Notre Dame football preparing for a make or break visit to end rough early start to the transfer portal period
Notre Dame has a very important transfer portal visitor on the horizon.
The minute that former Pitt defensive tackle Francis Brewu entered the transfer portal, he became a huge name of interest for Notre Dame football. Not only is he a very talented interior defender, but he also has a close relationship with new defensive line coach Charlie Partridge, who recruited him while he was with the Pitt Panthers. Due to that relationship and upside as a football player, Brewu has quickly become a bit of a “can’t miss player” for head coach Marcus Freeman and the Fighting Irish.
The Notre Dame staff has wasted no time going after the Ohio native and has locked him in for a multi-day visit on Thursday and Friday of this week. That will come after his visit to Tennessee today, and will follow with a potential weekend trip to Indiana, as well as future stops at Miami and Ohio State. All of those visit dates were reported by Bruce Feldman of The Athletic. The Irish will have to do their best to make sure that Brewu does land in South Bend and do whatever it takes to avoid him heading to Bloomington over the weekend.
With Notre Dame missing on Horace Lockett, Mateen Ibirogba, and potentially Xavier Gilliam already, they need to find some answers for defensive tackle in the portal. There is no reason why this program shouldn’t be able to land a player like Brewu. If they aren’t able to, more and more questions will begin to arise.
Francis Brewu’s career background
Brewu was originally considered to be a consensus three-star player by each of the major recruiting platforms coming out of the 2024 class. He ended up ranked as the No. 481 overall player, the No. 56 defensive lineman, and the No. 20 player from the state of Ohio in the 2024 recruiting class, according to the 247 Sports Composite ranking. That Columbus (Oh.) Thomas Worthington standout ended up as the second-highest rated player in the class for the Panthers.
Despite a somewhat modest offer list, the Ohio native did have some impressive options on the table. Some of Brewu’s top offers included Miami, Iowa State, Michigan State, Wisconsin, Boston College, Cincinnati, Minnesota, Northwestern, and Duke, among many others. The offer list will be even better this time around.
In two seasons with the Panthers, Brewu has developed into one of the defensive linemen in the ACC conference. During that stretch, the talented defender managed to record 42 total tackles, 9.5 sacks, 3.5 sacks, and a forced fumble. There is even more talent to continue tapping into as he moves into the future.
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