SOUTH BEND, Ind. — An idea that excited Brian Kelly seven years ago and that couldn’t come fast enough 4 ½ years later, when he parachuted out from Notre Dame, took a quantum leap into reality on Saturday.
Two hours before kickoff of the Blue-Gold Game at Notre Dame Stadium, a ceremonial groundbreaking ceremony Saturday morning for the Jack and Kathy Shields Family Hall, a new football support facility, took place with former players and current recruits watching closely.
Most importantly, it will be followed by actual non-ceremonial construction that will help Kelly’s successor as ND’s head football coach, Marcus Freeman, have another tangible asset to chase the school’s renewed and burgeoning ambitions when it comes to its hallowed football program.
The new facility will be located along Courtney Lane on the east side of campus and is set to open in the fall of 2026.
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With an emphasis on functionality and pragmatism, not keeping pace in a perceptual arms race.
The blueprints Kelly spoke of in the summer before the onset of an ongoing renaissance, that included two playoff appearances and chased a 4-8 cratering in 2016 into irrelevance, was an expanded version of the 19-year-old Guglielmino Athletics Complex.
That came with a different proposed footprint that included the Irish Athletics Center, ND’s indoor football practice facility completed in the summer of 2019, well before Kelly bolted for the head coaching job at LSU.
Shields Hall will be a much-needed complement instead of an actual extension. But what it solves and advances for the football program is similar to the original inspiration for the project.
At 150,000 square feet, the new facility will offer a nearly 50 percent increase in space over the Gug, which opened in 2005.
The facility will include an advanced training room; a stand-alone sports medicine facility; an equipment facility with body scanning and fabrication technology; a new and expanded locker room; meeting rooms, including a two-level, all-team auditorium and an augmented reality walkthrough room; media innovation spaces, including recording studios and photo studios; academic support spaces; and a new player nutrition area designed to foster community between teams and model healthy eating.
The new facility has already become part of Notre Dame's recruiting pitch.
"To our recruits that are out there," Freeman said at Saturday’s ceremony, "I want you all to understand this is a reflection of the commitment this university has to making sure that our football program, our student-athletes have endless opportunities to have success. We tell these recruits in our meetings that we are going to give them every possibility to reach their full potential, and this building reflects that.
"When we talk about our student athletes, our football players, we tell them daily to choose hard. And we embrace that. We embrace what being a student-athlete at Notre Dame truly entails. And now with this new football facility we will be able to not only embrace it, but thrive and really serve our players in a holistic approach."
The new facility should better fit the program's evolving needs.
“I think first and foremost, when the Gug was constructed, it was state of the art,” new Notre Dame athletic director Pete Bevacqua told Inside ND Sports in a one-on-one interview earlier this month. “The most succinct way to say it is we’ve just outgrown it.
“When you think about how our staff has grown two-fold in terms of assistant coaches, support staff — everything that goes into running a premier college football program — it’s just changed. The use of technology. Recruiting purposes. Every element we’ve just simply outgrown, and so we know we need a new facility, and that is a university priority.”
And now it’s in motion.
“First of all in terms of sports science and recovery, we’re at the top of the pyramid,” Bevacqua said in what’s most important among the new functionality. “We’re doing everything ahead of the class in terms of sports science and recovery.
“When you think about [associate athletic director, sports performance] John Wagle coming on to our staff. When you think about the new addition of [director of football performance] Loren Landow, it’s just kind of revolutionized the way we’re approaching sports science and recovery for our football team — and all of our sports. Sports science is about every single one of our sports and every single one of our student-athletes.
“There will be a better, bigger, more modern home for all of those things to occur on a day-in and day-out basis. Things change. I mean, we had to update the stadium, and to Jack’s [Swarbrick] credit, look at [Campus] Crossroads.
“I think it’s a model of success. I was here in the Loftus days, and we’re still using Loftus, but think about the IAC and how beautiful that is. I was in there a few weeks ago when we had Pro Day. And to hear the NFL scouts say, ‘Wow, this is such an amazing facility.’
“So, we have these really best-in-class facilities. We need that for our football operations facility, and we’re going to make that happen.”
Where it will happen is adjacent to the Gug and across the street from the IAC and the LaBar practice fields. It will cause the relocation of Notre Dame’s outdoor tennis courts to another part of campus.
A group of former University of Notre Dame football student-athletes led by linebacker Jack Shields will provide generous support for a new facility. Additional contributors to the facility include Pat and Jana Eilers, Dave and Clare Butler and other substantial donors who wish to remain anonymous. Pat Eilers is a former Notre Dame safety. Dave Butler played linebacker for the Irish.
Also recognized for their generous leadership and support are Pat Kramer, a former Notre Dame defensive lineman, and Tom Carter, a former Irish cornerback. Kramer and Carter are close friends of the Shieldses.
Together, these five former Notre Dame student-athletes are giving back to a program that has transformed their lives, wanting to extend that same opportunity to future generations.
“The Shields family’s remarkable gift, together with the support of many others, will enable us to greatly enhance our ability to support student-athletes physically, mentally, socially and academically,” Notre Dame President Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., said.
“Notre Dame has long been committed to both athletic success and care for the well-being of our student-athletes, and this new facility will help us to excel on the field while we advance the study of sports science, nutrition and medicine on campus, with benefits for athletes everywhere.”
Jack and Kathy Shields reside in Duxbury, Mass., and Tampa, Fla. They are the parents of four children: John, William, Madeline and Fallon, a 2006 Notre Dame graduate.
Jack Shields earned his bachelor’s degree from Notre Dame in 1983 and his law degree from Catholic University in 1986. He was the CEO of Shields Health Solutions, a specialty pharmacy accelerator, until 2021, when the company was acquired by Walgreens. Before that, he was president of Shields MRI, the largest outpatient imaging provider in New England. He is currently the founder and chair of Shields Health Innovations.
In addition to serving on the For Good cabinet, Jack Shields is on the Advisory Council for the Student-Athlete. He and Kathy are Friends of Ted & Ned, and they belong to the Badin Guild. They also have a family foundation that supports nonprofits in Massachusetts and Florida, including the Brockton Boys and Girls Clubs and BC High.
“Shields Hall is more than just a football facility,” Jack Shields said. “Kathy and I wanted to provide a center that will provide resources for our players’ minds, bodies and spirits during their time at Notre Dame and beyond. We want to ensure our team can play like champions today and live like champions for the rest of their lives.”
Starting with the Campus Crossroads project that brough renovations and additions to Notre Dame Stadium that was completed in 2017, Notre Dame's football program has been the center of a lot of development on campus.
"In nine short years from the time Campus Crossroads opened to the time this facility opens, we will have built the best triumvirate of football facilities in America," former Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick said Saturday. "But even more significantly, we built them the Notre Dame way.
"Campus Crossroads is an unbelievable stadium. But it’s the home academic units, a media center and a host of student services. The building behind me is, as Pete said, the best indoor facility in the country. We host all kinds of events in there. Other sports use it, student activities, social functions. And as Pete said this complex, the new building with the Guglielmino Center will not only serve a great football program, but it will be the best sports science and student services complex in the country."
BLUE-GOLD GAME ROSTERS
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