With the summer dead period bringing an end to official visits for 2023 prospects until the season starts, it should come as little surprise that there was a flurry of commitments across the country over the last couple of weeks. Few programs benefited as much as Notre Dame, as the Irish added a bevy of blue chip prospects – a pair of ’24 four stars in TE Jack Larsen and WR Cam Williams kicked off the festivities, and the fireworks continued in the ’23 class with top 200 WR Rico Flores, top 150 CB Micah Bell, top 100 CB Christian Gray, and top 100 OL Charles Jagusah. What Marcus Freeman has done in his first cycle in charge is very nearly unprecedented for Notre Dame in the modern recruiting era, and we promise that’s not hyperbole. The class held on to its #1 ranking through the national run on commitments, flipping back and forth with Ohio State through the July 4th weekend. It also has the third highest average 247 Composite score at 0.9320, behind just Alabama at 0.9407 (10 commits) and Ohio State at 0.9376 (16 commits). What’s more, there are five prospects left on the board who we would consider good bets to land in the class right now and four of them would actually bring that average up, believe it or not.
But wait, there’s more! The 247 Composite class score currently sits at 280.72, ahead of last year’s 7th-ranked class at 275.44 (22 commits) and barely behind the 2013 class, Brian Kelly’s peak, at 284.77 (23 commits). If the Irish land any one – one! – of LB Jaiden Ausberry, RB Jeremiyah Love, or WR Jaden Greathouse, three of the four players we think are likely, the class score will push past 2013’s. If they land all three plus the fourth guy, WR Ronan Hanafin, and nobody else (meaning no QB in the class, which is exceedingly unlikely), the class score will push to 296.41. The Composite didn’t strictly speaking exist when Charlie Weis landed Notre Dame’s best class of the internet era in 2008, but using 247’s nifty class calculator you get a class score of 297.39 for that group; only one positive surprise in the ’23 group would push the class score past that. The 2008 class followed a horrific 2007 season, but Weis still had a 19-6 run in 2005-06 fresh in everyone’s memory. The 2013 class was Kelly’s third and came fresh on the heels of a national championship game appearance. Freeman is doing this with an 0-1 career record as a head coach. Yes, he needs to perform on the field, but… What if he does?
Teasing that thought out a bit, it’s worth noting that while it’s quite early Notre Dame currently sits at #1 in the 2024 class rankings too, with five commits and an average 247 Composite score of 0.9438. The staff already landed five-star QB CJ Carr (#19 overall) and DL Brandon Davis-Swain (#64) and has made significant inroads with:
- WR Ryan Wingo (#4)
- LB Sammy Brown (#8)
- WR Micah Hudson (#9)
- QB Julian Sayin (#13, and obviously any continued interest is contingent on whether CJ Carr reclassifies to 2023, but still)
- EDGE Elijah Rushing (#17)
- S Peyton Woodyard (#19, Kyle Hamilton’s cousin)
- S Mike Matthews (#25)
- DL Justin Scott (#28)
- S Ricardo Jones (#51)
- CB Omilio Agard (#52)
- OT Guerby Lambert (#56, current ’23 DL commit Boubacar Traore’s teammate)
- LB Myles Graham (#60)
- EDGE Williams Nwaneri (#69)
- WR Bredell Richardson (#71)
- LB Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa (#97)
Obviously Notre Dame won’t land all or even most of these guys, but legitimate interest – almost all of them have either visited already, some multiple times, or said they intend to soon – from this many guys this early is exactly how you build an elite class.
The 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 or on other staffs’ boards. We try to make educated guesses at all of it, but we don’t know.
| Unit | Position | Name | 247C | Temp |
| O | IOL | Markis Deal | 0.9521 | Cold |
| O | IOL | TJ Shanahan | 0.9381 | Cold |
| O | OT | Samson Okunlola | 0.9887 | Cold |
| O | OT | Chase Bisontis | 0.9723 | Cold |
| O | OT | Monroe Freeling | 0.9699 | Cool |
| O | OT | Cayden Green | 0.9552 | Cold |
| O | OT | Vysen Lang | 0.8767 | Cold |
| O | OT | Koby Keenum | 0.8626 | Cold |
| O | QB | Dante Moore | 0.9942 | Mild |
| O | RB | Richard Young | 0.9874 | Cold |
| O | RB | Cedric Baxter | 0.9791 | Cold |
| O | RB | Justice Haynes | 0.9759 | Cold |
| O | RB | Jeremiyah Love | 0.9646 | Warm |
| O | RB | Treyaun Webb | 0.9324 | Cold |
| O | TE | Duce Robinson | 0.9902 | Cold |
| O | WR | Jalen Brown | 0.9857 | Cold |
| O | WR | Hykeem Williams | 0.9799 | Cold |
| O | WR | Jaquaize Pettaway | 0.9790 | Cold |
| O | WR | Jalen Hale | 0.9717 | Cold |
| O | WR | Dalton Brooks | 0.9691 | Cold |
| O | WR | Jaden Greathouse | 0.9478 | Hot |
| O | WR | Aidan Mizell | 0.9471 | Cold |
| O | WR | Tyler Williams | 0.9354 | Cold |
| O | WR | Joshua Manning | 0.9074 | Cold |
| O | WR | Malik Elzy | 0.9049 | Cold |
