Under new defensive coordinator Marcus Freeman, the Notre Dame defensive line directed by Mike Elston — his 12th year on the staff — will employ more variations or flexibility among its personnel.
The same holds true for Elston as he takes on the recruiting coordinator role, which he previously held from 2015-17 before it was turned over to special teams coordinator Brian Polian from 2018-20.
This winter, Elston and Polian swapped roles, with Polian now handling the associate head coach duties that Elston had the prior three campaigns. Under Polian’s watch as the recruiting coordinator, the roster balance and evaluation aided Notre Dame’s 33-5 run the past three years that featured earning two College Football Playoff bids.
But at the turn of the year, head coach Brian Kelly was proactive with adding another dimension to recruiting to aid the national championship aspirations, thus leading to the switch in job titles.
“It was really fun to watch the personnel side of it,” Elston said of Polian’s work that manifested itself with the quality depth that has been built, especially along Elston’s defensive line. “His strengths come out with evaluation and really getting the roster right with positions and being very integral in that part.
“Those aren’t necessarily my focus right now because that’s been done really well the last four years. My strengths are the creative part, how we get them to say yes part.”
Per Elston, there are two aspects to recruiting: one is identification/evaluation, which includes understanding the fit into a school’s culture, and the second is creativity, which is highlighted by closing the deal with premier prospects. As someone who has been at Notre Dame all through the Kelly era, Elston himself already possesses an excellent grasp of what constitutes the right fit at the school on and off the field.
“Brian was really good at the evaluation part, and so I learned a lot from that,” Elston said. “And now to then come back and help implement a little more of the creative side and lean on the things that Brian put into place in evaluation, and then for me to work with the recruiting office … I was excited to get back into it.”
Leading off the creative element since the turn of the new year was the “Pot of Gold” day on March 17, St. Patrick’s Day, that was heavily publicized via social media. On that day, more than two dozen new offers went out to 2023 prospects, while also contacting the 30 or so who had already been previously offered in the class.
The brainchild came from recruiting meetings on what can be done to create national appeal and chatter about Notre Dame.
“We had just changed some things within the evaluation piece to make sure we were going ahead and evaluating the 2023 and 2024 class ahead of time, ahead of when we normally would do it,” Elston said. “We had a lot of information we were gathering from transcripts, from character … we knew by St. Paddy’s Day a lot of underclassmen that we wanted to offer.
“It’s something we can build on for years to come. St. Paddy’s Day — luck of the Irish — no one else can really utilize that day like we can. It almost had the feel of a National Signing Day, and that’s what we were going for — to get some good buzz and on the cusp of rolling out a new plan for the 2023 class and getting ahead of the curve.”
Notre Dame’s current 2022 class with 11 verbal commits — eight of them four stars — ranks fourth, with optimism that it has a chance to vie for a top-five placement, which hasn’t been achieved by the Fighting Irish since 2013.
Augmenting the momentum so far is the addition of senior football analyst Chad Bowden, who had previously assisted Freeman at the University of Cincinnati and is working with the defensive staff as a form of coordinator for recruiting on that side of the ball.
Another could be added on offense, but for now current director of recruiting Aaryn Kearney is fulfilling that role.
"The best way to put it is they’re the offensive and defensive coordinators in recruiting,” Kelly said. “They get the whole staff together, coordinate the efforts in recruiting and making sure they’re touching base with recruits daily. That’s not a 9-to-5 job. That’s late at night, being on [the prospect's] schedule.”
With Kearney, Bowden and others helping with a lot of the leg work and evaluations, it allows Elston’s creative juices on the trail to flow more, including assembling presentations for recruits and family when official visits on campus are projected to be allowed again in June by the NCAA. Elston has long believed that Notre Dame's best sales tool is the feel of the campus itself.
“It allows us as coaches to be better on the phone, it allows us to better be involved with the process of getting the kids, educating the players,” Elston said. “[We’ve] moved the needle with a lot of guys in 2022-23, because the work force has been lifted, more people involved.”
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