'09 IN ATH Tyler Eifert (ND Verbal 7/8/08)

[NELL]

Notre Dame recruit Tyler Eifert and Bishop Dwenger won their season opener Friday, routing Concordia 36-7 in no small part because of the 6-foot-6 safety/wide receiver. Eifert had two interceptions, multiple hard hits jarring balls loose from Concordia's receivers and also caught two passes for 71 yards.

His presence as a safety, though, was the most impressive thing. He, along with his 6-foot-5 safety Brian Fogler, present a tall, intimidating back line in the secondary.

"We held them to seven points," Eifert said. "Our goal is a shutout, but seven points isn't bad."

Eifert's performance became more dominant because Concordia has one of Fort Wayne's best quarterbacks in senior Jake Owens and runs a spread, pass-happy offense. Led by Eifert, Owens completed 6 of 26 passes and threw four interceptions.

"Along with the pressure and having a guy like Eifert playing center field for them makes it pretty difficult to throw the football," Concordia coach Dean Doerffler said. "Especially this early in the year.

"...Well, (Eifert)'s going to Notre Dame, so does that answer the question. He's pretty good."

Another guy who stood out while I watched was Dwenger sophomore defensive end Tony Springman. At 6-foot-7, 225-pounds, he was in the Concordia backfield a lot Friday, which helped force Owens to throw up passes for Eifert.

He could be a basketball recruit, too, but he might be worth watching in the future.




By Michael RothsteinThe Journal Gazette

 

[IrishAddiction]

Tyler with two pics and two receptions is good to hear.......also interesting to hear about the sophomore DE springman. Great post NELL

 

[NDinL.A.]

That was a fantastic post Ness. But wait, only 3 posts in 2+ years? He's like the Anti-GD93.

I love tall DB's and safeties (Todd Light was a favorite of mine), so if he's a great ballhawk I'd love to see him in our defensive backfield...

 

[GO IRISH!!!]

Seeing him as a defensive back would be awesome, but if he is that athletic, having him at WR is too good of an option to pass up. Even TE, but he looks like a guy that could really make things happen down field.

 

[Ricochet]

Seeing him as a defensive back would be awesome, but if he is that athletic, having him at WR is too good of an option to pass up. Even TE, but he looks like a guy that could really make things happen down field.

Being athletic is one thing but does he have the speed to be a WR? A would rather have him as an athletic TE that has good speed for a TE rather then being an average or below average speed WR.

Me feeling is that speed kills and that if you can't catch the person then what does it matter how tall or strong somebody is. Sure big slow WR might be fine in the red zone but other than that I would rather go with speed well as long as they have the hands to make the speed worth while.

 

[NDinL.A.]

Wow, I need to learn to read more gooder. I thought he was 6'2", not 6'6" or 6'5". In that case, he's a definite tight-end if his top-end speed is lacking, and not a DB like I said earlier...

 

[BGIF]

"bothered a bulging disc"

"bothered a bulging disc"

That's doesn't sound good.



Up to 235

benchs 315

Ex_Saints star ready to start Irish career | The Journal Gazette, Fort Wayne, Ind.

Nice article by Rothstein

 

[Ironman8]

Irish tight end discovers work on his ‘time away’

Swikar Patel | The Journal Gazette

Notre Dame tight end Tyler Eifert mops the floor Saturday as part of renovation work at St. Felix Friary in Huntington.
Time away, he calls this. He picks up a mop. He picks up a paintbrush. He cleans, he dusts, he walks the long hardwood hallways, scarred by the years and the feet of devout men whose mandate you can still read in faded paint on the stucco arches overhead: SILENTIUM.

Sun and surf and a little melatonin time on a sugar-sand beach this is not.

Instead, it’s St. Felix, an 83-year-old friary on the south side of town, where Tyler Eifert has landed this Saturday as a favor to a childhood friend. The friend, Jake Tippmann, is the son of John V. Tippmann, whose foundation bought the 29-acre friary and grounds last August from United Brethren Church, which had owned it since 1979. Operations manager Rob Mayo and a literal army of volunteers (“Over 100,” Mayo says) have been feverishly renovating it since, with the intention of making it first a Catholic retreat center and, later, 18 months out or so, perhaps returning it to its original service as a seminary.

In any case, here Eifert is this day, flood of dark hair spilling from beneath a Notre Dame cap spun backward, pushing a mop. Not the way you might imagine a Notre Dame football player spending his “time away,” a term Eifert uses deliberately to distinguish it from the less-accurate “time off.”

There is, frankly, no such thing when you play football at a place like Notre Dame. There just isn’t.

“Yeah, it’s a year-round thing,” Eifert says.