| O | WR | Ronan Hanafin | 0.8967 | Hot |
| D | CB | Javien Toviano | 0.9876 | Cold |
| D | CB | Malik Muhammad | 0.9833 | Cold |
| D | CB | Caleb Presley | 0.9633 | Cold |
| D | CB | Jasiah Wagoner | 0.9255 | Cold |
| D | CB | Ethan Nation | 0.9135 | Cold |
| D | CB | Jyaire Hill | 0.9033 | Cold |
| D | DL | David Hicks | 0.9965 | Cold |
| D | DL | Peter Woods | 0.9875 | Cold |
| D | DL | Jason Moore | 0.9761 | Cool |
| D | DL | Derrick LeBlanc | 0.9634 | Cold |
| D | DL | Keldric Faulk | 0.9604 | Cold |
| D | DL | John Walker | 0.9537 | Cold |
| D | DL | Hunter Osborne | 0.9482 | Cold |
| D | DL | Xzavier McLeod | 0.9323 | Cold |
| D | DL | Jalen Thompson | 0.9208 | Cold |
| D | DL | Kendrick Gilbert | 0.9035 | Cold |
| D | DL | Stantavious Smith | 0.8519 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Matayo Uiagalelei | 0.9878 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Samuel M’Pemba | 0.9864 | Mild+ |
| D | EDGE | Jayden Wayne | 0.9856 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Chandavian Bradley | 0.9836 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Ta’Mere Robinson | 0.9394 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Desmond Umeozulu | 0.9392 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Derion Gullette | 0.9382 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Dylan Gooden | 0.9319 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Colton Vasek | 0.9283 | Cold |
| D | EDGE | Neeo Avery | 0.9203 | Cold |
| D | LB | Nyckoles Harbor | 0.9956 | Cold |
| D | LB | Anthony Hill | 0.9905 | Cold |
| D | LB | Troy Bowles | 0.9797 | Cold |
| D | LB | Malik Bryant | 0.9778 | Cold |
| D | LB | Jaiden Ausberry | 0.9659 | Warm |
| D | LB | Raylen Wilson | 0.9645 | Cold |
| D | LB | Tackett Curtis | 0.9619 | Cold |
| D | LB | Tony Rojas | 0.9382 | Cold |
| D | LB | Jayvant Brown | 0.9195 | Cold |
| D | S | Caleb Downs | 0.9950 | Mild |
| D | S | Joenel Aguero | 0.9840 | Cold |
| D | S | Mikal Harrison-Pilot | 0.9414 | Cold |
| D | S | Isaac Smith | 0.9339 | Cold |
| D | S | Rahmir Stewart | 0.9128 | Cold |
New to the Board
- LB Raylen Wilson, 0.9645, decommitted from Michigan (lol)
Off the Board
Deep breath…
- QB Arch Manning, 1.000, Texas
- OT Kadyn Proctor, 0.9952, Iowa
- CB Tony Mitchell, 0.9903, Alabama
- WR Johntay Cook, 0.9839, Texas
- S Derek Williams, 0.9835, Texas
- WR Noah Rogers, 0.9769, Ohio State
- OT Charles Jagusah, 0.9752, Notre Dame
- IOL Harris Sewell, 0.9646, Clemson
- CB Christian Gray, 0.9543, Notre Dame
- EDGE Jaxon Howard, 0.9540, LSU
- WR Nathanial Joseph, 0.9506, Miami
- CB Micah Bell, 0.9541, Notre Dame
- CB Kayin Lee, 0.9373, Ohio State
- CB Calvin Simpson-Hunt, 0.9289, Ohio State (flipped from Texas Tech)
- WR Rico Flores, 0.9246, Notre Dame
- CB Sharif Denson, 0.9204, Florida
- WR Christian Hamilton, 0.9196, North Carolina
- QB Avery Johnson, 0.9194, Kansas State
- DL Stephiylan Green, 0.9194, Clemson
- S Daemon Fagan, 0.9112, NC State
- S King Mack, 0.9092, Penn State
- LB Jaden Robinson, 0.8933, South Carolina
- RB Sedrick Irvin, 0.8900, Stanford
- LB Phil Piccioti, 0.8858, Oklahoma
- DL Ashton Sanders, 0.8719, Cal
- EDGE Kennedy McDowell, 0.0000, Colorado State
Quarterback
Commits: None
Slots: 1
We considered downgraded the temperature on top target Dante Moore to “Cool” given some recent buzz for Oregon, including a prediction in their favor from 247 national stalwart Steve Wiltfong and rumors that he might pop for them within days of visiting back on June 24th. We left it at “Mild” though as a good portion of that buzz has fizzled; Oregon may still lead but, as has so often been the case throughout his recruitment, nobody really seems to have a good feel for where things are with Moore. We suspect that one way or another we’ll have some clarity before the season on whether the ’23 quarterback will be Moore, a reclassified CJ Carr, or an-as-yet unoffered ’23 prospect. Names to know if the staff moves on with ’23 prospects are Purdue commit Rickie Collins (#204) and Baylor commit Austin Novosad (#261 but set to rise after a very good showing at the Elite 11 finals), neither of whom seem likely to stick with their current school.
Running Back
Commits: Jayden Limar, 0.9015, #317 overall/#19 position
Slots: 2-3
Jeremiyah Love (pictured) took his fifth and final official visit to Alabama right after our last update. There was strong pro-Irish buzz coming out of his Notre Dame official just before that and we don’t believe that has abated. There’s no clarity on what his timeline is but there’s also no doubt the Irish are in good shape with a prospect who was seriously considering Harvard earlier in the process…Â Richard Young announced a top three of Alabama, Georgia, and Oregon last night, and has accordingly been downgraded to Cold. Fun while it lasted. We give Alabama a 90% chance, Georgia 10%, and Oregon, well, 0%.
