Tag: Rivals

Rivals expects multiple 2021 Notre Dame three-star players to thrive

The scouting director for Rivals, Mike Farrell is high on a pair of three-stars in Notre Dame’s 2021 recruiting class.

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Let’s make it clear off the bat, being a three-star prospect doesn’t mean you can’t be a very good collegiate player. Plenty of lower ranked players go on to have great careers; recruiting isn’t an exact science.

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I’ve always been very high on Louisiana running back Logan Diggs and Rivals scouting director Mike Farrell agrees. He believes Diggs will outperform his ranking; he was named one of Farrell’s three-star prospects that will surprise. Farrell thinks the situation could be similar to a former Clemson star’s, “this one was easy for me as we could be looking at another Travis Etienne kind of rankings mistake.”

If Farrell is correct with his comparison, Diggs will go down as one of the best ever in South Bend. Travis Etienne is the all-time ACC leader in rushing yards. He finished just shy of 5,000 rushing yards during his career for the Tigers. That’s huge praise for the final signee of the 2021 Notre Dame recruiting class.

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Diggs wasn’t the only Irish recruit to be named to Farrell’s list; tight end Mitchell Evans also was named. This one is a completely different situation, as Evans was primarily a quarterback for his Wadsworth high school team.

It’s no surprise when the best athlete on a high school team plays quarterback, you want that player to have the ball in his hands as much as possible. Due to this, Evans didn’t have much film as a tight end thus a lower ranking among the recruiting services.

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Farrell sees the “6-foot-7 tight end target who is raw sound(ing) like a recipe for success in the Fighting Irish offense.” After what Michael Mayer showed last year, along with contributions from Tommy Tremble and George Takacs, the tight end room looks to be loaded for the foreseeable future.

I expect for both Diggs and Evans to have productive careers in the Blue and Gold. The excitement for the 2021 class continues to grow.

Rivals answers if Notre Dame is a Top 10 coaching job in college football

Rivals Mike Farrell lists his top-10 coaching jobs in major college football and he’s pretty biased towards one conference.

This argument happens every year, when looking across the country analyzing what each program does and it’s future potential to achieve. Recently, Mike Farrell of Rivals ranked the top-10 coaching jobs in the nation and Notre Dame did not make his list.

The Irish were mentioned after the initial 10, along with Michigan, Miami (FL), Oregon and Penn State. Is this too low? Is this just right?

The SEC leads the charge with half of the teams in Farrell’s top-10, which seems like it has to be off. How can a top-10 job be one that will finish consistently behind 3-4 other teams?

No argument from me with Alabama at the top of the list, you can extend it to the top 3 schools with Ohio State and Clemson. Those three consist of the elite-elite football schools.

Fourth on the list is Texas, a bit high in my estimation. They still have some pull, but haven’t been consistently good in years. Since 2010, the Longhorns have had under .500 records in 4 seasons, only breaking double-digit wins once in that time frame. Maybe in the early 2000’s a ranking this high for the Longhorns makes sense, but right now, they’re not a top-10 coaching job in my estimation.

The Trojans are next, in the same time frame, USC has just one under .500 season and four 10+ win years. Five is a bit high for me, but they should be inside the top 10.

Georgia (6), LSU (7), Oklahoma (8), and Florida (9) make up a group you can’t make too many arguments against being included, but it’s the tenth team that shouldn’t be in Texas A&M.

Like their Lone Star counterpart, they have not had much on-field success in the last 10 years. Just one 10-win season since ‘10, two since 1998 if you expand the time frame further. Farrell is off his rocker that the Aggies are a top 10 coaching job.

How about the team that’s made the College Football Playoffs two of the last three years? Four straight ten-plus win seasons, 5 of the last 6, two top-5 finishes in the last three years? Is that not enough to put Notre Dame inside the top-10?

I guess according to Farrell you have to have multiple average seasons and be in the SEC for him to view your coaching job as top-10 outfit. Not sure what he’s looking at, but he got this one wrong, Notre Dame should be considered a top-10 coaching job. Period.

Offensive Tackle Recruit Tyler Booker Receives Offer From Notre Dame

Notre Dame had a strong offensive line during the past season, and it’s making an effort to replenish that unit.

