame will face. Clemson will bring star QB Trevor Lawrence, ranked 1st, RB Travis Etienne ranked 7th, LB James Skalski at 23, and WR Justyn Ross, 28th, clearly a loaded Tigers squad. The USC Trojans had three players on Sallee’s list, DL Jay Tufele checked in at 21, WR Amon-Ra St. Brown was 24th, and WR Tyler Vaughns barely made the list at 31st. One more opponent had a player ranked inside the top 32, Duke’s DL Chris Rumph II was right behind Eichenberg at 12.

Where the current Irish commits rank inside the top 247 prior to their update

Where Notre Dame’s recruits rank inside 247Sports prior to their final updated rankings.

Tomorrow 247Sports will release their final update to the 2020 recruiting class rankings, re-ranking the top 247 players in the country. At the current moment, the Fighting Irish have the #14 ranked class nationally according to the 247Sports composite, which complies the rankings of major recruiting services such as Rivals, ESPN, and their own. You can see their team rankings right here.

With just 17 commits in the 2020 class after the release of Landen Bartleson, all of them having signed in the early period, there might not be much room for Brian Kelly to add any prospects. There are currently 88 players on scholarship, the max being 85, so with the NFL declaration deadline having passed and without players entering the transfer portal, Kelly does not have much wiggle room to add any new prospects.

So, prior to 247Sport’s release of their updated top 247, which can be seen here, this is where the currently signed Irish class is ranked who are ranked inside the top 247 players in the country:

ILB Jordan Botelho – 43

OT Tosh Baker – 44

RB Chris Tyree – 61

WR Jordan Johnson – 63

TE Michael Mayer – 69

OT Michael Carmondy – 109

ESPN predicts how Notre Dame wins the National Title in the 2020 season

Earlier this morning ESPN released an article on how each of the Top 25 teams could individually win the National Title in the 2021 campaign ( read here). As a projected top 10 team, the Irish have a very realistic chance at competing for a title …

Earlier this morning ESPN released an article on how each of the Top 25 teams could individually win the National Title in the 2021 campaign (read here). As a projected top 10 team, the Irish have a very realistic chance at competing for a title this coming season. With the return of Ian Book at quarterback and a schedule that features enough quality games to get the into the College Football Playoff’s top 4 and have a shot at winning the Coaches Trophy.

Tom VanHaaren made it out to be very simple on how Notre Dame will be able to win the championship next year:

“Without a conference championship game, Notre Dame can’t afford any mistakes in 2020. Without a win against Clemson that late in the season, the chances at a national championship are slim.”

I believe that VanHaaren is spot on with his projection of how the Irish can be atop the college football world at the end of the year. The season very much hinges on how the Clemson game plays out in South Bend. He also mentions the Wisconsin game, the Badgers will be losing a lot of talent, most notably RB Jonathan Taylor and LB Zack Baun. VanHaaren also brings up the Stanford game, but they have been gutted with players transferring out of the program, a whopping 14 Cardinals have entered the transfer portal. One game that VanHaaren fails to mention is the finale against USC, which is always a dog fight, especially in the Coliseum.

This coming season should be a prosperous one for Brian Kelly and crew and if things go right, we could be seeing the Irish playing in the College Football Playoff once again.

Taylor at it again, offering ’22 RB Megwa from Texas

A verbal offer out to a star Texas sophomore running back Emeka Megwa announced today.

Running back’s coach Lance Taylor has been all over the country this weekend, starting Friday along with Tommy Rees visiting ’21 5-Star Will Shipley, made a call out to Texas and offered yet another star running back in Emeka Megwa. The class of 2022 star stands six-feet tall and weighs 200 pounds, gigantic for a player so young, preps at the same high school as current freshman DE NaNa Osafo-Mensah and tagged him when Megwa announced his offer via Twitter.

Megwa absolutely dominated competition this past year, earning District MVP, 1st team All-Star and All-District, rushing for over 1,600 yards and scoring 25 touchdowns against Texas high school competition. For a sophomore those are extremely impressive numbers, ones that have clearly caught the eyes of many schools, holding offers from Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Ohio State, Oklahoma and more at this early stage of his recruitment.

You can never get enough talent at running back, having multiple backs that can do different things is an excellent way to diversify your offense and luring safeties into the box which enables more deep shots to wide receivers. With a reported forty time of 4.4, Megwa is a burner and would look great in Blue and Gold.

Okwara projected into NFL Draft’s First Round

Notre Dame’s DE Julian Okwara has been projected as a first round pick in the NFL Draft.

Now that the college football season is officially over with the conclusion of the Senior Bowl, multiple outlets will be posting their mock drafts and that’s exactly what SB Nations Dan Kadar did yesterday. Kader had only one former Golden Domer in his mock, DE Julian Okwara being selected 27th overall by the Seattle Seahawks.

Kader, however, wasn’t sure if Seattle would even be in that spot to select Okwara: “Chances are the Seahawks won’t be picking here on draft weekend considering general manager John Schneider’s usual transactional gymnastics. If the Seahawks happen to stay at No. 27, they could target a pass rusher. Okwara should test off the charts with the analytics community, and good coaching will take advantage of his traits.”

Many of these are just best guesses as the current moment, as the NFL’s version of a job hunt, the underwear Olympics, AKA the NFL combine won’t start until February 23rd and concludes on March 2nd. Pro day’s will be after that, then the big day, the NFL Draft on April 23-25, held on water. Yes, you read that right, it’s going to be on water this year, with the possibility that Okwara could be ferried out to the stage in the Fountain of Bellagio.