Wide Receiver
Commits: Braylon James, 0.9454, #117/#19 position; Rico Flores, 0.9246, #187/#27 position
Slots: 4-5
Rico Flores jumped in the class via an announcement on his late uncle’s birthday. He’s an extremely polished prospect who will have a great shot at making an early contribution… We still feel fairly confident that Jaden Greathouse and Ronan Hanafin will round out this group. Greathouse just set an announcement date of July 15th; Hanafin hasn’t set a date yet but we’re guessing it won’t be much longer… Keep in mind too that the staff considers Love a hybrid RB/slot WR prospect, so he figures into the WR picture in this class as well.
Tight End
Commits: Cooper Flanagan, 0.9143, #239 overall/#13 position
Slots: 1
Offensive Line
Commits: OT Charles Jagusah, 0.9752, #55/#5; OT Sullivan Absher, 0.9232, #191 overall/#19 position; Elijah Paige, 0.8985, #335 overall/#29 position; IOL Sam Pendleton, 0.8933, #378 overall/#20 position; IOL Joe Otting, 0.8752, #591 overall/#42 position
Slots: 5-6
Charles Jagusah kicked off that run of ’24 commits when he announced on June 30th. He’s very raw in terms of technique but very, very gifted in terms of power, athleticism, and leverage. There are even some rumors floating that Harry Hiestand finds him reminiscent of Quenton Nelson. Let’s hope he’s right… We downgraded Monroe Freeling to Cool. We’re not sure whether the Irish would take a sixth lineman or whether Freeling would want to be the sixth lineman in the class, but either way, we get the sense that he’s more likely to stay closer to home.
Defensive Line
Commits: EDGE Keon Keeley, 0.9955, #8 overall/#1 position; DL Brenan Vernon, 0.9532, #99 overall/#12 position; DL Boubacar Traore, 0.9440, #123 overall/#18 position; DL Devan Houstan, 0.9187, #216 overall/#32 position
Slots: 4-5
In a bit of a stunning reversal given how tight-lipped final target Jason Moore has been and how positive things seemed to be trending to Notre Dame, Ohio State now seems like the odds-on favorite to land him. Penn State and Michigan (lol) are on the fringes here as well. Like with Greathouse and Hanafin, we suspect a decision will come in the next month or so but that’s really just a guess at this point. We’ve left him in the optimistic close scenario on the chance that it swings back, but we’ve downgraded Moore to Cool after long having him penciled into the class. Between Devin, Dante, and now Jason, we may need to add a Moore Corollary to the Fresno Rule.
Linebackers
Commits: Drayk Bowen, 0.9635, #76 overall/#6 position; Preston Zinter, 0.8877, #425 overall/#37 position
Slots: 3-4
Samuel M’Pemba, as we noted last time, doesn’t seem in any rush to make a decision. He visited Oregon and Tennessee recently and had good things to say about each. Alabama, Miami, and Georgia are all in the picture as well. His interest in Notre Dame seems to be real but he also seems to still be very wide open. He still has all his official visits left and, we would imagine, will use them during the season for game day visits. He has already scheduled one of those, in fact – to Notre Dame for the Clemson game. Long way to go but the Irish are in it here…
Jaiden Ausberry, in contrast, recently took his final official visit, in his case to Michigan (lol). The real competition here is likely Auburn (where his brother just signed), LSU (he goes to University Lab High School on LSU’s campus), and Texas A&M (had good things to say about his official visit). Notably, Wiltfong has a prediction in for Ausberry to Notre Dame. Ausberry has talked about a potential fall decision, but there’s some buzz that he could end it sooner than that. Stay tuned.
Defensive Backs
Commits:Â S Peyton Bowen, 0.9763, #51 overall/#4 position; CB Christian Gray, 0.9543, #94 overall/#10 position; CB Micah Bell, 0.9451, #120 overall/#13 position; S Adon Shuler, 0.9179, #221 overall/#16 position
With all due respect to Jagusah and Flores, Christian Gray and Micah Bell combined to provide the loudest fireworks of the weekend for Notre Dame. They’re the highest-ranked tandem of corners in an Irish class since… well, we’re not sure when, actually. Maybe the Holtz era. As we wrote here over the last several days, Gray has the potential to be an elite boundary corner and Bell has the potential to be an elite field/nickel corner (and return man). Landing guys like these is how you make yourself able to address the receiver groups that Ohio State, Alabama, etc. can put on the field. Huge wins on the trail…
As of right now we believe the only other defensive back the staff is looking to add is five-star safety Caleb Downs, who had an official to Notre Dame last month and has been on campus four times during his recruitment. The general consensus is that Ohio State leads with Alabama and Georgia lurking, and Notre Dame fits in there somewhere but nobody is really sure where. Like with so many other guys still on the board, the timeline here is not at all clear and could potentially stretch into the season. With only a handful of prospects truly left on the board, the staff will be able to turn a ton of attention to Downs in the stretch run.
