Wooooo-ie, has it been a busy month since we last updated the board. Fourteen prospects with Notre Dame offers committed elsewhere, one flipped a longtime commitment to an in-state rival, one decomitted from a powerhouse program, and one new Irish offer went out.

The Offense Board

A reminder on how we do this – we’ll include the entire big board table but only review prospects who are above “Cold” status and who have had actual developments of late. Speaking of which, the temperature scale:

  • Hot means the prospect is on commit watch.
  • Warm means the prospect has Notre Dame in a small final group and/or is a possible Irish lean.
  • Mild/Mild+ means the prospect is in regular contact with the staff and has visited or has firm visit plans.
  • Cool means the prospect has some level of contact with the staff and/or vague visit plans; also the default temperature for most new offers.
  • Cold is a known (or reasonably safely assumed) lack of contact with the staff and/or an elimination.

Also, on the 247 Composite scores: Roughly speaking above .9830 is a five star, above .9500 is a top 100 prospect, above .9200 is a top 200 prospect, and above .8900 is a four star. Those slide around a little within a cycle and from one cycle to the next, but they’re pretty solid ballpark numbers.

Remember that of course we don’t have perfect information on all prospects – we don’t know for sure whether a prospect has or hasn’t talked to the staff outside of what’s reported elsewhere. We don’t know for sure how high prospects are on the staff’s board. We try to make highly-educated guesses at all of it, but we don’t know.

Position 247C First Name Last Name Temp
OG 0.9452 Carson Hinzman Cold
OT 0.9948 Zach Rice Mild+
OT 0.9510 Aamil Wagner Warm
OT 0.9481 Julian Armella Cold
OT 0.9360 Billy Schrauth Warm
OT 0.8950 Ryan Baer Cold
RB 0.8739 Quinshon Judkins Cool
TE 0.8958 Benji Gosnell Cold
TE 0.8810 Arlis Boardingham Cold
WR 0.9880 Kevin Coleman Cold
WR 0.9872 Evan Stewart Cold
WR 0.9735 Tetairoa McMillan Cold
WR 0.9636 CJ Williams Hot
WR 0.9635 Andre Greene Mild
WR 0.9624 Brenen Thompson Cold
WR 0.9579 Kendrick Law Cold
WR 0.9483 Tobias Merriweather Warm
WR 0.9467 Darrius Clemons Cold
WR 0.9354 Antonio Williams Cold
WR 0.9150 DJ Allen Cold
WR 0.8925 Omari Kelly Cold
WR 0.8742 Major Everhart Mild
WR 0.0000 Elic Ayomanor Mild
WR 0.0000 Eli King Cold
WR 0.0000 Xayvion Bradshaw Cool

On the Board

  • TE Benji Gosnell, 0.8958 rating, #319 overall/#13 position (decommitted from Ohio State)
  • WR Major Everhart, 0.8742 rating, #541 overall/#45 position (ranked as a RB, ND recruiting as a slot WR)

Off the Board

  • OT Tyler Booker, Alabama, 0.9810 rating, #39 overall/#5 position
  • OT Joe Brunner, Wisconsin, 0.9752 rating, #60 overall/#8 position
  • RB Nicholas Singleton, Penn State, 0.9689, #72 overall/#5 position
  • WR Kojo Antwi, Ohio State, 0.9486 rating, #125 overall/#17 position
  • OG Gunner Givens, Virginia Tech, 0.9466 rating, #135 overall/#4 position
  • OT Jacob Sexton, Oklahoma, 0.9114 rating, #238 overall/#22 position
  • WR Nicholas Anderson, Oregon, 0.9107 rating, #242 overall/#38 position
  • RB Gi’Bran Payne, Indiana, 0.9099 rating, #246 overall/#24 position
  • OT Jake Taylor, Oklahoma, 0.9069 rating, #258 overall/#25 position
  • RB Damari Alston, Auburn, 0.8980 rating, #299 overall/#28 position
  • RB Emeka Megwa, Washington, 0.8958 rating, #321 overall/#17 position (ATH)
  • OT George Fitzpatrick, Ohio State, 0.8958 rating, #317 overall/#29 position
  • TE Jack Nickel, Michigan State, 0.8784 rating, #504 overall/#23 position
  • WR Jay Fair, Auburn, 0.8743 rating, #532 overall/#69 position

Flipped

  • WR Talyn Shettron, Oklahoma to Oklahoma State, 0.9723, (followed his twin brother)

Quarterback

Commits: Steve Angeli, 0.9124 rating, #230 overall/#11 position
Slots: 1

Running Back

Commits: JD Price, 0.9151, #220 overall/#21 position
Slots: 2

Nicholas Singleton was the only back left that seemed to animate the staff; sadly, a couple of weeks after visiting Notre Dame, he announced for Penn State. He reportedly loved his Notre Dame visit enough to think about committing, but ultimately decided to stay home. Expect the staff to keep in touch with him, especially if Penn State tanks this year – and with a slate that features dates at Wisconsin, vs. Auburn, vs. Indiana, and at Iowa in the first half of the season, it’s on the table…

We’ve also upgraded Quinshon Judkins slightly from Cold to Cool, as it looks like the staff is keeping tabs on him more than we expected. Whether they’ve truly moved on him with Singleton off the board or whether they’re keeping the relationship going pending senior film or both or neither, we can’t guess. At the end of the day don’t expect the Irish staff to reach for a warm body here; I think they’d be perfectly fine resting on Price for this class.

