How Marcus Freeman built a Notre Dame team on the brink of winning a title

Asking college football fans to list the programs whose rosters contain the greatest number of five-star recruits will inevitably produce a handful or more of predictable answers. Alabama, which has won six national championships in the last 15 years, might be the first school someone mentions. And sure enough, the Crimson Tide led the country with 17 former five-star prospects on their roster, according to the 247Sports Team Talent Composite. Georgia, Ohio State and Texas would also be logical guesses, such is the recruiting power at institutions most people would consider blue blood. All three ranked in the top five nationally in the five-star arms race for 2024. And all three qualified for this year’s College Football Playoff, with the Buckeyes still alive in their quest for a national championship.

Four more participants in the expanded 12-team format (Clemson, Oregon, Penn State and Tennessee) were among 23 programs nationally whose rosters housed multiple five-star prospects, dating back to Alabama and its star-studded position atop the hierarchy to the sextet of educates the base of this metaphorical totem pole with exactly two of those recruiting gems each: USC, Ole Miss, North Carolina, Kentucky, Arkansas and TCU, who made an impressive run to the championship national. title game in 2022. In total, nearly 60% of this season’s College Football Playoff participants finished squarely among the densest group of teams with top-tier talent.

While it was probably intuitive for fans to place unlikely qualifiers Arizona State, Boise State and SMU outside the sport’s five-star oligarchy, a much smaller percentage of viewers would have also included Notre Dame, winner of eight national championships. in the Associated Press and Coaches Poll era, dating back to 1936, and three more national titles before that. But effectively, the version of Notre Dame that will face the Buckeyes at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta on Monday night only has one five-star recruit among its ranks, the same number that graced the rosters of SMU, Utah, Louisville, Texas Tech, Syracuse and Kansas this season.

“Winning helps everything,” Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said after his team defeated Penn State, which had five five-star recruits, in the Orange Bowl. “There are a lot of coaches that are out there recruiting, and fortunately for us, the best recruiting we can do is win.”

But how exactly are the Fighting Irish winning, and winning at such an elite level, without a handful or more of the players who were considered among the best in the country coming out of high school? Even last year’s Michigan team, which relied on high-level player development rather than supreme player acquisition to win the school’s first national championship of the 21st century, had two former five-star prospects on the roster. roster: quarterback JJ McCarthy and cornerback Will Johnson. The only five-star prospect in Notre Dame is junior linebacker Jaylen Sneed, who ranks sixth on the team in tackles with 50 and was the No. 34 player overall in the 2022 recruiting cycle.

Instead, Freeman and his coaching staff have amassed the largest collection of four-star prospects in the country, with 57 of them on this year’s roster alone, two more than Georgia and Ohio State, four more than Oklahoma and seven more than Alabama. , Texas and Oregon. Such a high volume of blue-chip talent, albeit almost entirely four-star recruits rather than five-star phenoms, still places the Fighting Irish among the top five rosters in the country in average prospect rating, according to 247Sports, behind only Alabama (93.79), Ohio State (93.29), Georgia (92.85) and Texas (91.98) in that category. Notre Dame’s score of 91.14 is the program’s second-highest score since the Team Talent Composite was first measured in 2015.

“Five stars is a subjective preview of what someone thinks [a player] could be in college,” former 247Sports recruiting director Steve Wiltfong, who is now the vice president of national college football recruiting and On3 transfer portal, said during an interview with FOX Sports. “Everyone has the opportunity. to write your own story. And if you’re a first round pick [when you leave college]you should have been a five star recruit. These guys [at Notre Dame] “I get to hear some of their names very early in the draft, and that’s really who they are, and not what they were given before their careers at Notre Dame or anywhere else.”