Scenario Tracking
Reasonable close – 5 prospects – 302.30 class score – 0.9362 average:
- QB CJ Carr (reclassified from ’24)
- RB/WR Jeremiyah Love
- WR Jaden Greathouse
- WR Ronan Hanafin
- LB Jaiden Ausberry
Optimistic close – 8 prospects – 316.58 class score – 0.9420 average:
- QB Dante Moore
- RB/WR Jeremiyah Love
- WR Jaden Greathouse
- WR Ronan Hanafin
- DL Jason Moore
- LB Samuel M’Pemba
- LB Jaiden Ausberry
- S Caleb Downs
Pessimistic close – 3 prospects – 288.45 class score – 0.9294 average:
- QB Brock Glenn (or similar)
- WR Jaden Greathouse
- WR Ronan Hanafin
Got some real warm fuzzies here. THIS is where the championships if tomorrow are won, Marcus freeman you my dude!
Clark Lea recruiting at a playoff level! Only two spots behind Michigan right now.
UM is also sitting at 13th in the Big 10. That’s worse than the conference’s name. This is Ty level ‘crootin’.
“Worse than the conference’s name”… So good.
For the season that they just had, beating Ohio St, going to the Orange bowl, etc.. This is wonderful. I guess Harbaugh’s flirtation with the Vikings hurt a heck of a lot more than his winning season helped.
I think it’s mostly their dumbass helmets.
Some random thoughts (outside of my UM schadenfreude, that deserved it’s own post).
Good for Sedrick Irvin. Not bad when Stanford is your backup plan.
I really wanted Calvin Simpson-Hunt, thought he would be a great 3rd CB. I know we’ve been out of it for a while, but still bummed.
With Wagoner eliminating us (or potentially us moving on from him), are we set on 2 CBs? 3 would have been nice given the talent level of our “tier 2” targets.
Lastly, how did Tease end up at Arkansas? What’s the scuttlebutt around that?
Agreed on Irvin… On Simpson-Hunt and Wagoner, I think the staff (a) was indeed set on 2 CBs (not sure I agree with that but then I didn’t see the current crew in spring practice and also I have no idea what I’m doing, lol) and (b) must’ve felt very good about landing two of Gray, Bell, and Wagoner to not let Simpson-Hunt visit. The official explanation was that they don’t want to host committed prospects but I’m not entirely sure I buy that, I think it was a slow play tactic.
Tease picked Arkansas because they were the first major program on him and the only one to recruit him as a receiver from the beginning. That’s it. ND came around to recruiting him at receiver but he decided to stick with his Day One, as it were. Somewhat similar story as with AJ Dillon and Treveyon Henderson – ND wanted both on defense first and came around to them wanting to play RB but it was too late.
this perfectly expresses how I feel so much of the time.
I like 3 because of the talent level that I have seen play, but if they feel really good about 2 freshman, and feel really good about 2 in the next class, then 3 really isn’t necessary.
Good info on Tease. Thanks. I hadn’t heard much about him and Arkansas, and based on who we are recruiting against these days, it was surprising to see us lose out to them.
I agree on Tease, and I almost hate to say it because he’s more than entitled to live his own life, but I can’t help thinking it’s a shame he landed there. Their HC is an OL guy and they were 10th nationally in rushing attempts last year and 112th in passing attempts (ND was 76th and 27th last year, 7th and 26th in 2020). He would likely be better utilized at ND and play on a bigger stage…
BUT his life is his own, and if he cares more about his connection with the Arkansas staff than that other stuff, more power to him. He seems like a good kid, I hope it works out as well as he imagines.
Yeah, probably not a lot of long term benefits of AR over ND, football or otherwise. But it’s super close to Tulsa, so at least it’s close to family and probably a very different experience overall (could be good or bad).
Huh – I didn’t know that. A very reasonable four hour drive from Tulsa to Little Rock. My knowledge of geography outside the upper Midwest and the eastern seaboard is pretty sketchy, lol. Like I know that Houston is closer to the water than Austin, but that’s about all I could tell you about their relative positions in the state. And proximity to things in other states? Forget it pal.
Isn’t the main Arkansas campus in Fayetteville? That’s only 2 hours to Tulsa. Admittedly, I’m not overly confident that the Razorbacks football team plays there, as opposed to some other U of AR campus.
I think they play a majority of their games on campus, which is in Fayetteville. They play once a year (their Shamrock Series) in Little Rock.
Derp, you’re right. I’m even worse at this than I thought.
We all have our blind spots
Here’s my favorite Texas geography fact: El Paso is closer to the Pacific Ocean than to Beaumont (East Texas next to LA border) and Beaumont is closer to the Atlantic Ocean than El Paso.
Insanity.
Basically the same thing, but I read a while back that the drive from El Paso to San Diego is the same as the drive from El Paso to Houston.
This sign post is on I-10 just inside the Texas/Louisiana border:
And it is not a scenic drive, either…
That’s the same distance as hopping on 90 in Boston and getting off at ND.
Didn’t they just have a receiver drafted in the first round? I largely agree with what you’re saying, but it *could* happen for Tease at Arkansas.
I wonder how/if this recent round of conference realignment might impact players committed/interested in, specifically PAC# schools, but to a lesser extent also BXII & ACC. Even though ND isn’t in one of the Super 2, it’s a relatively sure thing they’ll still be playing major college football in 3-4 years after all of the dust settles. The same can’t be said for Stanford/Baylor/K-State/Cal. I’d imagine there might be a few flips in there somewhere that might do some good for ND. (Not to mention, boosters of those schools might be a bit more preoccupied with survival than NIL deals, which might make poaching some of the recruits a bit easier, too.)
