Tag: Irish Recruiting

Rivals: Michigan trying to flip Irish 2021 commit

The Wolverine’s are hard at work trying to flip one of Notre Dame’s top 2021 commits.

This is not the first time that Rivals has put Notre Dame commit Lorenzo Styles Jr. on flip watch. Back in April, the Rivals recruiting experts thought the Ohio wide receiver was seriously listening to Jim Harbaugh selling his Michigan Wolverines. Just two month’s later, the feeling that Styles Jr. might flip is still lingering.

Josh Helmholdt, a Rivals recruiting analyst, looked at the Midwest prospects who could potentially flip and once again, Styles Jr.’s name appeared on the list. Helmholdt said “Michigan that is talked about as the Fighting Irish’s biggest threat. This will continue to be a recruitment to watch, and I expect to see additional visit form Styles when the dead period ends.” Just like in April, this news turns our collective stomachs.

Styles Jr. is seen as one of the top commits in the 2021 class, the only wide receiver currently committed. Georgia’s Deion Colzie was once in the class as well and if the Irish see Styles Jr. flip, Brian Kelly and his staff will have to scramble to get a quality receiver to join star quarterback Tyler Buchner.

The Irish will have to fight off the Wolverines until Styles Jr. signs his letter of intent, the first signing period starts on December 16th. With Michigan charging hard for the talented wide receiver, Kelly should continue to recruit Styles Jr. as if he were an uncommitted prospect.

Notre Dame Lands a Commitment from Maryland Cornerback

Irish landed commitment #11 in the 2021 class today when DB Ryan Barnes made his decision.

In late March, the Irish staff offered Maryland defensive back Ryan Barnes, and today he verballed to Notre Dame over Clemson, Georgia, LSU and others. The 6’2” and 180-pound cornerback is the 11th commit in the 2021 class.

Although Barnes ranking is fairly low, he is the 585th player ranked by the 247Sports composite. I feel like this is a scenario where if summer camps had happened this year, Barnes would have blown up. College coaches rarely look at the major recruiting services rankings, so looking at a players offer list is much better indication of how they are perceived. Along with the aforementioned trio, Penn State, Oregon, USC, and Oklahoma all offered Barnes a scholarship.

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Barnes’ frame is what stands out, his length creating issues for opposing wide receivers. Lining up at safety and corner brings plenty of versatility to Barnes’ game, from either position he is always looking for the big hit.

Brian Kelly will have to decide if Barnes’ will end up with safeties coach Terry Joseph or cornerback coach Mike Mickens. This is a great problem to have, as Barnes should make an impact at one of those positions.

Recruiting: Virtual Visit for One of Notre Dame’s Newest Offers

The Irish try to make an impression with a virtual visit to Notre Dame with one of their newest offered prospects.

With the NCAA extending the recruiting mandatory dead-period through the end of July, many teams continue to hold prospects to visit their campuses virtually. On Friday that happened with Iowa’s TJ Bollers, who was offered earlier this week.

Bollers interaction with the Irish staff has heated significantly this week and that bodes well for Brian Kelly and Mike Elston. Although late to the party with Bollers, getting him to visit virtually almost immediately after the offer confirms interest on both sides.

The one of the Irish’s biggest recruiters is commit Gabriel Rubio, who uses his social media account to try and entice Notre Dame prospects to join him in the 2021 class. Rubio seems pretty confident the Irish can get a commitment from the talented defensive end.

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At the moment the 2021 Notre Dame class features three commits on the defensive line, Rubio, Texas’ David Abiara and Rhode Island’s Jason Onye. Rubio, from Missouri, is the tackle in the class, with Abiara and Onye playing on the edge. There have been rumors of Abiara flipping to Oklahoma, so going after Bollers makes plenty of sense. Bollers relationship with Notre Dame has evolved quickly and I feel like that’s a great sign for the Irish going forward.

Does Notre Dame Need to Recruit Ohio Harder?

It might be time for the Irish and Brian Kelly to have more of an impact with their neighboring states recruits.

Indiana’s neighbor to the east is Ohio, the most fertile football recruiting ground of any of the northern states. Rivals took a look at which schools recruit the Buckeye state the best and Notre Dame was not listed as one of the top 5 schools.

