SOUTH BEND, Ind. — For a guy with one career catch on his college football résumé, sophomore tight end Cooper Flanagan figures to be in high demand on Thursday morning when Notre Dame holds its third-annual player draft for the Blue-Gold Game.
The spring finale itself, to ND’s 15-session spring football season, is set for 1 p.m. EDT on Saturday at Notre Dame Stadium (Peacock streaming), with the draft unfolding on YouTube Thursday at 9:15 a.m. https://youtube.com/live/3NUCEuHf8NY
As for the allure of Flanagan? He’s on the roster and he’s healthy, something that’s not taken for granted in the tight end room this spring.
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The 6-foot-6, 249-pound Pleasant Hill, Calif., product is also improving — and impressing his new position coach, offensive coordinator Mike Denbrock.
“Coop has been fantastic all spring,” Denbrock said. “Very, very encouraged by where he’s headed. Love his work ethic. He’s tough as nails. Love all that.”
What his role will look like if/when everyone is healthy — Mitchell Evans (sidelined by ACL recovery), Kevin Bauman (sidelined by ACL recovery), Eli Raridon (just recently practicing at full speed) — depends on how often multiple-tight sets are part of Denbrock’s game-planning, but by all accounts Flanagan is a better version of himself than the one who garnered 160 game snaps spread over 13 games.
“I’m just trying to take advantage of every rep I can get,” he said. “Being a young kid, I’m pretty lucky for this opportunity, so just trying to take advantage of every rep. Just trying to keep the perspective of, like, I’m lucky with this opportunity.”
Evans, a senior who suffered his ACL tear in an Oct. 31 rout of Pitt, figures to be Notre Dame’s No. 1 option when he returns. But junior Raridon, who played roughly the second half of the season in a cautious return from a second ACL tear, may have the highest ceiling in the group.
Bauman was a four-star recruit in the same class as former Irish All-American Michael Mayer, who left at the end of the 2022 season after three years, with virtually every career, single-season and single-game mark to his name.
But Bauman has missed large chunks of three seasons if not their entirety,
“Kind of like Mitch, [Bauman] is on the sideline here,” Flanagan said, “just helping with the plays, just kind of coaching you up after the play. And he’s very positive in the locker room.”
On the field Raridon, former walk-on Davis Sherwood and early enrolled freshman Jack Larsen have been competing with Flanagan.
“Jack is swimming,” Denbrock noted. “Just getting him lined up is a chore. But he’s really athletic. He can get out in space and run and catch the football.”
Flanagan, meanwhile, made learning the Denbrock playbook his first priority this spring.
“Knowing what to do is the first thing,” he said. “I think being on top of that has really helped me just kind of play free.”
This will be Flanagan’s first Blue-Gold Game, having been a June enrollee last year as a freshman. Sherwood (two catches for 21 yards) and Holden Staes (2 for 17) accounted for all of the tight end receiving production in last spring’s 24-0 domination by the Gold team.
Staes has since transferred to Tennessee after catching 15 passes for 176 yards and four TDs in 2023 for the Irish.
Flanagan — who played in a run-heavy offense at perennial prep power Concord De La Salle — made his first college start back home in the Bay Area in the regular-season finale at Stanford on Nov. 25, in place of Staes, and made his second against Oregon State in the Dec. 29 Sun Bowl.
He’s made the most of that experience ever since.
“I think I’m pretty comfortable with every route in the playbook,” Flanagan said. “Just like top-of-the-route stuff, release stuff. Just kind of being able to see man/zone, adjusting to that quickly. I think, just getting better at little things,”
And thinking big.
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