College kicker Mitch Jeter was high school soccer standout Mitch Jeter roughly six years ago when while “fooling around” kicking field goals for the first time ever, with a friend, he nailed a 40-yarder.
What followed has been calculated and curated when it comes to his football future, including the latest chapter — verbally committing Thursday to Notre Dame as a grad transfer for his final season of eligibility. The former South Carolina standout will be in line to be ND’s third straight grad transfer place-kicker in a three-year span, following New Orleans Saints rookie Blake Grupe and current Irish kicker Spencer Shrader.
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Jeter connected on 92 percent of his field goal attempts (23-of-25), all logged in the 2022 and ‘23 seasons, and was 77-of-80 on PATs (96.3%). The 5-foot-10, 194-pound Salisbury, N.C., product produced touchbacks on 62.5% of his kickoffs in 2023 at South Carolina.
Jeter had a long field goal of 51 in 2023, when he was 12-of-14 with both misses coming from 50-plus yards out. In 2022, he nailed both of his 50-yard-plus attempts in an 11-of-11 season. One of those was a 45-yarder against Notre Dame in a 45-38 loss to the Irish in the Gator Bowl last season.
South Carolina signed Jeter out of Concord (N.C.) Cannon School. Chris Sailer Kicking ranked Jeter as the No. 8 kicker in the 2020 class. Kohl’s Kicking ranked him No. 26.
Jeter has worked with private kicking coach Dan Orner out of Charlotte, N.C. Notre Dame punter Bryce McFerson also works with Orner.
The Irish really didn’t take a hard look at signing a high school scholarship kicker in the 2024 class, and likely won’t do so in subsequent classes for the foreseeable future, though they’re open to being convinced otherwise.
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“The great part about having camps in the summer, if anybody does catch your eye, then you're able to see it,” Irish special teams coordinator Marty Biagi said of high school kicking prospects. “But I would say the hardest part for us is trying to go see kickers play in their element in high school. It's just really hard to grasp that.
“Anybody can come and in a one day camp really perform, but you're trying to say 'OK, is this who I'm really putting my eggs in a basket for?' … You get film, and it's hard. You hate it. I was a kicker and you hate it, because 7-for-10 [on field goals] in high school, you don't know.
“Was it because of the hold? There's so many little things and you're like, ‘OK, the film is good in college.’ You can see it, so [taking a transfer] definitely makes sense.”
Biagi helped reform Shrader’s kicking motion at ND, and it added significant length to his field goals, though there was an adjustment period with accuracy. Shrader made just four of his first nine attempts in 2023, with a 56-yarder and a 59-yarder among his misses.
But then he finished the regular season on a 10-for-11 run, including a school-record 53-yarder against Louisville later broken in the same game when he connected from 54. He’s 14-of-20 heading into the Sun Bowl on Dec. 29.
Jeter joins Duke defensive end R.J. Oben, Duke quarterback Riley Leonard, Clemson wide receiver Beaux Collins, FIU wide receiver Kris Mitchell and Arizona State nickelback Jordan Clark so far on Notre Dame’s incoming transfer class.
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