2024 DL Kavion Benton Planning Notre Dame Return

Kavion Benton‍ got his recruitment off to an early start with scholarship offers from Florida and Louisville last summer before the 2024 Tennessee defensive lineman even began his sophomore season at Houston High School.

“It's really a blessing,” the 6-foot-3, 240-pounder he said. “I was excited. I was really speechless. I couldn't really believe it when they started rolling in like that.”

He added Memphis to that list in January.

In between, Benton made some unofficial visits for games last fall, including one to South Bend to see Notre Dame play North Carolina.

“I liked the environment,” he said. “It was energetic. I loved it. I loved Notre Dame the whole time I was there.

“The intensity, the atmosphere, the environment I was in the whole time. I just loved it.”

Benton had the chance to speak with some Irish staffers while on campus.

“They were telling me to keep my heads up, they'd be following up with me and to keep doing what I'm doing, keep working hard and just stay up,” he said.

Benton is already looking at a return.

“I'm going back to a Notre Dame camp this summer and I'm going to do another visit around that time,” he said. “I really just loved it the first time.”

He’s looking forward to showing what he can do during the camp.

“I'm going to just show how hard I've been working, all of my pass rushing moves, all my footwork, the explosiveness that I've been working on this whole,” he said. “Showing that I could do good against any competition, come out and be a dog.”

He also wants to make trips back to Georgia, Michigan, Tennessee, Ole Miss, Florida and Florida State among others.

He has an idea what he’s looking for in a college.

“Whatever school is showing the most interest in me and how they run things, how they run their defense, their education. That's it.”