Notre Dame Football: Jerry Tillery is Most Improved Player in ’18

In a year where multiple players could be up for this honor, it’s a senior leader that takes home the crown. Jerry Tillery’s play has soared to new heights in 2018 for Notre Dame football.

Ian Book, Jalen Elliott, Julian Okwara, Miles Boykin. Those are just a few names that would make sense for most improved on the 2018 Notre Dame football roster. Wimbush to Book has done wonders for this team. Elliott has given the safety play some stability after struggling mightily last season. Okwara has always been a gifted pass rusher, but has taken his game to another level with more opportunity. Boykin is Book’s favorite target and Notre Dame’s best receiver with Equanimeous St. Brown gone to the NFL.

However, the play of Jerry Tillery stands out above the rest.

With seven sacks, that’s already 1.5 more than he had for his career coming into 2018. He’s also on pace to surpass the nine tackles for loss he accumulated last year. We saw an at times dominant Tillery in 2017, but this year, he is the best player on nearly every snap. He’s forcing turnovers with his sacks and tackles, and he’s punishing offensive lineman and opposing skill position players.

The best part about his performance this season is how he has taken over games. The Notre Dame defensive line as a whole has been tremendous, therefore, Tillery is not always the man behind the stats. With that said, he had two sacks against Michigan and four against Stanford; arguably Notre Dame’s two toughest tests to date. In the Stanford game, he essentially ended the game by himself on back-to-back plays.

For those that don’t follow Notre Dame as close as others, let me take this a step forward with Tillery and start from the recruiting process.

He was originally recruited to play offensive tackle in South Bend out of Louisiana. He committed to Notre Dame early on in the process, but there was always speculation he might flip to in-state Power LSU — with some reports even suggesting his family was pushing him that way. That is neither here or there, but later in the recruiting process, the idea of defensive tackle was floated around. When he arrived in South Bend, he was a defensive lineman all the way.

Standing at 6-7 and over 300 lbs, Tillery was physically ready to compete as a true freshman. He appeared in all 12 games before receiving a suspension for the bowl game against Ohio State. His first sack came in his very first game against Texas. Needless to say, he showed flashes very early on in his career.

As a sophomore, he under-performed. Some questioned if football was really his top priority — mainly because he was certainly enjoying his Notre Dame education (go figure), but a few dirty plays againt USC didn’t help his cause in the eyes of the public. This was at the tail-end of a 4-8 season, and although that is no excuse, one can understand the frustration that would create.

Entering his junior year, there were many questions surrounding Tillery. Could he step up his on-field performance? Was he in fact a dirty player? Was he better suited along the offensive line?

Fair or not, these were all questions many Notre Dame fans asked themselves. He answered many of those questions and then some. Finishing the year with 4.5 sacks, nine tackles for loss and 11 quarterback hurries, it was easy to see improvement in his overall game. The narrative quickly changed. The only question after the season was whether or not he would return for his senior season or pursue a career in the NFL.

Much to the excitement of Irish nation, Tillery elected to come back for his final year of eligibility and improve on his draft stock. As mentioned, his size and athleticism have always been coveted by pro scouts. The problem was consistency.

The 2018 season has provided the best of Jerry Tillery. He’s averaging a sack per game, over a tackle for loss per contest and has forced 3 fumbles. The emergence of the outside pass rush certainly helps, but make no mistake about it — Tillery’s play has been outstanding and more than Notre Dame fans could have actually expected coming into the year.

The NFL Draft love has started, as he seems to be a first round or early second day lock in a deep defensive line class, and any questions about love for the game and attitude on the field are well behind him. Simply put, Jerry Tillery is one of the best interior defensive lineman in college football.