One day after Christmas and two days before last weekend’s Camping World Bowl against Iowa State, Brian Kelly made headlines by saying about as interesting thing as you’ll hear a head coach say about the future of their roster.
On Notre Dame’s recent recruiting and where it ends up in the future, Kelly stated:
“We want to break out of the 15th ranked or the 10th ranked, and we want to get into that next echelon …. I think we have some things that we’re going to implement that will allow us to do that.” – Brian Kelly on December 26, 2019
Notre Dame has recruited fine, some would even consider it pretty well, but nobody is confusing Brian Kelly and his recruiting classes for the amount of talent the likes of LSU, Georgia, Clemson and Alabama are bringing into their programs year after of late.
So how do you actually raise the bar for recruiting?
If a couple of recent misses by the Fighting Irish are to ask, the answer would be in the head coach.
Carter Karels of the South Bend Tribune did a fantastic piece Friday that explored the reasons big-time Notre Dame targets Lathan Ransom and Jalen McMillan signed with schools other than N-D in mid-December.
Although Notre Dame had pegged both as primary targets last recruiting cycle, the man who cashes the largest check was nowhere to be found in pursuing them.
“Washington, literally everyone on that staff, I have a relationship with,” McMillan said. “I have everyone’s phone number on that staff. I text them all the time, and it’s not even just about football. It’s about girls, food — anything other than football.
“With coach Kelly, he never texted me. He didn’t text my mom, my dad. So I didn’t feel like we had a relationship for me to actually want to go there.” – Jalen McMillan on why he chose Washington over Notre Dame
I may be crazy but if you’re trying to sell a huge target something, don’t you bring out the best you have to offer?
Maybe Notre Dame made it appear they were more interested than they really were in McMillan. Otherwise it’s an incredibly tough look for Kelly assuming McMillan is being truthful and we have no reason not to think he is.
You can hate it all you want but people like being appreciated or courted. That’s not to say Brian Kelly has to be creeping out the world and camping out at a recruits house like that weirdo Jim Harbaugh, but if certain players are such huge targets then establishing a relationship is key.
It feels like it should all go without needing to be written but the piece by Karels opens an eye to what Notre Dame has not done in recruiting that others have which is only further-proved when it’s mentioned how Ryan Day was texting with Ransom multiple times a week even after Ransom had committed to Ohio State.
I don’t have the information but I’d assume it can’t be that widespread of an issue because then I’d have trouble believing almost any big-time recruit would commit without establishing a good relationship with the head coach.
For instance, do I think for a second that Kelly wasn’t in touch with the likes of Chris Tyree or Michael Mayer this past cycle? I absolutely think he was because talents like that have to really, really like the school if they’re going to commit without really knowing their head coach.
My guess is that it’s the depths that Kelly is willing to go that is going to change. Maybe in years past he was willing to get engaged with a certain amount of targets but let his staff handle the rest.
Maybe that number grows for the next few years in order to try and close more of these deals.
I don’t know the perfect fix or solution for the problem that appears evident for Kelly here, again because I don’t know how wide-spread it is seeing as Notre Dame has again done fine, but not great in recruiting of late.
If it means Kelly having to be typing away on his phone more than so be it. We all have parts of our respective jobs we may dislike, that can just be added to his stack because it’s a necessary evil in today’s college football landscape.