Tag: Class of 2029

Two incoming Notre Dame players named McDonald’s All-Americans

Congrats to both players!

The future of Notre Dame basketball is very bright. The men’s team has one of if not the best 2025 recruiting class to look forward to. That same year, the women’s team will return a lot of talent from this year’s national championship contender.

Two players part of that promising Irish future are [autotag]Jalen Haralson[/autotag] and [autotag]Leah Macy[/autotag]. Both have been invited to play in their respective McDonald’s All-American Games. The rosters for those games were announced Monday.

This game is a regular thing for incoming women’s basketball players as the Irish have been represented every year except one since 2009. The men are featured far more infrequently with Haralson being the first incoming men’s player selected since JJ Starling in 2022.

Haralson is ranked 19th on ESPN’s recruiting ranks for the 2025 class and has a four-star rating. Coincidentally, Macy also has a ranking of 19th on ESPN’s 2025 girls list. She has a five-star rating there.

For good measure, here are some highlights of [autotag]Hannah Hidalgo[/autotag]’s co-MVP performance in the 2023 girls game:

Congratulations to Haralson and Macy on this great honor.

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Notre Dame photographer lauds women’s basketball student turnout

This is great to see.

When you photograph Notre Dame women’s basketball games for over 30 years, you tend to pick up on certain things. That’s the case for longtime Notre Dame photographer Matt Cashore. He graduated from the university in 1994 and has stuck around capturing the sights of campus ever since.

Among Cashore’s most prominent photographers have taken place at the athletic events on campus. That includes women’s basketball games, and he noticed one thing in particular during the Irish’s overtime win over Texas. That one thing was more students attending such a game than he could remember, and he took to social media to make that known.

It’s great to know that the Notre Dame students have started to take notice of a team that has national championship dreams this season. The men’s basketball team has to wait another season for arguably the best 2025 recruiting class in the country to arrive, so the women’s basketball team will do just fine this year:

The Irish need the students’ support if for no other reason than to make Purcell Pavilion an intimidating place for opponents. Hopefully, that will be the case by season’s end.

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2025 Notre Dame running back commit takes in Touchdown Jesus at night

Everyone appreciates this sight.

With Notre Dame about to play its first home game in almost a month, a bunch of recruits and commits are on campus for the weekend. Among them is 2025 three-star running back commit [autotag]Justin Thurman[/autotag], who made his decision at the start of August 2023.

Thurman, who hails from Tampa, Florida, is taking in the sights of what will be his home starting next year. One good thing about him is he understands that no matter who you are, visiting Touchdown Jesus is an absolute must when one sets foot on the Notre Dame campus. It’s one of those things that looks beautiful no matter what time of day or year it is.

Thurman took in this breathtaking sight Friday and posted about it on social media. He also used it as a battle cry for the Irish to defeat Florida State on Saturday. It’s perfectly fine that he did so because it hard not to use Touchdown Jesus for inspiration.

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2025 Michigan tight end commit will make official visit to Notre Dame

This would be a huge flip.

Notre Dame has developed a reputation in recent years for its quality tight ends. Another one could be coming to the Irish next season, and it would really would make the fan base happy.

Tight end recruit Andrew Olesh, the top-ranked 2025 recruit in Pennsylvania according to 247Sports, committed to Michigan on July 8 without the Irish having made him an offer. Clearly, something has changed though because Irish Illustrated is reporting that Olesh will make an official visit for the Irish’s Nov. 9 game against Florida State.

If the Irish were to lure Olesh away from the Wolverines, he would be the third 2025 commit that 247Sports has ranked as the best in their respective state. The ones so far are offensive tackle [autotag]Will Black[/autotag] from Connecticut and [autotag]James Flanigan[/autotag], currently the only tight end in that recruiting class, from Wisconsin.

247Sports currently ranks the Irish 13th among the 2025 recruiting classes, so this should bump them up a bit if it happens:

Best of luck to the Irish in efforts to flip Olesh.

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Notre Dame receiver commit celebrates touchdown Disney Channel style

Would you have recognized this?

Notre Dame 2025 receiver commit [autotag]Elijah Burress[/autotag] has a famous father. Plaxico Burress played 11 NFL seasons, mostly during the 2000s. While the younger Burress only was alive for the last few years of that decade, he clearly has a great appreciation for at least one aspect of it.

During the aforementioned decade, Disney Channel was at the height of its popularity. Many of the young people who starred in its shows and movies became household names. And Disney wanted viewers to know exactly who they were.

Between shows, one of the channel’s stars would let viewers know what channel they were watching before tracing the channel’s logo with a wand. The logo would appear on screen. Here’s an example:

After scoring a touchdown in a recent game, Burress decided to pay tribute to this bumper that’s become something of a meme, and the announcer made sure everyone watching the game knew what it was.

Hey, you gotta love pop culture references in touchdown celebrations.

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Micah Shrewsberry talks Notre Dame recruiting strategy with CBS Sports

Great job, Coach.

Notre Dame men’s basketball just had a recruiting week most programs only can dream of. Four commits since the beginning of last week, including new all-time highest-rated recruit [autotag]Jalen Haralson[/autotag], have propelled the Irish to the top of 247Sports’ recruiting rankings for the 2025 class.

Isaac Trotter of CBS Sports took notice of this and decided to reach out to [autotag]Micah Shrewsberry[/autotag] for some insights as part of a feature story about the Irish. Faced with a rebuild upon arriving to the program, Shrewsberry opted to hone in on high school recruiting as opposed to other programs that increasingly looked towards the transfer portal.

