Your weekly dose of Notre Dame news, opinion, and other stuff.

3 News Stories

#1 Not great news from Notre Dame football as rising redshirt sophomore offensive lineman Charles Jagusah broke his arm in an UTV accident while on a summer break with several teammates in Wyoming at the home of safety Luke Talich. He joins fellow offensive lineman Guerby Lambert (shoulder surgery) on the injury list. While it could be worse, it’s another significant setback for Jagusah who missed all but 3 playoff games last year after coming back from a torn pectoral muscle.

The early reporting suggests Jagusah won’t be back until October and Notre Dame is 100% opening fall camp without him. He was slotted to play right guard which leaves us with this lineup beginning next month:

LT Knapp
LG Schrauth
C Craig
RG
RT Wagner

We’ve found one of the main talking points for the fall camp preview articles!

#2 Notre Dame was on the main page of ESPN recently with an article looking at the top areas of concerns for the top 25 college football teams heading into 2025. The concern for the Irish? It’s…tight end. The blurb:

Since 2011, the Fighting Irish have had a whopping 10 tight ends selected in the NFL draft, including last season’s leading receiver, Mitchell Evans, who had 43 catches for 421 yards with three touchdowns. While the Irish feel they’ve upgraded their wide receiver group with the additions of Virginia transfer Malachi Fields and Wisconsin’s Will Pauling, tight end remains a bit of a question mark heading into preseason camp. Senior Eli Raridon has the size (6-foot-7) and hands to excel at the position, but he was plagued by injuries during his first couple of college seasons, after tearing an ACL as a freshman. He had 11 catches for 90 yards with two touchdowns in 2024. The status of another tight end, Cooper Flanagan, who tore his left Achilles tendon in the Sugar Bowl, is in question.

Is tight end an important enough position where it would be the top concern for this program right now? I’m not sure it would crack my top 5 at the moment. I went into reading the article thinking quarterback had to be the issue but of course Eli Raridon was the featured photograph on the main page.

#3 If you ain’t cheating you ain’t trying and the Big 12 is mad about things. That’s the word coming out of the media days this week in Dallas as the Big 12 let the complaints fly about the current landscape of college football. Some of the comments from coaches were as follows:

  • No one knows the rules.
  • Programs don’t know what kind of NIL deals Deloitte will clear or not.
  • Schools are promising more in contract offers than they can afford under the new compensation cap.
  • Under the table cash from collectives is being paid to recruits, against the rules.
  • Wealthy schools front loaded their cap spending while poorer teams have to catch up.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Recruiting

More and more commits for Notre Dame over the last week. First up is wide receiver Kaydon Finley (0.9499) who becomes the top ranked wideout of the Irish class. He was the 3rd wide receiver commit this year and was followed up by another in Devin Fitzgerald (0.8883) son of famous guy Larry and surely destined to rise up the rankings soon after an impressive off-season. If that’s not enough, and apparently for Notre Dame it wasn’t, speedster wide receiver Brayden Robinson (0.8991) became the 5th(!) commit at this position for the 2026 cycle.

A big joyous surprise as wide receiver Calvin Russell (0.9735) spurns Michigan and committed to Syracuse.

The Wolverines did add cornerback Dorian Barney (0.9356) recently.

The country’s top defensive lineman Lamar Brown (0.9967) is staying local and will go to LSU.

A big time defensive lineman came off the board as Bryce Perry-Wright (0.9803) committed to Texas A&M.

Another big time defensive lineman Jamarion Carlton (0.9802) committed to Baylor from nearby Temple, Texas.

Alabama added top safety Jireh Edwards (0.9864) out of St. Frances in Maryland.

Watch out for Stanford as they added safety Lasiah Jackson (0.9440) out of Georgia.

One of the top corners this cycle Chauncey Kennon (0.9662) is headed to Florida State.

Florida picked up linebacker Malik Morris (0.9230) from in-state Lakeland.

Wide receiver Jalen Lott (0.9725) committed to Oregon.

California running back Brian Bonner (0.9526) is headed to Washington.

Linebacker Brayden Rouse (0.9595) has picked Tennessee.

Uniform of the Week

Tennessee has been wearing smokey grey uniforms for several years and most of the time they are controversial. Looking back, they’ve had a couple sets that were okay and a few others that were big misses. Last week, the Vols released their “Volunteer Spirit” uniforms with a pretty extensive photoshoot at an airfield. Now, I am pretty steadfast in believing using military insignias and design elements are a bad idea unless you’re one of the service academies. It’s not really a moral issues, if you want to call it that, more of a tacky thing. But, I have to admit these Tennessee uniforms are bold and pretty damn sharp.

I like the mixture of dark and light grey. It looks like the helmet starts in light grey at the top and gradients into dark grey to match the jersey. Plus, the light grey pops just enough on the jersey. The little dashes are neat and while the military-like numbers I can do without it this isn’t an uniform that hits you over the head with the military notes. Additionally, this shows how accessories (especially the long orange socks and the arm warmer) in the right color can make all the difference. Well done, Vols.

TV & Movies

Years ago, I have a memory of watching a ton of episodes of Weeds that was airing on Showtime. I can’t recall ever subscribing to Showtime or having it part of a cable package but I was there with an old friend watching it nonetheless. I am doing the math and it looks like I made it into season 5 and the only reason I remember that is because that’s the season where Alanis Morrissette shows up on the show. She was really good in Weeds and I’m surprised she hasn’t continued to do a lot more acting.

This video is an interesting look back at the first season from 2005. Our approach to marijuana has changed quite a bit since then! My other endearing memory from the show was Kevin Nealon being really funny and a big part of the show’s success. He’s coming back for Happy Gilmore 2 later this month. Kevin Nealon, supremely underrated as a comedic actor?

Tunes

I have been introduced to Dream Theater by a co-worker. He’s a massive fan with multiple Dream Theater tattoos on his body. To be clear, progressive metal is certainly not in my wheelhouse. Their first album came out in 1989 and until very recently I knew absolutely nothing about this band. The one thing I did know is drummer Mike Portnoy who has been pretty active on my YouTube algorithm through the years and seems to be the most prominent member of the band by quite a large margin.

Today’s song is called “Panic Attack” from their 2005 album Octavarium. Cool title. To me, they sound like a metal band that merged with the band Muse. Does that sound like the perfect comparison? The singer has vocals that sound eerily similar to Muse’s Matt Bellamy. For what it’s doing it’s a nice song. I could never take a whole concert of metal like this, though.