Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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24 JUNE/JULY 2023 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED a vyper in 2020, then ping-ponged be- tween linebacker and rover in 2021. Botelho had been around long enough and played little enough to wonder if it would happen for him at Notre Dame. He had cleared enough hurdles to wonder if there would be a payoff. But he never reached the point of walking away and shoved away thoughts about restarting somewhere else. This 2023 opportunity is his reward for sticking around. "He's really mature and really made a point to go for it," Washington said. "He could have went any other way but forward with it, and he decided to go forward with it." For that, Botelho can thank an influ- ential figure at home. "My mom's a great example," he said. "She works very hard, and I know she has many setbacks, too, but she just kept going. She's done a great job, so I kind of modeled myself after her, just try my best and never give up." Notre Dame could afford to wait for him to pick his lane. Isaiah Foskey was the Irish's pass-rush staple the last two years and the starter at vyper. He posted back-to-back 11-sack seasons and set the program's all-time sack record. Now, though, Foskey is NFL bound and Notre Dame is reconstructing its pass rush after losing three starters on the defensive line. In recent years, the Irish have had ex- perienced rotation players ready to slide in for departed starters. This year, the new wave is less proven. Botelho might have starting-caliber talent, but he was not a weekly contributor last year. He played 127 snaps, 48 of which came in the Gator Bowl. But that final game re-lit the fuse on long-held breakout visions. He earned the start after Foskey left for the NFL and pestered South Carolina's pass protection. "I saw it as an opportunity, so I wanted to go out and try my best and just see what I could do," Botelho said. The result will remake Notre Dame's pass rush if he can produce anything like it this fall. It's hard to imagine the Irish finishing top-15 in sacks per game again if he's not a consistent producer. More than anything, though, he wants to show the Irish can rely on him — and not just as a pass rusher. Asked what he wants people to find out this year, he didn't start listing pass rush moves he hopes to unleash on offensive tackles. He started with a mindset that he has worked just as hard to build. "That I'm under control," Botelho said, "play hard, focused, and a team player." JASON ONYE SURGING IN MAKE-OR-BREAK YEAR In two years of college football, de- fensive tackle Jason Onye has gained all of 3 pounds, which on the surface, sounds alarmingly low for a defensive lineman who arrived at Notre Dame billed as a project. Strength gains, though, are not just about adding mass. For Onye, it meant overhauling his body composition. Onye enrolled in June 2021 weighing 289 pounds with 27 percent body fat, he said. He dropped to 275 by the end of 2022 to help cut the latter figure, even though it would come with a reduction in weight at a position that demands bulk. But that was only half the work. Onye emerged from winter workouts last month at 292 pounds and about 12 percent body fat. A certified specimen. "Right now, I feel good," Onye said. "I basically still weigh the same, I just lost body fat." The on-field result is a quicker, stron- ger Onye who has staked a claim to a 2023 role. He repped with the second-team defensive line all spring, primarily play- ing nose tackle. The Irish want a mini- mum of eight players in the defensive line rotation, four edge players and four tackles. He's tracking toward being part of that group come Aug. 26 in Dublin. "His overall athleticism, he can bend better," Notre Dame defensive line coach Al Washington said. "His output is higher, longer, especially inside the trenches. When you're in better shape, everything is calmer." Onye reaching that point figured to be a process from the moment he showed up, and not a short one. He didn't start playing football until 2018 — the same year that fellow Irish defensive lineman Javontae Jean-Baptiste began his college career. He played high school football in Rhode Island, a region not known for churning out FBS prospects en masse or providing stout competition for the few it does produce. If the initial foray into college football felt like swimming upstream, there's the cause. "When I first came in here, I just wanted to understand football," Onye said. "I just wanted to come here, un- derstand and adjust to everything." Sure enough, he spent two years be- hind the scenes and off the radar. He started out at big end, then moved to Junior Jason Onye has reshaped his body and is primed to break into the interior line rotation after logging just 8 snaps over the last two seasons. PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER