Notre Dame a finalist as nation’s top safety set to announce college decision

Do the Irish still have some sort of hope here?

One of the best safeties in the entire 2022 recruiting cycle nationally will be announcing his college commitment on Wednesday night and the good news for Notre Dame is that they’re one of three finalists.  There may be some bad news as well but we’ll get to that in a minute.

Xavier Nwankpa has a five-star rating at 247Sports as they list him as nation’s top safety in the 2022 class and 11th best player overall.  Nwankpa checks in at 6-2, 190-pounds and starred at Southeast Polk High School in Pleasant Hill, Iowa and will announce his college decision at 5 p.m. ET in his school’s auditorium.

Notre Dame is a finalist for Nwankpa along with Iowa and Ohio State.  Based on Marcus Freeman spending his time on the west coast while Nwankpa has tweeted photos from visits with both Ryan Day and Kirk Ferentz this week, it’d seem that the Irish are an underdog compared to the Buckeyes and Hawkeyes here.

That said, I’d be thrilled to be wrong about this later today.

Related: Notre Dame’s 2022 recruiting class commitments