Jeremiyah Love's 'academic based' Notre Dame comments are a breath of fresh air

In a college sports world filled with the transfer portal and NIL money, some athletes forget that the reason to go to college isn't all about what happens on the field or the court, but what happens in the classroom.

Universities weren't built solely for athletes to further their careers, but instead were built as a place for higher education and for students to attain a degree that will serve them in life. For Notre Dame, while sports have always been elite, so has working in the classroom been for all athletes.

Former running back Jeremiyah Love, who is preparing for the NFL Draft, shared that while the university puts an emphasis on sports, schoolwork is still at the top of the list for every athlete.

"Notre Dame is definitely a very academically-based school," Love said in an interview with On3. "If you’re not doing your classwork, you’re not going to be doing anything else. It doesn’t matter if you’re the greatest athlete to ever come through Notre Dame. You got to do your schoolwork."

Even though Love is leaving Notre Dame a year early to go to the NFL, he did at one point say he considered staying to get that degree. Granted, Love can always head back to South Bend to finish it at any time, but the Irish are very serious about schoolwork.

In the world of college sports now, it is so refreshing to hear that student-athletes are expected to be exactly what they are called: students. If they are not expected to be in class and get their work done, then what makes them any differnet than a professional athlete?

It comes as no surprise that Notre Dame holds schooling to the highest of standards for their student-athletes, and with the way head coach Marcus Freeman is, it is a safe assumption he is just as emphatic about school as the university is.