And so the former Dwenger standout and presumptive Next Great Irish Tight End got home from South Bend on Friday, and on May 30 he’ll go back. Summer school starts then, virtually a prerequisite these days for anyone who plays one of the money sports in a power athletic program. Lifting weights and running and working out starts then, too, as if it ever stops.

“It’s kind of like having a job,” Eifert says. “But it’s not that bad. We get Fridays off, so we get a three-day weekend. At first it sounds like it kind of sucks going back up there for your whole summer, but it’s not that bad.”

This is especially true if you’re Eifert, for whom hardly anything was bad from the moment it went bad last fall for his fellow tight end, Kyle Rudolph. Rudolph went down for the season in mid-October, Eifert stepped in … and seven games later he’d become not just an acceptable stand-in but a money receiver who caught 27 passes, 16 of which went for either a first down or a touchdown.

“Easy to cover, hard to stop,” says Notre Dame assistant Chuck Martin, who coaches the safeties and thus has seen a lot of Eifert in practice. “I watch him every day in practice, and it’s just amazing how the ball’s in the air and it doesn’t look like there’s going to be a completion, and that son of a gun finds a way to reel it in.”

All Eifert knows about that is how relieved he felt when he started for the first time against Western Michigan and found a way not to embarrass himself. In fact, he caught four balls and scored a touchdown that day, and Notre Dame had its next tight end.

“That just kind of let me know I belonged there and I can play at that level,” Eifert says.

And on this level, in an 83-year-old friary, on one of the precious few days before it all begins again?

He mops. He paints. He cleans. He aces Time Away.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

Three underclassmen could bolster a weak tight end class - ESPN

Basically talks about how the 2012 draft will be a weak TE class. States that Tyler would be a huge boost to the TE class if he left early. He would be a borderline day 2 pick.

I say he stays until 2012 and leaves with a year of eligibility, would be a solid 2nd round pick.

 

[IrishLax]

He's a TE in the Aaron Hernandez pass-catcher mold. Needs to develop more and he could be a 3rd rounder. Right now I don't think he is anything more than a 5th-7th.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

Eifert has the most upside of the group and is more likely than the others to declare, in which case he would have a chance to be a Day 2 pick.

Just saying I think you are selling him short. He is bigger than Hernandez and not as fast. If he continues to play the way he has been playing this year he would be a borderline day 2 pick. If he adds some weight, improves blocking and continues to produce in the pass game I think he would be a 2nd rounder next year.

 

[The Polish Irishman]

Just a 3 star

 

[Riddickulous]

Made first team tight end on Sporting News' midseason All-American team.

 

[ulukinatme]

I think we have enough tight ends...

Hah. I agree man. Now I would be all for this if we went after an elite TE who could challenge and or make our other great TE's better but with Yeatman coming back to go along with incumbent starter (Ragone who is also a soph) and Rudolph AND Fauria, this position is waaaaaaaay 2 stacked to be offering a run of the mill TE with an offer from Purwho.

Saw this comment on Page 1 when we were recruiting Eifert. The comment was given due to the high caliber TEs we already had, but they didn't all pan out. Kinda funny if we would have passed on him, huh?

Turned out that Rudolph left early, Ragone has been unfortunately injured and had problems off the field. Fauria left the university, and Yeatman transferred to Maryland. A lot of things can happen...glad we ended up with Eifert

 

[BGIF]

Saw this comment on Page 1 when we were recruiting Eifert. The comment was given due to the high caliber TEs we already had, but they didn't all pan out. Kinda funny if we would have passed on him, huh?

Turned out that Rudolph left early, Ragone has been unfortunately injured and had problems off the field. Fauria left the university, and Yeatman transferred to Maryland. A lot of things can happen...glad we ended up with Eifert

Eifert almost joined those former ND TEs. He had a back injury as a HS senior. As a freshman they considered surgery but didn't think it would resolve the problem. I figured it was a career ending injury. Guys with back problems can't lift and don't do well fighting with 300 pound DEs and DTs. He sat out and the next year and then boldly filled the void when Rudolph was injured.

Never too many TEs.

 

[military_irish]

I never knew he was classified as a ATH but I wonder what kind of impact he would be as a DB considering he is 6'6.

Love him as a TE though.

 

[Epitome]

He's a great kid. His father posted on here a couple of times when he was being recruited. He contacted me through PM a number of times to let me know where Tyler was in the recruiting process. I was always in his corner. During his senior season his body started to fill out and he went from being a WR to a TE. His rankings suffered because many scouts didn't think he had the frame to fill into a TE. When his father contacted me right before he committed, he assured me that Tyler was much bigger than everyone thought he was. He also said that he still played like a receiver. Anyways, I haven't seen his dad on the board since he committed If he still reads it, I'd like to say congrats. You're boy is everything that you said he'd be.

