Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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40 PRESEASON 2025 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED Diggs, meanwhile, was so confident in his own abilities in training camp that August that he regularly pointed out how the offensive linemen in front of him could do their jobs better — to them. Statistically, 1,000-yard rusher Kyren Williams' understudy over the final eight games of the season rushed for 230 yards on 52 carries with 3 touchdowns. He also caught 6 passes for 56 yards and a score during his eight-game run. Diggs is in his final college season of eligibility in 2025, and in his second sea- son at Ole Miss after a stopover for a season with Brian Kelly at LSU. 7. MYRON TAGOVAILOA-AMOSA, DT (2017) Like Hinish, Tagovailoa-Amosa was a Rivals three-star prospect who helped Notre Dame's defensive line depth when fellow freshman Ewell struggled. His bottom line was a little more tan- gible than Hinish's, though both started strong and got continually better. Unlike Hinish, Tagovailoa-Amosa wasn't a longtime 2017 class commit- ment who stuck around, but instead was one of six players Notre Dame scooped up in the final week of the recruiting cycle. Several of them were commit- ment flips (though not MTA) and none of them ranked higher than a three-star. Among that group was eventual unani- mous All-America linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah. Meanwhile, the Hawai'i product and cousin of former Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa went on to play in all 13 of Notre Dame's games that 2017 season, making 12 tackles with 1.5 stops for loss. This offseason Tagovailoa-Amosa returned to Notre Dame as the foot- ball program's director of recruiting ad- vancement. 6. CLARENCE LEWIS, CB (2020) COV I D -19 p ro to co l s w i p e d o u t Lewis' final high school track season at Mater Dei Prep in Middletown, N.J., but it also sort of leveled the playing field for the June enrollee, since the Notre Dame football team was only able to squeeze in one spring practice before football was shut down until June. Lewis and Ryan Daly got creative in finding ways to prep Lewis to ascend during the summer once he got to Notre Dame. The latter was a linebackers coach at Lewis' high school and a full- time police officer who runs a side busi- ness training athletes. On a College Football Playoff qualifier, Lewis played in 12 games in 2020, start- ing six of them. He finished his fresh- man season with 33 tackles (1 for loss), 7 passes broken up and 1 forced fumble. 5. JULIAN LOVE, CB (2016) Love spent most of his recruiting cy- cle as a three-star prospect and bumped up late to four-star status, but still only had 13 reported offers and several of those were from Mid-American Con- ference schools. He looked so much better than that from the first day of training camp. But it wasn't until defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder was fired after Game 4 of Notre Dame's 4-8 lost season in 2016 that he moved into the starting lineup for the final eight games of that season under clandestine interim defensive co- ordinator Mike Elston. An eventual Jim Thorpe Award fi- nalist in 2018 and Irish career leader in passes broken up, Love finished his freshman season with 45 tackles, 1 in- terception, 1 fumble recovery and 1 forced fumble. 4. JOE ALT, OT (2021) With different parameters, Alt's place- ment in this spot would look like a com- puter glitch or brain cramp. After all, he'd go on to become a unanimous All-Amer- ican and a first-round draft pick. In 2021, though, he was a Rivals three-star prospect who provided an emphatic answer at left tackle as the fourth option Brian Kelly tried there that season. Fellow freshman and five-star pros- pect Blake Fisher started the 2021 sea- son opener at Florida State and was lost in that game to injury until December. Michael Carmody and Tosh Baker fol- lowed in starting before Alt got the as- signment in Game 6 against Virginia Tech and stayed there for the rest of his career. Alt came out of high school having played mostly tight end, and even quar- terback early in his career at Totino- Grace High in Fridley, Minn. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was a wonky recruiting cycle anyway when it came to both evaluations and offers. Alt had just nine offers, and only Rut- gers outside of the Midwest. NO. 3 JOSH ADAMS, RB (2015) An ACL tear in October of his junior season at Central Bucks South High near Philadelphia limited Josh Adams' scholarship offers and helped convince Rivals that he wasn't among the top 40 running backs in the 2015 class and in the three-star category. There was early opportunity at Notre