Well didn't take long for Coach Ivey to make an impact. She got her 1st verbal, the #2 overall player in the 2021 class and the #1 PG in Olivia Miles from New Jersey. Great start!
I feel bad for Cole Kmet, he's a Bear now! They have 10 TE's at the moment! He's happy though I assume he grew up in a suburb of Chicago, is likely a Bears fan, etc. Bet Aaron Rodgers would have been happier if the Packers had passed on the QB and drafted Kmet!
Not as unhappy as Eagles fans. They were organizing on Twitter to meet at the Rocky statue and march on the GM's house...
It will be interesting to see how Hurts does. He is a natural leader but I don't know whether he can read defenses well enough for the NFL.
Chase Claypool to the Steelers Julian Okwara to the Lions Troy Pride Jr to the Panthers Khalid Kareem to the Bengals Alohi Gilman to the Chargers I'm guessing that Tony Jones Jr will be a undrafted free agent, along with Jalen Elliott.
Asmar Bilal FA to the Chargers Tony Jones Jr FA to the Saints Jamir Jones FA to the Texans Jalen Elliott FA to the Lions Chris Finke FA to the 49ner's
Sounds like the Irish did okay getting just about everyone they could to the NFL. Kelly, Rees and Taylor are working Zoom trying to get a commitment from Shipley the 5* RB into the 2021 class. The kid seems to be saying all the right things but hey, until they commit.....who really knows.
Wow Niele Ivey got another top 20 player for her 2021 class, Sonia Citron a guard from New Rochelle. She's on fire
There have been some good highlights videos over on und.com. Best runs, best game winning catches, top punt/kick returns. All fun to watch. They've been doing a Sat live chat and game watch. This week it's the 1998 LSU/ND game at South Bend. Last week it was the 2019 VaTech/ND game the Irish won on a last sec TD run by Ian Book. I tried watching them but really didn't get into the whole running chat comments by those logged into Youtube. Liked the Highlights tapes though. Seems to be bad news with regards to the recruitment of 5 star RB, Will Shipley. The emerging consensus is that he's going to chose Clemson. Irish have been focusing a lot of attention on him so to lose out on him will be a bitter pill to swallow. Also leave them scrambling for a replacement(s). Could reignite the talk of that grad transfer RB from Stanford.
New 2021 4* CB Commit: "Notre Dame has landed a vital prospect from the Sunshine State as 2021 Bloomingdale (Fla.) cornerback Philip Riley has committed to the Fighting Irish. The Irish staff offered the four-star prospect at the end of March and quickly went to work. New cornerbacks coach Mike Mickens led this recruitment and the two have developed a special relationship. "I've gotten to know him on a deeper level and some personal things in his life," Riley told Irish Sports Daily. "I've gotten to know his wife and his daughter. We're still working to build the relationship even more than that." This happened pretty fast.
Yeah that was good work by the new guy, MIckens. One of the criticisms of Todd Lyght was that he was never a good recruiter. Mickens however is quickly developing a good reputation as a assistant who really gets out there and works. One of my criticisms of Kelly is that for too long he has tolerated too many assistants who were not good recruiters, and he himself was not a good recruiting HC. In this stretch since we had the losing season in 2016 and the staff rebuild things have improved but we are still not in the same class as Clemson, Ohio State, Alabama. I'm not sure we'll ever get back to where we were in the glory days of Lou Holtz.
Swarbrick did a Zoom press conference yesterday. Not much came out of it, other than things are still up in the air. Navy game, still no final decision all options being looked at, haven't definitely ruled out Ireland yet. IMHO I can't imaging going to Ireland and I can't understand why it is so hard to go ahead and give up on that goal and work on a US venue if the game is to played. May 15th is an important date he said. It's when ND will make a final decision on whether there will be on campus classes for the second summer session. Also said he's not worried about the ND schedule if the conferences go to a conference only schedule and a delayed start to the season. I guess he is counting on the ACC contract for 5 games and somehow getting exceptions from conferences for games vs USC and Wisconsin. Navy is a conference member as well, so if the AAC went to a conference only schedule they would need an exception. I'm thinking W.Michigan given the payday they will get for coming to ND would get an exception from the MAC
Terry, you may be right but then again 8 or 9 yrs ago who thought Clemson would be in the same class of recruiting as Alabama? Personally, I think ND should be able to always recruit at the top 10 class level. Depends on who is doing the recruiting.
Beating Tim to the punch on this one. DE Jason Onye from Joel's mini-state of Rhode Island just verballed to the Irish. He's a bit of a project, but tons of upside in terms of physical ability. Isn't a kid who will come in and play like Kyle Hamilton, but will need the red shirt year and dedication in the weight room and have some patience so he can maybe be a meaningful contributors by his Jr. year.
Irish pickup a Grad Transfer CB from North Carolina State, Nick McCloud. He didn't play a lot last year due to an injury in the 1st game of the year last year. He was a captain, so that's usually a good sign in terms of character and stuff like that. From what I've read he's not likely to come in and just be the starter, but even if he doesn't start he'll provide quality proven depth. Something the Irish sorely lack at CB this season.
Jack Swarbrick was on a Zoom program that ND had called "The Fight". It's intention was to raise money for students and students families impacted by the pandemic. But a couple of things he said were 1) that he wants some fans in the stands starting with students. 2) the Ath Dept will be looking at budgets to help with the hit finances have taken. Maybe shortened seasons for some sports and more regional scheduling to avoid expense of flying. I look at golf and the Irish golf teams travel extensively around the country, that might come to an end. I wonder if some of the pre-conference travel for softball and baseball will be affected. Both teams again travel extensively to warm weather tournaments in the run up to conference play. I posted in another topic that the Pac12 is kicking around not leaving the region, playing an all Pac12 schedule. No mention of except for Notre Dame, the Irish with both USC and Stanford on the schedule could be looking at those games going away. Swarbrick has said in the past that he's not worried about conferences going to conference only schedules he's confident that the Irish will have a full schedule. I assume he's counting on the agreement with that ACC to allow ACC teams to play ND. We have 6 ACC football games this year. Maybe he's been talking to conferences about allowing their members to keep the ND game. But it could be a problem.