After Landing Blake Wesley, Where Does Notre Dame go From here on the recruiting trail?

When looking at Notre Dame basketball recruiting over the past year, their goal was always clear... land Blake Wesley. Each time the Irish missed out on a prospect (Caleb Furst, DaRon Holmes, Jordan Hawkins, etc) the answer to where they went from there was simple, but now after landing the four star recruit the answer is a lot more complicated. Along with having an extremely talented, deep roster with limited scholarship spots remaining, the NCAA's decision to give all winter athletes an extra year of eligibility will make for a tough recruiting pitch for Brey and the staff. Even with this, the staff has been aggressive in terms of pursuing players to add to the roster so here are two ways the Irish can add to their team after landing Blake Wesley and likely finishing the 2021 class.

Adding A Big Man Through the Transfer Portal

Assuming Juwan Durham moves on after the 2020-21 season and Matt Zona dosen't show enough flashes for the staff to give him a huge role (two big assumptions), the Irish will need to find an experienced big man to complete their 2021-22 team. The way to do that this offseason will be to land a transfer/ grad transfer to fill out the front court. Normally Brey is a huge proponent of having his transfers sit out a season, but he will have to break his principle this time to fill out his team next season. There is speculation that the Irish could land a transfer in the next few months because of the IVY league canceling their season and which leads high level players to explore going to a power 5 school. Brey and the staff have already reached out to former Yale forward Paul Atkinson who recently entered the portal and while Atkinson is going to be a hard guy to land (but not impossible by any means) he fits the mold of what they could be looking for in a transfer. If the Irish lose Durham they will need to replace his post scoring ability and maybe more importantly his shot blocking ability which they may not be able to find anywhere else on the roster.

Landing Some of their class of 22' targets.

After missing out on sharpshooting guard Fletcher Loyer, the Irish are now down to 8 offerees in the class of 22' who are uncommitted. While the Irish will likely try to land a guard to replace Prentiss Hubb, the departure of assistant coach Ryan Ayers and the excess of projected guard depth on the roster for years to come may make it an hard sell for guards coming out in this class. Outside of Loyer, Brey and the staff have only offered two more guards in Jaden Bradley and JJ Starling who they seem to be serious about landing. Outside of the guards the Irish may need to add a big man or two in this class to succeed the class of 20' big men, right now the staff has offers out to forwards Isaac Traudt (6'9), Kyle Filipowski (6'10), and Ben Middlebrooks (6'10) along with center Donovan Clingan (7'1) all of which could fill the holes left by the departures of Notre Dame's current bigmen. The class of 22' could be the most complicated one that Brey has had to face his entire career because of all the obstacles the coronavirus has created, but even if everything goes perfectly the staff will still need to land a player or two to fill needs that will inevitably be created.

Here is a link to an article from a few weeks back evaluating where Notre Dame and the staff stand with class of 22' recruits: https://www.breakingdownbreysboys.com/post/checking-in-on-where-notre-dame-stands-with-2022-recruits

The Notre Dame staff finally got their guy in Blake Wesley last week and now they will shift their focus to these two areas which will likely provide them their next commit. However the 2021-22 team looks to be as deep of a team as Brey has had in his career and will take a lot of pressure off of recruiting over the next few seasons.

Follow us on twitter @NDbballanalysis for more Notre Dame basketball content.