2026 ND Portal Targets

[IrishLax]

We keep talking about DT, but K perplexes me as well...we have nothing there and didn't recruit from HS.

However, the transfer portal just started and I will try and focus on my job lol

We will find someone who can kick a football, there are enough dudes out there that you can find someone who is average even late in the cycle.

There are not a lot of 300 pound / proven DTs.

 

[arrowryan]

Yeah, I see that guy on Twitter. Anyone know what his story is? Legit or fraud?

He’s the biggest fraud of all frauds

 

[IrishinSyria]

To play devil's advocate, ND obviously wanted Ibirogba. The beat was talking about him immediately and ND tried to get a visit. Same for Ian Strong, same for Nick Marsh, same for the now USC CB, same for the UCF DT...

So the staff absolutely wanted these guys and no matter how this lands, I'm not sweeping that under the rug. There will be a learning curve for Martin/Freeman I expect them to work on for next year.

I mean the learning may just be that unless you’re willing to dedicate a higher share of your revenue share money to the portal than we are you’re not going to be able to consistently land more than one or two starters out of it.

With our recruiting classes getting better and better under Freeman, I’d expect us to allocate less and less to the portal and more and more to keeping guys who already are here. Doesn’t mean we should stop taking swings in the portal, but I don’t think I’d expect our batting average to go up in the future.

 

[Huntr]

If they miss on Gilliam then they are really running out of options. The DT position for 2026 is not sustainable and anyone who tries to sugar coat it is a rube. You cannot rely on youth + no depth at a position like that. I don't want to go back to the era of Carlo Calabrese playing emergency nose tackle.

ND, and a lot of folks on this board, fundamentally do not understand player movement through the portal.

 

[Classic Irish]

He’s the biggest fraud of all frauds

I believe you but how so? Does he just make stuff up?

 

[notredomer23]

Gilliam unless he left in the middle of the night is supposed to still be on campus. If that is truly the case, CB could be agent driven to drive up the price. #copium

 

[Huntr]

I believe you but how so? Does he just make stuff up?

He posts shit he reads on message boards like it's OC.

 

[arrowryan]

I believe you but how so? Does he just make stuff up?

Takes stuff from VIP sites and claims it as his own. He said Nick Marsh was on campus and a day later he committed to IU. He couldn’t have been more wrong.

 

[RudyVerse]

We keep talking about DT, but K perplexes me as well...we have nothing there and didn't recruit from HS.

However, the transfer portal just started and I will try and focus on my job lol

I honestly don't care about kicker until we have 2 DTs signed. It doesn't matter if we don't have a middle of the defense and our best returning interior player was 6th in the rotation last year...

 

[JerseyIrishMan]

Gotta pay a premium to land who you want. No such thing as overpaying in this market. Just need to prioritize and allocate effectively.

 

[Jiggafini19Deux]

ISD keeps making the great point that Dawson was like the 80th ranked portal DT last year. There are guys a DT that can make an impact on the team that are still in the portal.

The issue is that the fanbase is conflating the top rated DTs as being a difference maker. Every DT in the portal would project as a rotation DT in 2025. There isn't an Aaron Donald or Jalen Carter in the portal to fuel the revenge tour. Just because Mateen Ibirogba was the top rated portal DT doesn't mean there aren't other DTs that can help the program in a similar way (or even better).

Another fantastic point.

 

[RudyVerse]

Nakos from ON3 now with a CB to Tennessee for Xavier. Good lord we got smoked.

 

[NDPhilly]

Ok now we can panic

 

[Cpnd1]

Wetting the bed as we speak

 

[rtrn2glory]

Bottom line is everyone is willing to overpay except us. We'll prolly end up circling these two weeks as a big reason why/if we don't reach our potential in 2026

 

[SoIll]

Poverty Progrum

 

[stpeteirish]

I find it fascinating that people are obsessing over players that only a few days ago nobody had ever really heard of. Makes it very difficult for me to feel all bent about "missing out" on these guys. I want to let the process play out fully before I assess what the portal was or was not for Notre Dame. My fandom will lose very sleep over a WR from Rutgers going to Cal. WR, TE seem like luxury positions. It's obvious DL is the pain point and they just hired a really good DL coach. Let's watch it play out.

Very curious to see if any other guys start jumping in and set visits to ND right away.

Good point, until yesterday I had never heard of Ian Strong. And, since he's going to Cal, I may never heard of him again.

 

[arrowryan]

We suck again

 

[rtrn2glory]

What is the exact penalty for "breaking" the $20 million salary cap? is that even a thing or

 

[IrishTusker]

Why should fans pay hundreds (thousands) of dollars to see an ND game when the program is this cheap? If ND won't pay, neither should ND fans.

 

[rtrn2glory]

hell at this point, find 2-3 DT's that you can coach up and sign them just so we won't have a traffic cone lining up there in the fall.

 

[Huntr]

What is the exact penalty for "breaking" the $20 million salary cap? is that even a thing or

The 20.5 mill is a different pile of money than NIL.


NIL is not limited.

 

[IrishFanForever23]

Some posters saying Graham will be staying at Ohio St.

 

[BeauBenken]

They didn't give that much of a shit about Ian Strong. They reallllllly wanted Marsh, and liked the ISU DB a lot too.

DT is the position where I'm perplexed but holding out hope until the clock strikes midnight. By all accounts, it's where they wanted to spend the most money because they feel pretty good about most other positions on the roster. If they lose out on Gilliam, they need to do a lot of soul searching about what their "budgets" look like and how they approached the portal. They are nowhere close to competitive with what $$ is getting thrown around at the top guys that have already come off the board. It's hard to square how good HS recruiting has been with how ND has yet to land a single player in the portal.

Wasn't it reported that we have been more than competitive money-wise on some of these targets. Somebody said Gilliam was offered more by ND than by Tennessee and others. Marsh was offered a substantial package reportedly.

 

[NDpendent]

Wetting the bed as we speak

I literally just jumped back in bed just to take a piss.

 

[RudyVerse]

Again, if you can't go all in, or even half-all in on the "run it back" Marcus Freeman year, when you have a heisman level QB, a deep roster everywhere but DL, what are we even doing as a program in 2026?

Just hoping and praying?

 

[Dale]

Nakos from ON3 now with a CB to Tennessee for Xavier. Good lord we got smoked.

Definitely a failure if they don’t land Gilliam. It’ll be an overpay, just pay it.

Someone in the room gotta be like we can’t not have a DT.

 

[NDMatt91]

Are they saving the money just so they can just buy the top Defensive Tackles in the 2027 class?

 

[FightingIrishLover7]

ND accounting nerds "oh no, this DT no longer fits into our imaginary made up monetary value matrix!"

 

[MacIrish75]

I mean if I was Marcus, I'd be league bound after this fiasco. What a fustercluck.