The Notre Dame football team is slowly but surely filling the holes it saw pop open this offseason.
On Saturday morning, the Fighting Irish made the hire of new defensive coordinator Chris Ash official. Could Marcus Freeman be about to pull the trigger on the next big hire for his staff? There are some rather loud rumblings that Chad Bowden’s replacement could be named in the next day or two.
Last week, a front runner for the Notre Dame football GM position seemed to surface. The Irish were said to be close to hiring Texas Tech’s Chris Blanchard. Now, FootballScoop is reporting that contract talks have progressed to the point that Blanchard is in South Bend and could be signing his deal on Sunday.
Notre Dame football close to landing its GM
John Brice and Zach Barnett wrote on Sunday morning that Blanchard has long been on the radar of Freeman. In fact, he tried to hire him two years ago, but the recruiting staffer was offered a better contract by the Red Raiders.
It appears that Notre Dame is trying to rectify that mistake now that Bowden has moved onto USC. His jump to the bitter rival certainly seems to free up quite a bit of cash in the budget for the role, considering he secured himself a massive raise last year when the Michigan Wolverines tried to lure him away.
Freeman and Blanchard have been talking almost since the day Bowden departed. They reportedly had a quite a few discussions in Mobile, Alabama when both men were in attendance to watch Senior Bowl practices.
Brice and Barnett say that things have gotten to the point where Blanchard will be deciding if he wants to take the Notre Dame football job this time, or once again choose to stay with Texas Tech instead.