Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/259072
BY DAN MURPHY T he weight room at Speedway High School on the western edge of India- napolis is a sliver of a room lined on either side with squat racks, benches and machines. The corridor between them is narrow enough that a lengthy man could almost stretch out his arms and touch the weights on either side at the same time. Most importantly, for Notre Dame wide receiver Justin Brent, it's wedged between a hall of classrooms and the school's basketball gym. As a freshman, Brent came to school at 6 a.m. each morning to shoot 1,000 free throws before the day's first bell rang. He played football then, but his heart was set on succeeding in bas- ketball. There's a door that connects the gym to the weight room at half court. Every so often Jereme Howard — a local cop who volunteers as a strength coach for some of the students at Speedway — would fill the door's wide frame with his own and holler out at Brent on the free throw line. "You're going to need this," he said, pointing to the weights behind him. It took time, but the message even- tually sunk in. Brent grew from a bud- ding, skinny hoops player to a 6-1, 204-pound muscle-bound senior who was more than prepared physically to enroll at Notre Dame this January. When Irish head coach Brian Kelly got his first look at the early enrollee on campus this semester, he found it hard to believe he was looking at a freshman. "He had his shirt off this morning. He was running around, and he looks like a senior," Kelly said on National Signing Day. "He is a physically gifted young man. You can see a lot of the ac- colades that are out there with him in terms of where he was ranked." Brent is ranked as the top player in Indiana by both 247Sports and Ri- vals.com, which gives Notre Dame Justin Brent Has Worked His Way Up The Recruiting Rankings Brent, who moved to running back for his senior season, finished his prep career with 4,510 all- purpose yards, 58 touchdowns and an average of 14.1 yards per touch. PHOTO COURTESY SPEEDWAY HIGH SCHOOL