The current roster has 8 players from the state of Ohio; offensive linemen Tommy Kraemer and Liam Eichenberg along with defensive back Shaun Crawford are the biggest impact players from the state for the Irish. In this current recruiting cycle, wide receiver Lorenzo Styles Jr. is the lone Ohioan commit.

The state pumps out high-level Division I football players each year and it seems like Brian Kelly hasn’t been dipping into Ohio enough. This year, the state’s top 20 players are ranked inside the top 600 nationally, with schools like LSU, Northwestern, Purdue poaching talent.

It will always be a battle against Ohio State for their state’s top prospects, they usually have their pick of the litter. When Michigan was a college football power, they relied on Ohio players to make an impact. Their most recent Heisman winner Charles Woodson, he’s from Fremont, Ohio.

Kelly should know about how talent rich Ohio is, he should still have plenty of connections from his time as Cincinnati’s lead man, even if it was 10 years ago. Since 2016, the Irish have signed 4 players from the state. Not in one cycle, four total in that time frame, not including Styles Jr. who has yet to sign.

This year’s class from Ohio is deep, but even when it’s not, there are player’s who undoubtedly have the academic and athletic profile that fits what the Irish are looking for. It might be too late for the 2021 cycle but going forward it’s time to go back into Indiana’s neighboring state and start poaching away prospects.

Running back with Irish offer Commits to National Champs

Notre Dame offer Corey Kiner of Ohio commits to LSU taking yet another name off the Irish’s running back recruiting board.

Yet another name can be crossed off Notre Dame’s running back big board as Ohioan Corey Kiner has committed to LSU today. The Tigers just got involved in Kiner’s recruitment, offering him just a little more than 6 weeks ago.

Kiner was a prospect that I thought made a ton of sense for the Irish to go hard after. The Irish have had good luck with prospects from the Cincinnati area, but this just wasn’t meant to be. That seems like the trend with running backs in this cycle, as Notre Dame has missed out on a lot of their early offers at the position, with North Carolina’s Will Shipley going to Clemson hurting the most.

The Irish must now go out and look for a running back that they didn’t expect to go all that hard after, but that is the roller coaster called recruiting. At this point in time I would expect for Brian Kelly to turn his focus onto Michigan’s Donovan Edwards and Texas’ Prophet Brown. If neither of them work out, look for the Irish to go after Louisiana’s Logan Diggs and Texas’ Alton McCaskill. All four of these prospects have Notre Dame offers and each one of them would look fantastic wearing Blue and Gold.

Another Flurry of Offers Yesterday for ’22 Notre Dame Prospects

The Irish coaching staff was very busy yesterday, doling out offers to multiple class of ’22 prospects across the country.

The Irish staff has been very busy this past week on the recruiting trail, adding two commits in CB Philip Riley and DE Jason Onye for the 2021 class. The focus isn’t just on this year, but also the next as the Notre Dame staff has been offering prospects left and right this week.

Tuesday it was corner Domani Jackson and defensive end Aiden Gobaira getting offered within minutes of each other, then wide receiver Caleb Burton got his offer on Wednesday as did tight end/athletes Benjamin Gosnell and Jack Nickel. Devin Moore started it off yesterday and he was just the beginning of the Irish offers.

It was then out to Texas as an offer was given to LSU commit Bryce Anderson. The safety stands 6’0” and weights 187-pounds is a big-time player, holding offers from Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Ohio State and others.

Anderson has been committed to the Tigers since September of last year, but that hasn’t stopped school like Oregon, Auburn and Arizona State offering the star this week. Anderson seems like a good candidate to be flipped at some point and the Irish are hoping they’re the ones with the spatula.

The next offer went out to wide receiver Kevin Coleman of Missouri. Coleman stands at 5’11” and weights 170-pounds and that size hasn’t scared off anyone. He lists offers from Georgia, Alabama, LSU, Michigan, Penn State among others.

The star sophomore has yet to cut any schools so getting out in front of his recruitment will help the Irish. The battle will be tough going up against major players, but the Irish staff will be up for the challenge.

