Notre Dame’s 2023 class added its third prospect today when four-star athlete Adon Shuler announced for the Irish. The 6’0″, 190-pound New Jerseyan earned his offer by camping at Notre Dame in early June, then showed his interest was serious by returning for the BBQ at the end of July. While he’s currently ranked as an athlete in the 247 Composite and has played some receicver, he definitely profiles to and is being recruited at safety. He’s young for his class – he just turned 15, so in the sophomore highlights below he’s 14. He needs polish for sure but he has a good frame and plus athleticism already, and perhaps more importantly a very aggressive attitude. Fun trivia: As 247’s Kevin Sinclair highlighted in this free article, Shuler’s current coach was a high school teammate of former Irish cornerback Leo Ferrine. Small world.

Also, his Twitter feed suggests he already has a deep understanding of Notre Dame fandom:

Recruiting Service Rankings

247Sports Composite — 4 star (.9175 rating), #242 overall, #18 ATH, #3 in NJ

247Sports — 4 star (90 rating), #200 overall, #18 ATH, #3 in NJ

Rivals — 4 star (5.8 rating), #213 overall, #15 S, #2 in NJ

ESPN — Not evaluated

Irish Sports Daily — 4 star (91 rating)

Cohort

In addition to Notre Dame, Shuler holds early offers from Boston College, Cincinnati (extended by Marcus Freeman), Florida, Kentucky, Maryland, Nebraska, Penn State, Pitt, Syracuse, Temple, and West Virginia.

Highlights

Two things worth  keeping in mind here: this is sophomore film, and Shuler is young – he just turned 15, so he was comfortably 14 in these highlights. I don’t know how recent his listed measurements are, and I hate to do this too often, but to me he looks longer than his listed 6’0″ by an inch or two. Regardless of what the exact measurement is, he has a good frame with long arms and I expect he’ll be bigger by the time he gets to campus. He shows very good burst and surprising strength for someone of his age and build. It’s good to see him making real contributions on offense and all special teams units as well; it speaks to his athleticism and his willingness to do whatever the team needs.

He never really gets out in the open here, and while he ran track this spring his PR in the 100M is a fairly pedestrian 11.9. His coaches swear that he’s very fast and first-ever track times as a sophomore are hardly set in stone, but that’s one thing to monitor as we get more information on him. Another his how he fares in coverage, as there’s very little here aside from a few clips where he plays centerfield on some very badly thrown balls.

What probably stands out the most on this highlight reel is his aggressiveness. He plays with a confidence level far beyond that of your average sophomore, and it shows in how quickly and fearlessly he comes downhill looking for contact. I particularly enjoyed the play at the 1:05 mark, which gave me flashbacks to Kinnon Tatum’s hit against USC in 1995. You know the one. Once he feels he knows where the play is going he absolutely fires at the ball.

Impact

There are a lot of question marks in Notre Dame’s safety depth chart beyond 2021 and Shuler is very early in his development, which makes it difficult to gauge whether he’ll be able to make an immediate impact. I need to see more of him as a junior, particularly as regards long speed and coverage ability, and know what the final 2022 class composition is before I’d be comfortable making a real projection. I do think he shows a lot of promise though, with physical tools and particularly an aggressive mindset that the Irish staff will love. I think his ceiling right now looks reasonably high.

Welcome to the Irish family, Adon!