During Freeman’s tenure as head coach, which began when he was promoted from defensive coordinator to replace Brian Kelly on Dec. 3, 2021, the Fighting Irish have thrived in the upper echelon of four-star recruits. In 2022, Freeman’s first recruiting class was headlined by Sneed, the only five-star prospect on the current roster, but also included a surprising 17 players ranked between 109th overall in outside linebacker Josh Burnham and 365th overall. overall on quarterback Steve Angeli. , whose valiant relief appearance against Penn State produced a critical field goal while starter Riley Leonard was being evaluated for a concussion. In 2023, Freeman wasn’t able to sign any of the top 60 players in the country, but he did manage to land 15 players ranked 61st overall, including offensive lineman Charles Jagusah, who could step in at left tackle against Ohio State on Monday night. night after getting lost. most of the season due to injury, and 285th overall on offensive lineman Sullivan Absher, a special teams contributor. Freeman’s most recent recruit, in 2024, featured 10 players ranked 41st overall, linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa, who had four tackles in the win over Penn State, and running back Aneyas ranked 251st overall Williams, who caught five. Passes for 66 yards against the Nittany Lions.

Freeman’s philosophy of identifying specific players and an unwavering belief in on-campus development continues to ring true in the transfer portal, where Notre Dame’s last three groups of newcomers ranked 75th nationally in 2022, 38th nationally in 2023 and 40th nationally in 2024, a far cry from the giant group added by Ohio State last winter. Only twice during that three-year span have the Fighting Irish even signed players ranked among the top 40 transfers in the country for a given cycle: Former Northwestern safety Brandon Joseph was ranked the No. 17 overall transfer in 2022; Former Wake Forest quarterback Sam Hartman was rated the No. 7 overall transfer in 2023, and both have since progressed to the NFL.

But that doesn’t mean the impact of Notre Dame transfers is insignificant, just as the absence of former five-star prospects hasn’t stopped the Fighting Irish from competing for a national title. Quarterback Riley Leonard, a 44th overall transfer from Duke and a former three-star recruit out of high school, was among the nation’s top dual-threat players with 866 rushing yards and 16 touchdowns along with more than 2,600 air yards. and 19 more scores. Wide receiver Beaux Collins, the 313th overall transfer after three modest seasons at Clemson, is now Notre Dame’s second-leading receiver with 37 receptions for 458 yards and three touchdowns. Defensive back Rod Heard II, formerly of Northwestern, was the 250th overall transfer and contributed three tackles, including a sack, against Penn State after finishing high school ranked outside the top 900 players in his class.

“What do I think the country is learning about our program?” Leonard said after the Orange Bowl. “I think the most important thing is just [that] Culture wins. You see a lot of talented guys in our locker room, but you can see it anywhere in the country. I think at the end of the day it’s [about] which guys are risking their bodies and doing everything they can for the man next to them. Nobody’s thinking about draft stock or next year or anything like that, any kind of individual glory. We are all thinking about the man next to us. I think that throughout the season we showed that culture wins and [Notre Dame] “It’s a special place for a reason.”

Many industry experts believe this year’s run to the national championship could elevate Notre Dame to an even higher plane, especially as attention on Freeman continues to increase. He’s quickly become one of the most dynamic personalities in college football at just 39 years old (Freeman celebrated his birthday last week) and now he’s on the verge of leading arguably the sport’s most recognizable brand to a title for the first time. time since 1988. an achievement that would instantly make him a legend. Even the Chicago Bears have expressed interest in interviewing Freeman for their head coaching vacancy.

It would be almost impossible for the recruits not to notice, from four stars to five stars and everything in between.

“I don’t think a lot of kids, a lot of promising high school football players, knew Marcus Freeman the same way they know Kirby Smart. [at Georgia] and coaches of that magnitude,” Wiltfong told FOX Sports. “But now that they have a chance to see how he operates, oh man, it’s going to be a big deal when people know they’re going to be on the phone with Marcus. Freeman and how passionate he is about Notre Dame. It will be intoxicating. “I think they can be a consistent winner year after year.”

Michael Cohen covers college football and basketball for FOX Sports with an emphasis on the Big Ten. follow him on @Michael_Cohen13.

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