Notre Dame football: Breaking down Alohi Gilman’s combine

Notre Dame safety Alohi Gilman’s draft projections vary vastly which puts additional emphasis on him having a solid performance at the NFL combine.

NFL draft experts had Notre Dame safety Alohi Gilman projected in a wide array of rounds in their mock drafts, with the former Irish star ranging from the third round of the draft all the way to a seventh-round selection. As a result, it was important that Gilman had a solid showing at the NFL Combine.

Gilman was expected to shine in the Reese’s Senior Bowl but was forced to miss the final two practices and the game due to a hamstring injury. With the lack of tape from the Senior Bowl, Gilman would need to have a standout performance in the combine to boost his stock.

Gilman first received his official measurements, where he was listed at 5’10”, 201-pounds, with 9 1/4″ hands, 30 7/8″ arms and a 74″ wingspan. He has the prototypical height and weight of an NFL safety but is a bit short on length in regards to arm length and overall wingspan, something that could be a concern for some NFL teams.

However, anyone who has witnessed Gilman during his playing days for both the Navy Midshipmen and the Notre Dame Irish after he transferred from Navy to South Bend, knows that what Gilman lacks in length, he more than makes up for in heart and tenacity.

The combine started off slow (no pun intended) for Gilman, who initially was reported by the NFL Network as running a 4.67 and 4.68 on his two runs in the 40-yard dash events. Both of those runs would be considered somewhat slow for an NFL safety.

Later, it would be announced that Gilman’s official time in the 40-yard dash was actually 4.60 seconds. That time would be good for 12th best of all participating safeties and would place Gilman six spots higher in the rankings versus the time of 4.67 seconds that was initially reported.

In the bench press event, Gilman would do 17 repetitions of 225-pounds, which would tie him for 11th-best among participating safeties. His 32″ vertical jump was worst among all participating safeties and was 10″ less than the height that Kyle Dugger of Lenoir-Rhyne jumped, as his 42″ vertical jump paced the field of safeties.

Gilman would not fare terribly well in the broad jump either, finishing with an official jump of 119″, which left him with the fourth-worst jump among all participating safeties and well behind Jeremy Chinn of Southern Illinois University, who led all safeties with a 138″ jump.

Things would go much better for Gilman in the 20-yard shuttle and three-cone drill events. In the 20-yard shuttle, Gilman would post an official time of 4.08 seconds, which would be good for second-best among participating safeties.

His time of 6.81 seconds in the three-cone drill would also be second-best among safeties. Gilman would finish behind only Clemson’s K’Von Wallace, who posted the best time of any safety this year with a time of 6.76 seconds.

Perhaps the most notable effort of Gilman’s combine is when NFL Network’s Kimberly Jones reported on Gilman remaining after the combine workouts to assist with cleanup of trash on the field. It was a testament to the high character of Gilman who oozed leadership qualities throughout his Notre Dame career.

In summary, Gilman had a solid NFL Combine and while he didn’t have any events where he exceeded expectations to a level that it would send his draft status rocketing, he also didn’t have any instances where he wildly underperformed that could cause his draft status to crash.

As a result, Gilman’s draft stock likely remained pretty much the same. That isn’t the worst outcome for the former Notre Dame safety, as he is still likely to hear his name called between the third and fifth rounds of the draft.