Georgia athlete Malaki Starks was the next to tweet out his offer from the Notre Dame coaching staff. The Peach State star already had the SEC big boys after him, Alabama, Georgia, and LSU, with the Irish offer his first from a northern state.

Starks could line up at multiple position when he arrives at a college campus, either quarterback, running back or cornerback, depending on how his 6’2” and 190-pound frame fills out.

The last offer that went out yesterday was to Louisiana corner Laterrance Welch. He already possess ideal lock down corner size at 6’1” and 180-pounds and once again the SEC powers have already noticed Welch. Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma are just some of his early offers at this juncture.

It is so early in the 2022 cycle so it is hard to tell at the current moment how much impact these early offers will have. There is one thing that we do know, that the Irish want these talented athletes to matriculate to South Bend and wear the Blue and Gold in the near future.

Have you Eaten your Wheaties? Notre Dame Recruits Have

The Irish’s photo edits impress many recruits according to a poll recently taken by high school prospects.

Catching the eye of high school recruits is not an easy thing to do, it used to be mailers sent to them before social media came into play. The emergence of the social platforms and recruiting has made teams change the way they attack their recruiting marketing and being at the forefront of this effort goes a long way in connecting with recruits.

In a poll taken by collegiate prospects conducted by 247Sports, the Irish were mentioned as one of the best for their Wheaties box edit they sent to multiple prospects and commitments.

The example 247Sports used was one that was sent to star North Carolina running back Will Shipley, in hopes to catch his eye and see what Notre Dame can offer him. With student-athletes being able to soon make money off their likeness’, it is very important for schools to show marketing value to their prospective players.

The Irish are on top of their game when it comes to these edits, with much of the credit going out to Aaryn Kearney, the Director of Recruiting and his staff. As long as Notre Dame continues to pump out these kinds of impressive edits to recruits, they’ll be on the mind of many of the top prospects in the country.

California ’21 DB McCutcheon Schedules Notre Dame Visit

California ’21 DB McCutcheon will unofficially visit Notre Dame in early April.

In a report from Rival’s Mike Singer, class of 2021 defensive back Dyson McCutcheon will visit South Bend on April 4th. According to Singer’s report McCutcheon is also looking to lock in an official visit at some point in the future.

It may be difficult for the Irish to get McCutcheon away from USC’s grips, as his father Daylon played there from ’95-’98 before playing for the Cleveland Browns from ’99-’06. The Trojans have offered the California star, along with Arizona, California, Wisconsin and others.

A two-way player in high school, McCutcheon projects to play on the defensive side of the ball, but clearly if he wanted to try and play offense, the Irish staff would try and find him snaps on that side of the ball. Singer says that new CB coach Mike Mickens hasn’t been in contact but that will surely change in the near future. The Irish have a real chance with McCutcheon, and getting him on campus multiple times prior to either signing period is a very encouraging sign.

Notre Dame Offers Two ’21 Defensive Backs

Notre Dame Football offers CB Dreyden Norwood and S Khari Gee.

The eleven o’clock hour this morning saw two offers go out to defensive backs, first Arkansas CB Dreyden Norwood. Having already held offers from Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas A&M, the Irish are getting in the mix for the 6’0” hundred- and seventy-pound corner.

Although Norwood played quarterback this year for Northside High School, he projects to play on the other side of the ball. Norwood looks like a natural with the ball in his hands, so when he does move over to defense, look for him to be able to take turnovers to the house.

It was safety Khari Gee’s turn a short time after Norwood, as the 6’3” 185-pound Georgian also has an impressive offer list. Clemson, LSU, and Michigan are a few of the offers Gee had prior to today and at the moment there is a lot of ground Brian Kelly will have to make up.

Gee released his Top 10 schools just last week, but this was clearly prior to the Irish offering the talent prospect. If Brian Kelly and his staff are able to convince Gee to visit, the Irish very much could sneak into the safety’s recruitment. The defender likes to come up and hit his opponents, often lineup up in the box and making plays You can see Gee do just that right here.

The Woodward Academy star is definitely a playmaker and with Notre Dame offering him a scholarship, hopefully he changes his Top 10 in the Irish’s favor.