Notre Dame had a strong offensive line during the past season, and it’s making an effort to replenish that unit. Its latest to do so comes in the form of offensive tackle Tyler Booker, a junior at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida. Booker weighs in at 6-foot-5, 315 pounds, which could easily fill the void left by Tommy Kraemer in a couple of years.

Rivals believes Florida is the odds-on favorite to land the hometown product. Still, seemingly everyone is interested in Booker as he now has received offers from 32 of the 33 schools that have expressed interest. Among the more prominent programs expressing real interest are Georgia, Penn State, Texas, Alabama, Miami, Ohio State and LSU. The only certain thing is that plenty of playing time will await whichever school he chooses.

Booker also is the nephew of former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive tackle Ulish Booker, so it’s almost a given that he has playing prospects beyond college. That’s why everyone wants to land him so badly.

Oklahoma signs first five-star defensive player since 2018 with Rivals updated rankings

Oklahoma has now signed their first five-star defensive player since 2018 with Rivals updated recruiting rankings on Monday.

Oklahoma’s 2021 recruiting class got better this week without adding a player – at least in terms of rankings.

Linebacker Clayton Smith was elevated up to a five-star recruit on Monday by Rivals.

The Texarkana, Texas product is the second-ranked outside linebacker prospect in his class and the 33rd overall rated recruit by Rivals. This is the first defensive five-star player the Sooners have been able to add in their recruiting class since Brendan Radly-Hiles signed on with Oklahoma in the class of 2018.

Smith is certainly someone that the Sooners are very excited about and this rise in his rating is only going to add to that. Oklahoma currently has the 13th ranked 2021 recruiting class.

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Oklahoma signs first five-star defensive player since 2018 with Rivals updated rankings

Oklahoma has now signed their first five-star defensive player since 2018 with Rivals updated recruiting rankings on Monday.

Oklahoma’s 2021 recruiting class got better this week without adding a player – at least in terms of rankings.

Linebacker Clayton Smith was elevated up to a five-star recruit on Monday by Rivals.

The Texarkana, Texas product is the second-ranked outside linebacker prospect in his class and the 33rd overall rated recruit by Rivals. This is the first defensive five-star player the Sooners have been able to add in their recruiting class since Brendan Radly-Hiles signed on with Oklahoma in the class of 2018.

Smith is certainly someone that the Sooners are very excited about and this rise in his rating is only going to add to that. Oklahoma currently has the 13th ranked 2021 recruiting class.

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Rivals names Texas running back Bijan Robinson to freshman All-American team

Let the accolades continue to pile up for Texas running back Bijan Robinson.

The accolades keep rolling in for the talented five-star running back from Tuscon, Arizona. Continue reading “Rivals names Texas running back Bijan Robinson to freshman All-American team”

Notre Dame OT Commit Joey Tanona Selected for 2022 All-American Bowl

COVID-19 canceled this year’s All-American Bowl, but players already are being picked for the 2022 edition.

COVID-19 canceled this year’s All-American Bowl, but players already are being picked for the 2022 edition. It might seem strange when the game is almost a year away, but this pandemic has thrown norms out the window. That’s just fine for Notre Dame offensive tackle commit Joey Tanona because an honor’s an honor:

Tanona, who hails from Zionsville, Indiana, and weighs in at 6-foot 5 and 320 pounds, committed to the Irish on July 25. That decision was made after recruiting efforts from Tommy Rees and Jeff Quinn. He also received offers from LSU, Tennessee, Arizona State, Cincinnati, Kansas State and eight Big Ten schools.

Rivals lists Tanona as a four-star prospect and ranks him as the No. 5 player in all of Indiana. In October, the Indianapolis Colts published a story about him on their website. The expectations for this kid will be high, but he should be able to rise to the challenge.

Report: West Bloomfield 4-star ATH trending towards MSU Football

The good news is continuing to come out for MSU football, with another potential big-time recruit reportedly trending towards the Spartans.

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The good news is continuing to come out for Michigan State football, with another potential big-time recruit reportedly trending towards the Spartans.