I think this is a good point. But I think it’ll be hard to figure out for anyone exactly who might be left out in the cold and who ends up in one of the big 2. And there is an easy way to transfer if needed. So I think this will affect recruits more in the next cycle when more dominos fall.
Yeah, I’d tend to agree – it’s not nothing but how much more than nothing it is, I’m not sure. The other factor is that gives a substantial amount of credit for thinking ahead to a demographic that typically isn’t known for being that good at it.
I think there could also be more of a pull for, say, Midwest guys to USC if they know they’re going to play in the Midwest 3-4 times a year. Lots to sort out still.
Interesting that you mentioned K State, as Avery Johnson, erstwhile “well, maybe we can fall back on him…” QB for ND, just picked them. I don’t think anybody with two brain cells to rub together could honestly predict that they will be playing major college football in Manhattan in a few years.
I just grabbed the schools from the “Off The Board” above that are in the PAC/B12 contingent, and I think Baylor was also mentioned somewhere.
What a class so far! And one would think that this is closer to the floor of what ND can do with Freeman than the ceiling. Many of the coaches have only been around roughly the last 3-5 months. Think what Freeman and company can do in place for a whole cycle or more.
Also Michigan recruiting seems to be a dumpster fire right now. (Can’t let this go without a mention.)
And LSU is not exactly lighting things up losing some important Louisiana prospects. Right now 7 out of the top 10 prospects in Louisana are committed or CBed elsewhere than LSU (and the 10th prospect is ranked 139 natl so that’s a lot of talent). The #8 prospect in the state – a WR – just committed to Nebraska! Not good. They are really only in it total for 3 top 100 players at the moment (from anywhere not just in the home state).
Kelly goes to LSU to win a Natty because he thinks he can get better players there and in the first cycle he’s going to do worse (maybe a lot worse) than Freeman’s first cycle at ND. That speaks volumes and will only reinforce the narrative that Kelly is not an elite recruiter. I wonder when the LSU fans will worry they wasted a bunch of money and years on Kelly.
A few other notes, btw… I may have been remiss in mentioning Austin Novosad – I didn’t see that he picked up a Texas A&M offer recently. The Aggies are going to be extremely hard to beat as he’s a double legacy who lives a two hour drive from College Station. I would almost write him into their class in pen.
Also, the Irish may kick the tires on Rickie Collins, but I should’ve pointed out that he’s going to be very, very popular once the Dante Moore dust settles and he’s from Baton Rouge, so again, high likelihood that the hometown team will come calling and they might be hard to ignore.
Top 100 QB Dylan Lonergan is still out there too, likely choosing between Stanford and Alabama soon (despite Alabama picking up another top 100 QB already in Eli Holstein). I’m not sure why but ND has never really shown any level of interest in chasing him, so I doubt that will change now.
Maybe – and it’s a huge maybe – they could get back in with Micah Tease if ND takes off and Arkansas faceplants this season. He’s really the only flip candidate I see at WR right now.
Any other flip candidates are completely off the radar as of right now, so we’ll have to see what might unfold during the season. I’m pretty sure that this staff, even if the board gets cleared, is going to refill it and keep grinding.
Perhaps something similar could happen with Dante Moore that you mention here with Tease if Moore commits elsewhere. It seems like he wanted to come to ND for a long time but now is getting cold feet. Perhaps – even with a commitment elsewhere – he could rediscover those original reasons and with the help of a good season from ND and something concerning from the team he committed to he changes his mind. With Freeman at the helm this feels possible (where with other coaches it might just be wishful thinking).
I don’t think Carr reclassifying is a long shot but I don’t think it’s a sure thing either. I think it would be fairly characterized as 50/50 at this point. I honestly think the staff’s preference would be for him to reclassify and then they go big game hunting again in ’24 rather than deal with the constant Moore drama, but they’re not going to push him. As we’ve noted earlier, he’s within days of being the same age as Moore and he’s in position academically, even for ND, so it’s not as outlandish as it might sound.
Anything is possible with Moore. Right after his OV to Oregon it seemed like he was going to commit to them within a couple of days, but now we’re 2+ weeks out and as I said above their glow is fading a bit. If I had to guess, I would say that he likes ND and has always wanted to be in the class but there are, shall we say, other forces around him that have gotten in the way of that. It’s entirely possible that he’s not sold on any of these other schools and isn’t comfortable pulling the trigger for them. I feel for him, as frustrating as the saga has been for me as a fan – it’s the biggest decision in his life to this point, after all.
EDIT: Just to clarify, I still think it’s more likely that Dante ends up somewhere else when all is said and done. But nothing would surprise me at this point.
Yea it seems like we’d be in a better position to get another QB in 2024 so it makes sense that we’d prefer Carr to reclassify. I suppose reading around I would put it more at like 25-75 but admittedly there isn’t much to go on. I suppose I thought the “reasonable” scenario would include choices that would be at least 60/40 to happen so that even at 50/50 it would be more in the optimistic scenario. But I realize I’m splitting hairs here now and it’s not a big difference one way or the other.
That sounds about right with Moore – which means we aren’t really out of it (no one is!) and maybe have then a 1/5 chance to land him. It also means the process might be pretty drawn out and we might be left standing with no one else to get with little time left.
Handicapping the three options, I’d put it at something like 50% Carr reclassifying, 45% landing another ’23 QB, 5% landing Moore. So in that I consider the most likely option (barely, granted), I have Carr reclassifying as part of the reasonable scenario.
