Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1541906
BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM JANUARY 2026 13 UNDER THE DOME "There's a ton of momentum for Notre Dame right now on the recruiting trail, and the Irish reap- ing the rewards in the 2026 cycle. It's the No. 2 class in the country. "It's the best defensive back class in the country. It's the best defensive line class in the country. Al- ways one of the best O-line classes in the country, top tight end class in the country, arguably the best running back class in the country. And Notre Dame also hit on major needs at wide receiver with guys like Kaydon Finley, [Devin] Fitzgerald. "This is a recruiting class that keeps Notre Dame in the discussion for championship football for years to come." — Steve Wiltfong, vice president of recruiting and transfer portal for Rivals and On3 "Notre Dame selling a head coach everyone wants combined with a legitimate national title contender is a heck of a recruiting cocktail. Last year's signing class didn't get that bump because it was assembled before the CFP run. This year? It felt like the Death Star being fully operational." — Pete Sampson of The Athletic "I don't want to give away all Treash's secrets. I don't know all of Treash's secrets. Sometimes lists pop up, and I will tell you that we've had great suc- cess with some of the lists that have popped up. But he's able to use numbers and statistics and games played and all sorts of information that helped us narrow our scope and focus in on the right players. … "Don't let Treash fool you. Treash is an awesome evaluator as well, and he was able to, he did a lot of evaluation for us and helped us sort of nar- row our focus and get to the right names. And so hats off to Treash. He's unbelievable at what he does." — Notre Dame football general manager Mike Martin on how director of football strategy Anthony Treash impacts recruiting "Notre Dame is the ultimate eye-test team — though its metrics are good, too — as a squad with national title potential but without a classic resume to back it up. Yes, the Irish are playing as well as any- body in the nation short of Ohio State." — Sampson on the Irish at the end of the regular season "We are seriously nearing 40 years without Notre Dame winning a championship. That Notre Dame is a relic, a school and team out of time, is one of its primary selling points, and surely has always been true. In the same way that some actors seem to have been in their mid-40s from birth (there is no way Clint Eastwood was ever a teenager), Notre Dame has always felt old-fashioned and nostalgic. "It's central to the program's appeal. Notre Dame fans seem slightly more rational than your average Southern football fan — the school has lost two national championship games in the past 13 years, and each time it did sort of look a little happy just to be there — but four decades without a title, for a signature college football brand with a fan base that expects to compete for one every season, is a Red Sox-level drought." — Will Leitch of The Athletic on including the Irish (last national title in 1988) on his list of five schools that meet the "pre- title level of desperate/insane/irrational/fevered/ screaming-into-a-mirror-until-your-face-melts-off desire for a championship" — Tyler James Irish On Social Media THEY SAID IT THEY SAID IT "My vision has always been to have a high school quarterback be the future of Notre Dame football. I know in my first two years I had to make decisions that decided to go into the transfer portal, but when Riley Leonard was our quarterback two years ago, I knew the future quarterback of Notre Dame was in-house [current redshirt freshman CJ Carr] and it was one of three people that I believe could be the future of our program. "I have a strong belief [2026 QB signee] Noah Grubbs will get here and do some great things in his first year, and we're going to continue to make sure and hope that the future of our quarterback position is built through high school recruiting." — Notre Dame head coach MARCUS FREEMAN on quarterback recruiting PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER