Recruiting Visits Major Question Mark for Notre Dame and College Football
There isn't a guide to navigating a pandemic when it comes to college football recruiting. Notre Dame has adapted by taking commitments from prospects who haven't visited campus, but they've failed to land a couple of critical targets.
"We're grinding through recruiting like everybody else," stated Notre Dame football coach Brian Kelly. "I think we've had some really good gets. We've missed on a couple, but it's really competitive when everything is online. Everybody is doing Zoom meetings and no one can have anyone on campus. Everybody loses something. We lose something by not being able to get you out of your state and bring you up to Notre Dame. There is no doubt about it."
The college football season looks promising as of June 9th, but Kelly and other coaches aren't exactly hopeful they will be able to host recruits on campus this fall as the calendar isn't favorable as fall camp and the addition of classes beginning two weeks earlier.
"We know we're not going to see them through the month of July," explained Kelly. "That seems to be pretty clear. Now we get into August and everybody's going to be wrapped up in camps. We don't see to be that that's going to be reasonable [for recruits to visit]. School starts on the 10th (of August)."
When it comes to games, it's a risk coaches might not want to take at the end of the day. Recruits spending time with the staff and current members of the team is the most important aspect of a visit, which presents a risky situation.
"We seem to think that with all the precautions that are being taken, relative to your own campus, relative to testing, how is it that you can fly in somebody, a family, that hasn't been tested, put them up on your campus and your hotels and let them walk around campus freely," Kelly stated. "I just seem to think that's going to be hard to navigate through this in the fall. There's still work to be done. I don't think it's going to happen quickly. If it does happen, we'll be excited about it, but we'll be very cautious and we'll have a lot of questions.
"So, I guess the long answer to your question is, we're operating as if you will not visit this campus this recruiting season, and we have to take our campus to you."
Whether visits happen or not, Kelly remained confident his staff has the tools available to them to land a quality class. How good will be determined by work ethic.
"We're going to keep being who we are and working hard," said Kelly. "At the end of the day, we're going to be fine. We're going to have a great class with kids who fit Notre Dame and kids we can develop into outstanding football players that can help us win a championship."