If it wasn’t official last year it is now. Notre Dame (along with the vast majority of the country) now treat Early Signing Day, which concluded last Friday, December 20, 2019, as the traditional Signing Day. Now that NSD is jammed in between the end of the regular season and bowl season it feels lost in the shuffle. Many like the lack of drama that has flourished–and while I wonder if this lasts forever–it does seem like college football permanently altered something that made the sport unique and dare I say exciting.
Now, it feels like a 25-point win over 5-7 Purdue. Sure, it lacks drama but something appears missing.
Anyway, the Fighting Irish wrapped up a 18-man class for 2020 that currently sits at 11th nationally in the Composite team rankings. We have scholarship numbers to discuss.
Out of Eligibility Following 2019
WR Chris Finke
WR Chase Claypool
OL Trevor Ruhland
DE Julian Okwara
DE Khalid Kareem
DE Jamir Jones
LB Asmar Bilal
CB Donte Vaughn
CB Troy Pride
S Jalen Elliott
It’s the time of year where we are juggling two scholarship numbers. The first is the 85-man limit for the 2020 football season. Currently, with all 9 graduate students included in the count Notre Dame is sitting at 90 scholarships. That actually feels a touch low as the program may be down to 86 within a couple weeks after the bowl game as two grad students are projected not to come back and there’s always transfers expected, as well.
List of Eligible 2020 Grad Students
Tier I
QB Ian Book
S Alohi Gilman
OL Liam Eichenberg
OL Tommy Kraemer
DE Ade Ogundeji
RB Tony Jones
DE Daelin Hayes
CB Shaun Crawford
Tier II
WR Javon McKinley
LS John Shannon
Tier III
LB Jonathan Jones
This section is usually down below the academic classes but we will move it here to discuss the 85-man limit for 2020.
The inaugural Patrick Mannelly Award Winner for the best long-snapper in the nation, John Shannon, will not be returning for a graduate season and is pursuing a career in law enforcement. The beat media has also reported that journeyman Jonathan Jones will not return either.
Most do not expect Javon McKinley to return and all signs coming from Alohi Gilman and his recent comments point to him giving the NFL a shot. That will bring things down to 88 scholarships prior to any further transfers.
I expect all of the other grad students to come back including Tony Jones who I am hoping realizes he could be a big part of the offense again in 2020. The Irish need him back. Quick note that these numbers do include tight end Cole Kmet coming back which seems like the biggest question mark of the off-season at this point as it seems kind of close to certain Ian Book has decided to return even before the bowl game and a NFL evaluation.
2021-22 Academic Classes
7 Verbal Commits
18 Sophomores
22 Juniors
24 Seniors
10 Graduates
81 Total Scholarships
Now switching over to the 2021 recruiting scholarship number (it feels super weird to type 2022 when I’m not even used to 2020 yet) and the early returns are showing a large class is possible for next year’s haul.
This time last year after Early Signing Day, the program was sitting at 95 scholarships and would eventually lose long-term scholarships to DT Darnell Ewell (medically retired), LB D.J. Morgan (transfer), CB Noah Boykin (transfer), and S Derrik Allen (transfer).
2021 possible grad students will include: RB Jafar Armstrong, RB Avery Davis, WR Isaiah Robertson, OL Dillon Gibbons, OL Aaron Banks, OL Josh Lugg, DE Kofi Wardlow, DT Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa, LB Drew White, and LB Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah.
You would hope the 6 projected starters from that group (Armstrong, Banks, Lugg, MTA, White, JOK) all come back which is a nice sizable group. I really don’t see anyone from the 2018 class who would be jumping to the NFL after 3 years. All the same, the 2021 class size should get into the low 20’sat minimum for this cycle.
***SCHOLARSHIP CHART CLICK HERE***
2021 Positional Needs
Done (or Close to Done)
Quarterback
Tight End
Offensive Tackle
Wide Receiver
It’ll be a big spring and summer for Tyler Buchner who may have many nits picked as he plays in a smaller Californian league that saw him put up a ridiculous 4,474 passing yards at 16.8 yards per attempt with 53 touchdowns to just 6 interceptions. That plus 1,610 rushing yards at 12.6 yards per carry and another 28 touchdowns. If he excels in the all-star circuit it would be a shock if Buchner isn’t a 5-star by the time he begins his senior season. He’s also planning on enrolling early, too.
No surprise as the Irish have the No. 1 tight end committed again in Cane Berrong. That’ll do with a pair of blue-chips coming in for 2020 ahead of him.
Blake Fisher is currently the No. 55 player in the country as a tackle with a ceiling probably even higher than that. Sure, you could easily add another tackle (they probably will) but in addition to Fisher you have 4 players in the 2019-20 classes all with 4 years left today and each of them are tackles until otherwise noted.
A pair of blue-chip receivers are already on board for 2021, too. Five bodies over 2 cycles is probably enough (particularly with the quality and talent) but if ’21 is a larger class of course a third wideout would be welcome.