Wide Receiver

Commits: Amorion Walker, 0.8540, #792 overall, #103 position
Slots: 3-4

Some intrigue here, folks… Top 100 target CJ Williams will announce on August 8th, per his Twitter feed. The momentum here has been all Irish for a long time despite July visits to Texas, Stanford, and Ohio State, a string of unofficial visits to USC and his attended at Mater Dei, normally a USC feeder school, and his status as an Alabama legacy. (Yes, has has an Alabama offer, no, we don’t know how hard they were chasing him, but still). We expect Notre Dame fans to get some very good news in a few days. The 247 “crystal ball” feature is not perfect, of course, but it’s worth noting that there are five predictions in and all of them are for Notre Dame – they’re from 247 Notre Dame beat guys Tom Loy and Kevin Sinclair, 247 USC beat guy Gerard Martinez, national guy Steve Wiltfong, and West Coast regional guy Greg Biggins (perhaps the most significant one, as Biggins is fair-minded and dialed in out west)…

Top 150 target Tobias Merriweather (pictured), who may have a higher ceiling than Williams despite their respective rankings, has a top two of Notre Dame and Stanford with a few other schools nibbling around the edges. The buzz coming out of his official visit to Notre Dame was extremely positive for the Irish and we have no reason to believe that has changed. There’s no public timeline yet on Merriweather’s decision, but we’d be surprised if starts his season uncommitted. He has the feel of a kid who wants to get it done with and focus on the field…

Andre Greene, on the other hand, seems to be in no rush and more interested in taking game day visits in the fall to his finalists. He scheduled an official visit to Notre Dame for Cincinnati weekend. Will the Irish be done at the position by then? It seems ludicrous to think so, but they could very well be sitting on a group of Williams, Merriweather, and Walker by then and would have some interesting decisions to make. I would gladly take Greene as a fourth receiver no matter what, but then I don’t get paid to do this…

10.34. 10.38. 10.43. 10.44. 10.46. 10.50. 10.55. Those are all 100 meter times that new offer Major Everhart posted in the Spring 2021 track season in Texas. He’s ranked as a running back and, judging from his Hudl film, he played tailback and slot back exclusively in Amarillo High’s triple option offense. By all accounts the staff is recruiting him as a slot receiver though, and with that kind of speed I can’t say that I blame them. It’ll be interesting to see how hard they continue to pursue if they land other targets, and if they do see him as just a receiver or more of an all-purpose guy…

Nothing really new to report on Xayvion Bradshaw; he continues to express interest in Notre Dame, and Notre Dame and almost all other Power 5 programs continue to be unenthused or at least ambivalent towards him. He plays against pretty bad competition, but so did Jack Kiser and Tyler Buchner and that didn’t stop the Irish from going after both of them. The little bit of film we have looks pretty good, granted, but at this point there has to be something else going on here.  There are whispers that Bradshaw’s camp has been difficult about simple requests from coaching staffs regarding measurables, which raises a couple of red flags if true. Does it seem more likely (a) that the staff of every major program in the country is whiffing on the evaluation of an NFL legacy, or (b) that there’s something we don’t know about that makes them all concerned about his ability at the next level?

Tight End

Commits: Holden Staes, 0.9036 rating, #10 position/#268 overall; Eli Raridon, 0.8830 rating, #18 position/#438 overall
Slots: 2

With Staes and Raridon in, the Irish won’t be chasing Benji Gosnell. Just worth noting that he apparently decommitted from Ohio State of his own volition; if I were a betting man I’d put my money on hometown North Carolina, where his brother plays, as his eventual destination… Also, erstwhile Irish commit Jack Nickel found himself a pretty solid landing spot at Michigan State.

Offensive Line

Commits: OT Joey Tanona, 0.9385, #155 overall/#18 position; OT Ty Chan, 0.9235, #199 overall/#26 position; OT Ashton Craig, 0.8728 rating, #579 overall/#52 position
Slots: 4-5

You can still count me in the camp that thinks Zach Rice is a long shot, but his July official visit went extraordinarily well and perhaps put the Irish closer to being in the race. Rice reportedly clicked with everyone and everything. Also, as he has done for a long time now, he’s been working out with Notre Dame defensive end commit Aiden Gobaira, who no doubt is more than willing to share some positive thoughts with him. I would still lean toward North Carolina, which is the virtual hometown team for the Virginian, but I’m less sure of that now than I was a couple of months ago…

Ohio State landing a commitment from George Fitzpatrick is all kinds of interesting. First, he’s a guy Notre Dame essentially passed on – the staff reportedly thought about bringing him in for a visit this summer and then nixed it. Second, it could have implications for Aamil Wagner; Ohio State will likely take three or four linemen this year, Fitzpatrick is their second, and they’re in solid shape with two other four star guys. There has been some chatter that the Buckeyes view Wagner as a developmental guy and are willing to take a lower ceiling kid who would be ready sooner. Which describes Fitzpatrick. Wagner, like Greene, doesn’t seem to be in any particular hurry. Watch Kentucky, where his brother plays, too…

We don’t have a good feel for what’s going on with Billy Schrauth. The tea leaves suggested he was on the verge of committing to Notre Dame four months ago. Then things seemed to cool, then hometown Wisconsin had some momentum, now things are either cooling again for them or maybe possibly even tilting back in Notre Dame’s favor. Schrauth is a very quiet kid, which makes it hard for anyone to get a read here, but we do think that the longer this goes on the better it is for the Irish. Stay tuned.