But yes, we’re splitting hairs, and I couldn’t argue too much with your position either!
Well put, I agree. We don’t really know if it’s 25%, 50% or 75% and could be any of them. Tough to set odds on a decision that has not yet been made.
We do know:
-he’s kept the door open to re-classifying
-he and his family would consider it
-it would be good for Notre Dame if he does
So if they can encourage (without pressuring) the move, it would make sense for all parties and possibly/probably is what will be at least attempted from the Notre Dame side at some point this summer.
I’m fine with considering it a “reasonable” possibility right now, though surely wouldn’t put him in the 2023 class beyond that until the decision process plays out.
Seems like the timing works out for Carr to reclassify. Take a redshirt freshman year, ideally work his way up to second team reps RS soph. year, and then take over for Buchner after he jumps to the NFL following back-to-back Nattys.
And while I’m dreaming, I’d like a pony. And Caleb Downs and Richard Young. 🙂
This is exactly why I’m not so keen on Carr reclassifying. Probably said this before, but I don’t consider Buchner much of a threat to leave early unless it’s because things go sideways for him.
It also seems that Carr reclassifying still seems more of a longshot (optimistic scenario) rather than a “reasonable” scenario though.
If we don’t end up with Dante Moore it seems most likely we’ll end up with some high 3 star/low 4 star flip just to make sure we have enough bodies at QB (I’m not counting Powlus as a “body.”) I’m assuming Pyne will leave as a graduate transfer. This will be the most disappointing aspect of Freeman’s 1st class which would be more or less “perfect” with an elite QB in it. And that’s saying a lot given the transition there is with a new coaching staff.
Along with flip candidates, I do wonder if they’ll be able to really go after maybe a couple more kids through the fall that we are currently not keyed in on. This class has come together pretty quickly and of course the staff is going to have to spend time keeping the commits here, but with so many already signed on (so to say for verbal commits) I wonder if they can spend a little more time going after others. That could mean flipping targets or getting in touch with players who there isn’t much record of interest one way or the other.
Also a great point. I just went through the list of “Cold” prospects – kids that ND has offered but haven’t shown any interest for a long time or ever – to see if I could pick out a couple that make sense. The most likely targets there are kids who (a) had some interest earlier in the process and/or (b) we know the staff prioritized until ND was eliminated and (c) are at a position that could actually take another body. There are other kids who are completely off our radar who could drift into the picture of course too. Anyway, here are a handful that I came up with:
Can we steal Jaxon Howard? Baton Rouge is definitely going to be too hot and sticky for a nice MN kid.
Webb committed to Florida yesterday, btw, so likely doesn’t really belong on this list.
So what is the consensus on the # of 2023 recruits? Reasonable has 29 and optimistic has 32. Either way, there has to be several who will be EE’s. Also, with a class of 29-32 that’s going mean some transfers from 20/21/22 classes or some marginal guys with 5th year eligibility moving on. In terms of players moving on to the NFL before their 4th year in college, it’s mainly Mayer and possibly Tyree?
On a chart, I saw 15 players now are grad students in 2022, all of whom I assume are moving on after 2022 for one reason or another.
Not difficult to go through the positions and find 1-2 in just about every spot that potentially could fly the coop early if things don’t break right. And just based on numbers, it’s a guarantee, just a matter of which players.
Mayer, like you said, way gone. Tyree, Joseph and Hart all are leaving if they have good enough years. Pyne could grad transfer, Diggs and Botelho seem like flight risks. Always some random OL’s (Carmody? Baker? younger guys) that will leave. TE is way deep and if Raridon is on the next Mayer track, are all 4 other guys coming back where one is TE5 behind a stud? Probably not. DL and specifically DE has some current fresh/soph projects who are getting recruited over currently. CB and S have a ton of bodies and some of whom might get discouraged at lack of usage this year.
I think it might be COVID related, but there def will be a lot of turnover after this season as far as departures. Also no one really transferred out after spring ball, which is almost unheard of too, so who knows, maybe before fall 1-2 might still find an escape.
I’m guessing the final number will be about 25.
We’re at 19 now, so that’s six more.
Huh? Reasonable close has five guys to bring us to 24, optimistic has eight to bring us to 27. I think we’ll end up at 25 probably.
I thought I read ND has 23 recruits for the next class, but 23 recruits was just a reference to 2023 recruits- so that’s were I came up with 29 and 32.
Dante Moore set to announce Friday now. That should help clear things up – but I still would suggest if it’s not ND that there still might be room for a flip to ND (not that I would get my hopes up).
On3 has ND with less than 1% chance of landing Moore.
Yea I don’t think he’s coming here but I also wouldn’t be shocked with anything he chooses. I don’t think he talks much about where he’s going so that people don’t have a real good sense of it. In some ways I’ll be surprised if it is Oregon only because that’s where people think he’s headed.
Jason Moore announcing Saturday too. Likely bad news for us with each.
I wonder if he waited to set commitment until after elite 11 to try to drive his NIL value up? Would a collective (TA&M, Oregon) be willing to pay more for a great showing? I know Oregon leads the crystal balls, but I wonder if the PAC 12 decimation leads to him looking harder at the other schools in his favorites. I have hope that ND lands him, however with Carr on Deck in 2024, I’m ok if he doesn’t. Also, wonder if the staff have had a discussion with Carr about waiting to decide to reclassify until Moore makes a decision.