Need Numbers
Running Back
Offensive Guard
Defensive Tackle
If we are blessed enough to bring Will Shipley (current No. 1 all-purpose back out of Charlotte) aboard then you can likely shut down this position. If not, and we’re talking more about 4-star or 3-star players, then at least 2 bodies need to follow up Chris Tyree.
There’s a lot of smoke about current ’21 commit offensive guard Greg Crippen looking elsewhere. With or without him there’s a pretty big need for at least two interior linemen prospects.
Others like the trio of 2020 recruits at defensive tackle more than me so I was tempted to put this position down below. Either way, there’s some work to be done outside of commit Gabriel Rubio who is a Top 100 recruit at the moment.
Need Talent
Defensive End
Linebacker
Corner
Safety
Isaiah Foskey (2019 freshman) looks promising and big things are expected of incoming freshman Jordan Botelho at defensive end. It’s fair to say NaNa Osafo-Mensah disappointed a little this year (let’s see where he stands in the spring) and I don’t know what to expect from Alex Ehrensberger or if he’ll remain on the edge anyway. In order to keep the good times rolling at this position a really talented 2021 class is needed.
Notre Dame, somewhat controversially, passed on linebackers for 2020 citing numbers and liking the talent currently on campus. The former is easier to swallow as 10 out of the 11 linebackers going into 2020 are eligible to be back for 2021. The assessment on talent will surely change and now linebacker becomes a big need moving forward for the next recruiting class.
The Irish just added 3 corners and 1 safety for 2020, none of them blue-chip recruits. Enough said.
Word is McKinley is leaning to coming back. It had some to do with Long leaving.
We only brought in 2 OL this past cycle. Is it that we need interior guys more than tackles ? There seem to be some(3-4) big time linemen giving ND a good look. The type of guys that are hard to pass on if they are interested.
Same at WR we have two good ones but some other big time targets are looking. Buckner having a good summer could be an attraction for 2021 WRs.
I’d love to get Shipley but he’s a lot like Tyree, a bigger more powerful RB would be nice too…….yes I’m being greedy.
It’s super weird to me that the coaches were so sure they could only go to 18 with the recruiting class, given that they are (as you note) 5 scholarships fewer than they were at this point last year. It also seems like there are some obvious transfer candidates based on depth and eligibility:
– At least one of Flemister/Smith/Williams, especially if Tony Jones comes back
– Wardlow (if he can graduate before the season and go somewhere he might play)
– Wright (if Kmet stays; I’ve read somewhere he will be graduation-ready by the end of next summer)
– Robertson (there have been rumors he will leave as well)
– One if not two LBs
– Maybe one of the backup QBs, assuming Book is back
So, realistically, that’s very likely below 85 (maybe a few below 85) with quasi-natural attrition, without accounting for surprise/non-obvious depth chart losses.
It makes me wonder if they’re going to target more grad transfers. That might not be a bad strategy – it seems like there might be quite a bit of value on the transfer market now with the 4-game redshirt rule and the normalization of the transfer portal process. I’m hoping there is a talented cornerback who pops up.
Also Pryor is a possible 2021 grad student.
As far as GT’s Kelly basically said, never say never but, doubtful. I think Kelly has a good idea of who is staying or going. They would have taken one more last week, so the door isn’t completely shut.
Yea it’s possible they weren’t set on 18 but were setting their sights a little higher on quality if they were to bring anyone else in and not just take a body to take a body.
Kelly has obviously gotten to a pretty decent spot juggling the scholarship limit if we are complaining a bit about ONLY being 5 over the current limit (I’m not knocking your point, just trying to put it into perspective). Prior to the last few years we may have only taken 13 or 14 guys!
Yeah, I think they would have taken any blue chip DB who wanted to join, and maybe another OL, but everything else was filled up and with good talent. Well, other than LB of course.
“Kelly has obviously gotten to a pretty decent spot juggling the scholarship limit if we are complaining a bit about ONLY being 5 over the current limit”
Agreed, and great point. I don’t think they really could have pushed it too much more this year with recruits to sign, especially since Kelly and Polian have directly said they know who is coming back next year. So, obvious enough, if they knew they had room to add more incoming recruits, they would have taken a higher number.
This isn’t Alabama where you’re going to force depth players to greyshirt for no reason besides being buried. I think they’ve done a good job in recent years of “encouraging” players to transfer if they wish to get playing time and staying near the 85 limit, but I’m also glad that they’re not pushing it to the extreme either. Seems like a pretty happy medium place to be right now that’s about as fair as it can be for the kids while still giving the program the wiggle room they need to compete.
Watch out for Cane Berrong decommitting and switching to Oregon. He could follow Chip Long.
Long’s going to Oregon? In what capacity?
So do either of the Christmas scholarships affect this, or are they just for the remainder of the year?
From what I read, those 2 scholarships are for the 2019-2020 school year