Ace Alston had been planning to get back to Notre Dame this fall all along and now, the top 2027 Ohio cornerback knows when.
“I’ll be back for the USC game,” Alston tells Irish Sports Daily.
The Anderson High School star has already made multiple trips to South Bend and is looking forward to returning.
“Just the culture and just the coaches who are there,” he says of what he likes about Notre Dame. They're very genuine. I can definitely see my future being a member of the Irish there.
“I just want to get back up there as many times as I can, keep building a relationship with the coaches, go see that game day experience that I've never seen before. It'll be a great time to go up there and see what they're really about.”
The Irish coaches, specifically head coach Marcus Freeman and defensive backs coach Mike Mickens, have done a tremendous job grabbing Alston’s attention.
“The whole coaching staff, but I'll start with Coach Freeman,” he says. “Every time I get to sit down and talk with him, it is a great conversation. To be honest with you, we don't really talk about football, we just talk about life and we also talk about life after football. That's what I really take into account because that's really important to me and that's one of my goals; to try to own my own business, own my own restaurant. I feel like Notre Dame would be a great school to help me do that and succeed my dreams with the NFL and my business part of it.
“Coach Mickens, he stays in contact with me pretty often. We always have great conversations and things like that. I definitely learned a lot from him from the time that I was up there. He always sends me little stuff that I learned from too. That's a good relationship that we have built. I can't wait to see how he coaches the players on the game day.”
Alston has more than 40 offers from schools like Notre Dame, Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Auburn, Duke, Tennessee, Texas A&M, USC, UCLA and Oregon among several others.
He will be making trips to other schools as well, but doesn’t know exactly when and where just yet.
“Not all of them are locked in,” he says. “I know that Notre Dame-USC games going to be locked in.”
Alston doesn’t have a timeframe for trimming his extensive list of options.
“Me and my parents are still talking about that,” he says.
But he does know what he’ll be looking at when he is narrowing his list.
“Really just the culture, the brotherhood, and the way the coaches coach,” he says. “I definitely want to be coached hard and compete every day. A great school just overall with the education and things like that too. I just take all that into factor and when I'm looking for a head coach, I'm looking for a head coach that's going to be a great coach on the field and a great coach off the field too.
“I'm just looking for that great culture all the way around and that's what I take into effect when I'm looking for that one school that I'm going to commit to.”
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