Honestly not sure whether to be disappointed or not by this class. On one hand they’ve done really good, landed like 8 top 100 players, hit pretty much every need (except qb), and made inroads in places nd hadn’t been able to have success in the past. On the other hand there are a lot of guys that could’ve really accelerated this timeline that ND Led for or was in the front pack: carnell tate, dante, jason moore, caleb downs, freeling, m pemba, and we’ll see what happens with live and ausberry.
I am really curious to see how the staff responds to this week missing on jason and dante moore. Last time things looked a little rough was after rhett recommitted and gray seemed to be fading away and the staff nailed that. also looking forward to the dante stories finally coming out this week
also they did all of this without a star qb to anchor the class, which is incredibly impressive. thanks again dante
And did it without a full year of the staff being in place.
Moore just said he’s committing tomorrow live on ESPN, so at least the saga is coming to an abrupt conclusion. Tea leaves have seemingly been pointing to Oregon as of late, but who knows. Doesn’t seem like there’s any traction or momentum with Notre Dame, it’ll be interesting to hear what if anything comes out about what happened in the spring when he pulled away despite everything trending in such a good direction.
I’m not too disappointed. Disappointing is when you try for one top-50 player (Shipley), come up short and then don’t have any other good options.
I know Moore was highly rated, but keep the other 5 and it’s no big deal. Tate, IMO, was always a longshot even though he was interested a bit. Not a shock a WR that decided to go to a football factory HS in Florida ends up going to tOSU…Freeling isn’t really a loss because the staff preferred Jagusah and Paige. Etc, etc.
The success rates for top-50, top-100 players are lower, even for some of the big programs. The overall advancement of the blue chip ratio and just general more top 100 and top 125-150 players is very encouraging for Notre Dame.
And then when this flips to 2024, as Brendan laid out so excellently above, they’re already in the race for 15 more top-100ish players, to go along with the 3 that are already committed.
I wouldn’t take discouragement away from losing on some elite players when the net is being cast so wide and also succeeding at bringing more into the fold. That’s a positive and it will take time to build to start even attempting to match what the “big 5” are doing.
The fact that we are in the conversation for these guys speaks loudly about the staffs recruiting efforts. In the past, if we were in the top 5 for this type of recruit, it seemed like it was more about the recruit sticking ND in there due to name recognition vs genuine interest (with a few exceptions). They certainly would have accelerated ND’s climb up the mountain to “ELITE”, but I can’t be disappointed with the staff’s effort. Always disappointed when we miss on a high upside recruit that we were in the running for.
I agree, the first step was really being legitimately involved with a lot of these top guys but this top 2024 list that was just made, the 2023 version probably had a lot of the guys who will end up elsewhere. But ultimately the staff hit on everyone position with legit guys, not the stretches we’d have at d line or cb or rb that we had for like 6 years.
I do think the staff will have a surprise up their sleeve at qb and will still one a top 110 guy that we don’t currently project. Ohio state flipped a top 50 qb in december last year, right?
If Dante Moore doesn’t select us, would love to see another high 4 star select us.
I’m presuming Dante doesn’t pick us but this is also what I was talking about with Freeman, Rees and the staff hopefully going hunting for a big flip or otherwise uncommitted recruit that we haven’t had much noise about before. QB seems like an obvious one
Call me crazy, but I’d rather a low 5 star select ND.
edit – reply fail, thought this was to me
Disappointed? I don’t see it. You don’t go from where we’ve been to picking off 5-star kids left & right unless you are bringing out briefcases of cash. It’s a building process, and what was said in the article about 2024 kids offers a proper road map for continued improvement.
Curious what the preference here would be, CJ carr stick in 24 or reclassify? Personally I would say stay in 24, for the kid but even for recruiting, it sounds like he’ll jump up to top 10 overall, number 2/3 qb in 24 and he already recruits his butt off. Having that for 1.5 years would be pretty impactful. in 23 would really just be to bump up the class ranking for his spot
I believe you are right in that there is more value added to ND in recruiting for Carr to stay in 2024. Reclassifying to 2023 creates a short term splash and takes the class up a bit. Having Carr stay in 2024 and in the ears of other 2024 recruits may bring that class up a whole lot more.
The flip side is getting Carr learning experience and bulking up in ND’s system for two years vs one before he becomes the projected starter. Which is more valuable to the coaches over the long term is unknown to me.
As far as Carr is concerned, I see very little benefit for him playing two more years of HS FB. Getting him in a year early is better for him and ND, IMO.
Hanafin jumped about 100 spots in the 247 rankings….now a top 200 player.
Wow, huge jump. Makes sense considering the programs that are interested in him.
Something I’ve been ruminating on here a bit… What if it has always been CJ’s plan to reclassify? Reporting has been quite consistent that he’s been on the fence about it for a long time. But what if he really wasn’t?
There are some dots to connect to support this that I believe include premium info from various sites, so I won’t get into too much detail here. I’ll just note that (a) they’re 7-on-7 teammates, so they know each other very well, and (b) Dante was reportedly very rattled when CJ committed to ND, enough so to reach out to the staff. I’ve been trying to make sense of why (b) is the case; CJ always planning to move to ’23 makes some things fall neatly into place that otherwise don’t make much sense.
If – and obviously a big if because this is all pretty speculative – this is more or less how things went down, I wouldn’t be at all surprised (but would be quite entertained) if news breaks shortly after Dante’s commitment to Oregon that CJ is reclassifying.
Who do you think is better, Moore or Carr?
