Notre Dame Football All-Decade Team: Cornerback
This is another position that was easy to weed out, but that doesn’t mean the talent at the position for Notre Dame football has been barren.
The easy choice for all-decade corner is Julian Love. He is the all-time leader in pass break-ups for Notre Dame Football, and was staple at corner for all three years in South Bend. Ironically, he was quickly moved to safety in the NFL — after many years of Notre Dame fans acknowledging that could be his best long-term position. The others on this list include Keivarae Russell, Robert Blanton and Bennett Jackon — all freshman contributors in a pretty big way.
Robert Blanton (2008-2011)
He played in 12 games as a freshman — only sitting out the opener, and was actually a starter at corner in the last 4. Much like the career path Matthias Farley took while at Notre Dame, while he wasn’t always a starter, he essentially was with the amount of snaps he played each game. Throughout his time in South Bend, he picked off 8 passes — 2 each season. During his last two years, he totaled, 10 PBUs on top of the 4 interceptions, while also accumulating 15.5 tackles for loss and 123 tackles. As you can see, for a corner, he was a tremendous run defender and always willing to wreak havoc around the line of scrimmage and in the backfield. He also remained healthy throughout his entire career, playing in every game from the second game of his freshman year on.
In the NFL, he was a solid role player for the Minnesota Vikings after his 5th round selection in the 2012 draft. His physical play followed him to the NFL, but he switched from corner to safety, and actually was a starter for the Vikings in 2014 — leading the team in tackles with 106. After four years with Minnesota, he signed a one year deal with the Buffalo Bills, where he started 2 games before going on IR in week 11. He would then be signed by the Dallas Cowboys where he was cut during preseason, and then ultimately found himself back on the Bills in 2017. He would play 2 games before an October release — his last time playing in the league.