Corey Robinson of Rivals entered a futurecast on Tuesday in favor of Michigan State for four-star athlete Dillon Tatum of West Bloomfield. Tatum, who is listed at 5-foot-11 and 190 pounds, is the No. 14 ATH and No. 5 overall recruit in Michigan for the class of 2022.

Robinson said he doesn’t anticipate anything is “imminent” for Tatum, but “felt like Michigan State has been in a very favorable position for him for a few months.”

Tatum currently holds offers from countless Power Five programs, including Michigan, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Georgia, Florida and Penn State.

There are currently no crystal ball predictions entered for Tatum on 247Sports at this time.

On Monday, a handful of crystal ball forecasts from 247Sports flipped from Michigan to Michigan State for four-star defensive tackle Rayshaun Benny. The Oak Park, Mich. 2021 prospect is expected to announce his commitment on Nov. 9.

Should Michigan State land both of these recruits, it would bode really well for what new head coach Mel Tucker is looking to build in East Lansing. Especially, with both being top talents from the state of Michigan.

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Pete Carroll comments on rival-fueled schedule ahead for Seahawks

Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll commented on this stretch of schedule, which has four division games in the next five weeks.

The Seattle Seahawks come off their bye week to face the Arizona Cardinals on the road in the first game of a stretch of schedule dominated by division rivals.

Divisional games are always unpredictable, but the Seahawks have not been dominant against their division in the past few years, and the NFC West is now widely considered the top division in the NFL.

“I think this is as tough as it gets,” head coach Pete Carroll told reporters. “I don’t know that anybody’s got to play a row of teams like this. A month from now, we’ll have a pretty good feel for how everything’s fit.”

Despite the expected challenges in the weeks ahead, Carroll professed that it is enticing to see the division competitive again and that adds motivation to play every game like the season is on the line.

“It’s exciting to see the division come back around like this,” Carroll explained. “We’ve seen it go kind of up and down over the years, and it always seems to keep coming back strong, and we’re strong again—everybody can play football. Injury factors have entered into some of the play of the teams, and as everybody kind of finds their way gets back to balance, it’s a really difficult schedule for us. So we’ll take them one week at a time, and we’re going to play every one of them like it’s the only game in the world and go for it, and that’s what we’re doing this week.”

It certainly is interesting to see the NFC West stacked again, but it only makes the Seahawks’ margin for error thinner, even at 5-0.

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Another day, another doubter for Notre Dame, this time over at Rivals

More shade for Notre Dame, this time from Mike Farrell at Rivals, saying the Irish aren’t contenders for the College Football Playoffs.

The fallout from a very lackluster win against Louisville continues, this time over at Rivals. We looked at Kirk Herbstreit’s comments about the Irish yesterday, and today it’s Mike Farrell’s turn.

In his Three-Point Stance article, he looked at a variety of questions surrounding the college football season right now. One of those was Notre Dame’s validity of making the College Football Playoffs. In short, it’s not good.

The recruiting director doesn’t see the Irish as serious contenders for a CFP spot. “If this Notre Dame team falls behind by a couple of scores, it is done. The Fighting Irish don’t have the offense to come back as the passing game is bad.”

The passing game Farrell is talking about hasn’t obviously been great. The Irish are middle-of-the-pack as far as a scoring offense, putting up 33 points per game.  Even with the blah outing against Louisville, the offense is still gaining 440 yards a game.

Yes, the offense needs work, but putting a fork in Brian Kelly’s group and declaring them done is way too premature. The defense has led the 2020 group, giving the offense an opportunity to catch-up. The whole narrative can change in a week, as we have seen.

This weeks matchup against Pittsburgh has just that much more juice to it. The Irish don’t need anymore locker room material to get fired up, but Farrell provided them with more.

Remember, there are many factors as to why the offense has struggled out of the gate this year. Breaking in a new starter at every offensive skill position wasn’t going to be easy. Tommy Rees’ has to settle in to becoming the guy calling the plays.

It was never going to be a smooth ride offensively for the Irish this year. There was bound to be some bumps along the way, but the schedule gods have given them plenty of time to get it right, but that time is running out.

Including this week, the offense will have two more games to get things right before big, bad Clemson comes to town. Hopefully by November 7th, the Irish offense is humming and can match what the defense has brought so far this season.

(Photo courtesy of Notre Dame Athletics)