IMO Moore is better right now but Carr has more arm talent
This would also make sense why they haven’t done anything about ’23 QBs since Carr committed and Moore moved on.
I know they are “waiting to see what Carr does” but he initially said he wasn’t going to re-classify, so they would have moved immediately if they didn’t think he was going to. Even if there’s a chance he doesn’t reclassify, you’d think they’d be out talking to new prospects.
They’ve had some quiet conversations with a few prospects, reportedly, but nothing too serious. They certainly didn’t try too hard to put the brakes on Avery Johnson’s commitment to Kansas State or Austin Novosad’s imminent commitment to Texas A&M. But I agree with your point, there has never seemed to be any urgency about finding another ’23 QB, and while admittedly my scenario is speculative it would explain the lack of urgency pretty easily.
RE: who I think is better, man, I’m not sure. They’re both really good. They have similar accuracy, decisiveness, athleticism, toughness, effortless arm strength… They’re even within days of being the same age. Maybe a slight edge to Moore because he’s shown more on the field than Carr has to this point, but it’s slight. I’d rather have both, to be sure, but I don’t think there’s a lot of daylight between them.
For reference, here’s Dante’s 2021 highlights:
http://www.hudl.com/video/3/12957981/61a6b8e3ff03530b18da2842
And CJ’s:
http://www.hudl.com/v/2GHSRv
Moore just committed to Oregon, btw. We’ll see what happens with CJ now.
I don’t even pretend to be able to compare prospects. Often when ND gets a commit I watch his highlights, then go watch whoever is the #1 ranked recruit just to compare. It used to be pretty obvious who was better, these days it’s tough to tell.
In some ways, how the staff is acting almost has to mean one of two things: either (a) there’s more going on in terms of reclassification than everyone is saying or (b) they’re OK taking a(nother) 3-starish QB this year and then Carr. I certainly hope it’s the latter, particularly given the purported interest of Julian Sayin for 2024, who was interested even when Moore seemed like a lock.
You mean you hope it’s the former right? And that Carr reclassifies so we can get another 5 star QB in 2024.
Though I did just see that Sayin was CBed to Georgia just a week ago. (Not that that means we couldn’t get him or anything.)
Whoops yes. Point being: I hope the staff doesn’t think CJ Carr is enough. For ND to be a serious contender, it needs to keep up with the Joneses on QB recruiting at least (considering QB probably should be a relative position of strength for a school like ND), and that means a top-100 QB at least every other year and probably at least 3 out of 4 years at this point given how other top schools are recruiting.
Agreed.
5 stars/total top 100 QBs:
’15: 3/10 (Rosen, Barnett, Murray)
’16: 2/8 (Patterson, Eason)
’17: 3/5 (Mills, Johnson, Tua)
’18: 3/13 (Lawrence, Fields, Daniels)
’19: 2/6 (Rattler, Nix)
’20: 2/7 (Young, DJU)
’21: 6/14
’22: 4/6
’23: 6/9
’24: 5/10
There’s been a massive uptick in either the quality of top QBs, or the ranking of them due to importance. To compete we need a 5 star every other year now (top 5ish), and the fillers should be top 100ish given Freeman’s recruiting ability.
Side note. How does Washington keep getting such good QB commits? They land high 4 star guys constantly (probably more than ND) and turn them into mud. They’ve had 1 QB drafted since Jake Locker (Eason in the ’20 4th round), while they’ve landed QBs ranked 98, 101, 221, 73, 91, 94, 171, 121, 12 since then.
I’d be curious how many of the top 100 QBs have really worked out for teams. It seems like the 5 stars have a pretty high percentage but the rest of the top 100 Qbs (non-5 stars) didn’t look like a lot of names that have played well – but that was just from a quick perusal (and based off my own memory of the QBs career).
I’m not saying getting the higher talent doesn’t matter. I’m partially wondering how many years in a row would you have to get a top 100 QB to have 1 guy to turn into a pretty good starting QB and like you said do you really just need those 5 stars because there’s actually a pretty big chasm between 5 star QBs and other top 100 QBs?
I suspect you are right that getting a 5 star every other year is basically what is needed because there is such a large gap and that even getting a top 100 QB every year might not quite work out for a team.
Yea, really odd with Washington!
Having scanned through all the top 100 QBs of the past 10 years, I would say that the success rate (i.e. me being aware that they were good) is pretty low overall. Usually 1-2 out of the top 10 QBs made a name for themselves.
But, when you scroll down to even the rest of the 4 stars, there are basically 0 recognizable names.
So similar to the rest of the positions, being a 5 star is still a long shot to be NFL caliber, but it means you are wayyyy more likely than a 3 star.
Then there was the ridiculous 2018 class with Lawrence, Fields, Corral, Jurkovec, and Yankoff (well, he didn’t make a name for himself as much as his parents made an incredible name for him) all in the top 10.
Right. I was surprised by how many names I either didn’t recognize or knew turned out not to be much of anything in college who were top 100 QBs.
But it also seemed that a 5 star was closer to a 50% chance to turn into something good where like a top 100 non-5 star was significantly lower – like 25% chance. And yes of course I’m sure it would be even lower for an average 4 star or even a 3 star. But I was surprised by what seemed to me a large gap between a 5 star QB – which is essentially like top 30, and QBs that were ranked 31-100.
I wonder if QB is the worst position meaning the hardest to hit on. I just would think at another position a top 100 player would have a much better chance than what I saw with the QBs of turning into something pretty good.