 

[koonja]

by hansensouthbend
ND TE Tyler Eifert named to Mackey midseason watchlist. Former ND TE Joseph Fauria, now at UCLA, also named. Winner announced Dec. 8.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

Scout and Rivals had hm as a 3*, but ESPN liked him. They gave him a grade of 79, which would be 4* and the 13th TE in the class.

 

[BeauBenken]

I would hate to see this offense without Eifert. The kid has some serious hands for a TE. So many bad balls are thrown his way that he still catches, and he is constantly keeping drives alive.

 

[NDFan4Life]

Eifert Named Mackey Award Semifinalist

Eifert Named Mackey Award Semifinalist

BETHPAGE, N.Y. - The Nassau County Sports Commission has announced eight semifinalists for the 2011 John Mackey Award. Listed alphabetically, they are Dwayne Allen (JR, Clemson), Orson Charles (JR, Georgia), Drake Dunsmore (SR, Northwestern), Tyler Eifert (SO, Notre Dame), Coby Fleener (SR, Stanford), Ladarius Green (SR, Louisiana), Jacob Pederson (SO, Wisconsin) and Nick Provo (SR, Syracuse).

The eight semifinalists were determined by confidential balloting of the John Mackey Award Selection Committee. The 2011 John Mackey Award finalists will be announced on Monday, November 21, 2011 at www.johnmackeyaward.org. The website also features all Mackey Award related information including the John Mackey Selection Committee, the selection process and award criteria, information on all past award recipients and a high resolution image of the award trophy available for download.

The Nassau County Sports Commission, a non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization sponsored by Briarcliffe College, is responsible for the administration of the John Mackey Award and the John Mackey Award Selection Committee. For additional information, please visit www.johnmackeyaward.org or The Nassau County Sports Commission.

The John Mackey Award is a member of the National College Football Awards Association (NCFAA). The NCFAA was founded in 1997 as a coalition of the major collegiate football awards to protect, preserve and enhance the integrity, influence and prestige of the game's predominant awards. The NCFAA encourages professionalism and the highest standards for the administration of its member awards and the selection of their candidates and recipients. For more information, visit the association's official website, National College Football Awards Association.

2011 John Mackey Award Semi-Finalists
(alphabetical order)

Dwayne Allen (JR, Clemson)
Orson Charles (JR, Georgia)
Drake Dunsmore (SR, Northwestern)
Tyler Eifert (SO, Notre Dame)
Coby Fleener (SR, Stanford)
Ladarius Green (SR, Louisiana)
Jacob Pederson (SO, Wisconsin)
Nick Provo (SR, Syracuse)

Mackey Award Semifinalists Named > NCAA Football > News

 

[Irish Man3]

I'll say Fleener or Allen wins.

 

[NDPhilly]

Fleener 24 rec 487 yds 8 TD

Allen 42 rec 518 yds 5 TD

Eifert 51 rec 589 yds 5 TD

 

[Irish Man3]

Fleener 24 rec 487 yds 8 TD

Allen 42 rec 518 yds 5 TD

Eifert 51 rec 589 yds 5 TD

Fleener is going to get a lot of love because of the A Luck/Stanford love rolling through the media.

I'd be shocker if it wasn't Fleener.

Allen is probably the most NFL ready TE in my mind.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

Fleener 24 rec 487 yds 8 TD

Allen 42 rec 518 yds 5 TD

Eifert 51 rec 589 yds 5 TD

These three should be the finalist.

 

[IrishLax]

Eifert named a finalist. If he gets in the endzone one or two times this weekend he should win it. Leads in everything but TDs.

 

[Irish Man3]

Rumor:

A poster on NDNation (I know, I know) says he talked to Eifert last night and he will return to ND next year.

Eifert has also exchanged tweets with a few ND players about spring ball.

Obviously nothing concrete here but good looking signs.

 

[Rack Em]

Rumor:

A poster on NDNation (I know, I know) says he talked to Eifert last night and he will return to ND next year.

Eifert has also exchanged tweets with a few ND players about spring ball.

Obviously nothing concrete here but good looking signs.

He's coming back. His father told Pete Sampson on II that Tyler had an apartment in SB for next academic year.

 

[PLACforever]

One more year and he'll get drafted where Carlson and Rudolph did, maybe higher.

 

[Carlyle Javar Holiday]

I would say that Eifert is a better Aaron Hernandez type TE. He should be the #1 TE in the 2013 draft.