Blue chip safety Khalil Terry became the sixth member of Notre Dame’s 2027 recruiting class yesterday when he announced his commitment to the Irish. The 6’0″, 185-pound Californian and erstwhile Michigan State commit had been trending towards USC in the not-too-distant past, picking up some predictions to land with them as recently as a month ago. Terry backed off his Spartan pledge over the summer; he had committed to them in December 2024 and in the following months picked up many more Power 4 offers that no doubt made him reconsider his early decision. One of those offers came from USC, about six weeks after he committed to Michigan State; he lives about 15 minutes from Disneyland, so one might imagine some second thoughts started right then.

At the end of the day though, while USC is closer Notre Dame apparently felt more like home. Terry visited Notre Dame for the spring game in April, was a late scratch for the USC game this October, and immediately rescheduled his visit for the Navy game. As ISD’s Mike Frank likes to say, watch what they do, and an LA kid quickly rescheduling an unofficial visit for a non-marquee opponent a few weeks further into the cold season says plenty. As does setting commitment date immediately after completing that rescheduled visit. Terry seems to be all in on what the Irish program is selling these days, and the staff is reportedly very happy to have him. We’ll get into this more below, but he profiles as a plus strong safety at the next level and a solid replacement for Adon Shuler.

Also, the sharper-eyed among you may have already noticed that there’s a good reason why the header image, which is a snapshot of Rivals content generator Hayes Fawcett’s Instagram post, includes the comments on his post. A rather prominent future teammate dropped a nice little shoutout to Terry.

Recruiting Service Rankings

247Sports Composite — 4 star (.9276 rating), #198 overall, #21 S, #20 in CA

Rivals Industry Comparison — 4 star (91.08 rating), #157 overall, #16 S, #16 in CA

The 247 Composite and Rivals Industry Comparison both combine the major service rankings.  On3 acquired Rivals on July 1st and is now using the Rivals brand for all of their recruiting coverage.

247Sports — 4 star (90 rating), #246 overall, #27 S, #24 in CA

Rivals — 4 star (90 rating), #130 overall, #13 S, #11 in CA

ESPN — 4 star (80 rating), #227 overall, #22 S, #23 in CA

Irish Sports Daily — 4 star (91 rating)

Note: Jamie does the recruit evaluations for ISD, and we trust his evals as much as anyone’s; while the 247 Composite and the On3 Consensus don’t factor in ISD evals, we put a lot of weight on them ourselves. ISD only ranks the top 50 prospects in each class, and hasn’t ranked 2027 yet. Based on past classes a 95 rating would be the bottom end of their top 50.

Cohort

In addition to Notre Dame, USC, and Michigan State, Terry holds offers from Alabama, Arizona State, Arkansas, Auburn, Cal, Georgia, Georgia Tech, LSU, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Oregon, Penn State, Syracusxe, Tennessee, UCLA, Utah, and Washington, among many others. Not too shabby.

Highlights

This was a fun watch… Jamie U at ISD likes to talk about ball production with secondary prospects – that you want to see guys around the ball in high school to give you some confidence that they can be disruptive players at the next level. Well, let me tell ya bud, Terry is around the ball constantly. Some of that is due to his athleticism of course; although I think he’s plus-not-elite in that category, he does cover ground pretty well and plays with power. I think more of it is due to his read-and-react skills, and that’s what has me really excited about him as a prospect. Look at the play at the 1:02 mark. He and the slot defender are showing man coverage on the two inside receivers. Terry starts about six yards off the line; when he sees the outside receiver motion in to make a three-man bunch, he creeps up two yards. Why two yards? Because he knows what’s coming. If he stays where he is it’s a pitch and catch. If he creeps up closer it’s too easy for the blocking receiver to take him out of the play. On the snap he gives the slighest hesitation step and then fires, beating the blocker and very nearly picking the ball off with one hand.

That’s the first play that made me sit up straighter watching this clip. Recognition, speed, strength, tenacity, ball skills all on display. Wow. There’s a lot more – he plays a really good centerfield, he’s comfortable and aggressive coming downhill in the run game, he looks great with the ball in his hands as a running back, he does well enough in man coverage (not something that I think would be a strength at the next level unless he gets more fluid, but he’s credible there if needed). But the main thing that jumps out over and over is that he is. Always. Around. The. Ball. So many breakups, picks, even a forced fumble, it just says so much about what kind of player he is. Love it.

Impact

As noted above, I think he profiles very well as a future starter at strong safety. Notre Dame has been on an absurdly good run recruiting secondary prospects for the last few cycles, so it’s hard to say exactly when he would rise to prominence, but he has all the tools to do it. I think he’ll push the older guys ahead of him to be better and will get his shot, and when he does I wouldn’t be remotely surprised to see him continue his production at the next level.

Welcome to the Irish family, Khalil!