Shrewsberry focused on high school recruits almost out of necessity with the transfer portal about to lose the players who were granted an extra year of eligibility by COVID-19. But even taking that out of the equation, he now has the luxury of RALLY, Notre Dame’s new NIL collective, to keep players around.

When asked how this year’s Irish were able to keep almost all of their top scorers from a season ago, Shrewsberry said this:

“I think our guys believed in what we were doing, but they also believed in their teammates and the guys who were going to be their teammates. They could see the positives throughout last season and what we could look like going forward.”

The future in South Bend looks very bright, and it all has to do with the culture Shrewsberry is building. You can’t put a price on that.

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2026 Notre Dame quarterback commit reemphasizes commitment to program

Does this make you feel better?

The news that 2025 Notre Dame quarterback commit Deuce Knight was flipping to Auburn understandably isn’t sitting well with many Irish fans. Not only was Knight their highest-rated commit in that recruiting class, but he was the only quarterback. And while some 247Sports top 100 2025 quarterback recruits remain uncommitted, none have better than a three-star rating.

The good news for Irish fans is that the program still has one quarterback commit, and that’s [autotag]Noah Grubbs[/autotag] in the 2026 class. Even better, Irish fans don’t have to worry about him going anywhere, at least for now.

Undoubtedly prompted by the Knight news, Grubbs took to social media to reiterate his commitment to the Irish. While Irish fans will have to wait a year longer for him to arrive, they can sleep easy knowing the quarterback commit cupboard is not completely bare. If anything, this should make Grubbs even more admirable in the eyes of the fan base:

So yes, the Knight news hurts. But this post should at least inspire some confidence in the future.

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Notre Dame lands four-star center, top 2025 Minnesota recruit

Micah Shrewsberry is doing something right.

For the fourth time in the span of a week, [autotag]Micah Shrewsberry[/autotag] has proven that Notre Dame now is an attractive program for big-time recruits. That’s the story after [autotag]Tommy Ahneman[/autotag], a four-star center and the top 2025 recruit in Minnesota, has committed to the Irish. only two days after making his official visit.

Ahneman joins a 2025 Irish class that has netted [autotag]Brady Koehler[/autotag], [autotag]Ryder Frost[/autotag] and [autotag]Jalen Haralson[/autotag], the program’s highest-rated commit since the internet started tracking rankings, over the past week. This should strengthen the Irish’s hold as the top-ranked 2025 recruiting class according to 247Sports.

Ahneman especially attracted interest from Big Ten programs and was scheduled to make official visits to Minnesota and Iowa in October. Clearly, those won’t happen anymore unless he only wants to pay lip service to those programs.

When asked by On3 why he picked the Irish, Ahneman said this:

“I chose Notre Dame because of what they have – a great atmosphere, great people, and a great recruiting class that I now get to be a part of.”

And if that doesn’t excite you, try this quote on for size:

 

Get on the Irish bandwagon now, folks. The latter half of the 2020s is shaping up to be quite promising.

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Four-star 2025 New Hampshire forward commits to Notre Dame

Guess who now has the top 2025 recruiting class?

Easily the best recruiting week for Notre Dame since [autotag]Micah Shrewsberry[/autotag] took over wrapped up appropriately. The Irish received three commits for their 2025 class every other day, and the future of the program seems set as a result.

[autotag]Ryder Frost[/autotag], a four-star forward recruit and the third-ranked 2025 recruit from New Hampshire according to 247Sports, has committed to the Irish, joining [autotag]Jalen Haralson[/autotag] and [autotag]Brady Koehler[/autotag] from earlier in the week. Just missing out on Frost were other finalists Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Syracuse and Virginia Tech.

The Irish now rank first overall in 247Sports 2025 recruiting class rankings with one five-star commit, who also happens to be the highest-rated recruit since the internet started tracking such ratings, and two four-star commits. Iowa State, which ranks second, is over two-and-a-half points behind. If that doesn’t give you cause for excitement, nothing will.

Chances are you missed Frost’s announcement on the 247Sports YouTube channel so here it is:

Shrewsberry has convinced some serious talent to commit to South Bend, and it won’t be long before that talent is around to try and return the Irish to glory that mostly has been elusive for some time.

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Notre Dame hoops lands highest-rated recruit in internet rankings era

Ladies and gentlemen, we got him.

If there was any doubt about [autotag]Micah Shrewsberry[/autotag] and his staff to get top recruits to commit to Notre Dame, that officially can go away.

[autotag]Jalen Haralson[/autotag], a five-star forward and the top-rated player from Indiana in the 2025 recruiting class according to 247Sports, has committed to the Irish over other finalists Indiana and Michigan State. That makes him the highest-rated commit to the program since internet rankings began in 2000.

The previous high mark for Irish commits was JJ Starling, who transferred to Syracuse after one year after [autotag]Mike Brey[/autotag] departed. Since Haralson is Shrewsberry’s guy though, his chances of leaving South Bend are much lower, as least as long as Shrewsberry’s around.

Haralson is the second Indiana-based recruit to commit to the Irish this week after four-star forward [autotag]Brady Koehler[/autotag]. It fits perfectly with the vision of focusing on talent in the basketball-rich Hoosier State that Shrewsberry had when he took over.

If you missed the announcement live, here it is:

Irish fans understandably will get antsy waiting for over a year to pass before they get to see Haralson in an Irish uniform. For those who don’t live far from Notre Dame though, they can catch him during his senior season at La Lumiere in La Porte.

Here’s to this being the first of many memorable moments Haralson will provide for the Irish and their fans.

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