So much of Brey recruiting focus was the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast where he had great contacts.
Colin Falls, Chris Quinn, Luke Harangody, Tory Jackson, Zach Hillesland, Luke Zeller, Carleton Scott, Jack Cooley, Alex Dragisevich, Jon Peoples, Cam Biedscheid, VJ Beachem, Demetrius Jackson, Austin Torres, Rex Pfleuger, John Mooney, Nik Djogo, Robby Carmody, Dane Goodwin, Nate Laszewski, JR Konieczny, Blake Wesley, JJ Starling, and Markus Burton.
Also Parker Friedrichsen and Brady Dunlap, who Brey signed in his last class but decided to go elsewhere when he left ND.
I left out some of the lesser players who didn't have much impact on the program.
I suppose it's still okay to say "so much" recruiting was from the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, but I read insinuation that it was his predominant recruiting turf. It wasn't. As you can see from the list above, many of Brey's best recruits came from the Midwest.
Perhaps they are considered holdovers from Doherty's recruitment?
Brey had to re-recruit them, but the original contact up to getting commitments was Doherty's work just as Burton's was Brey's work.
Checked.
I trusted google and it let me down
As best I could I reconstructed all his recruiting classes for HS seniors.
Total recruits 63 players (I did not included Friedrichsen or Dunlap as they are Other location-wise)
IL/IN/MI/OH -- 20 players (proxy for 250 miles)
PA -- 6
NJ -- 5
NY -- 3 * I included JJ Staling as IN not NY where he's from
MA -- 6
MD/DC/VA -- 5
Total Core -- 25
Maine/RI/CT -- 4 (Colson, Knight, Abromaitis, Campbell) - Didn't include Markwood...not sure who recruited.
Total Core Plus -- 29
All Other Places -- 14 (California, Texas, FL, etc.)
Total all recruits -- 63
Best I can do with the data I could scrape up via 247 and then where missing press releases. 63 seems about right - about 3 per year. I didn't include any transfers in, just high school recruits.
Who knows what the focus of Shrewsbury will be. I just hope he tries to do better in IL/IN/MI/OH.
Obviously it's nice to lock down the immediate South Bend area, which ND typically does, but I have no preference for a recruit in Indianapolis or Detroit vs Philly/NYC, Charlotte, Atlanta, Texas, etc.
I want better players. If Shrews decides he can land them in the midwest, so be it.
Increasing talent upside is the key.
In the portal area, a lot of kids who leave Indiana will look to come back when they enter the portal. And we haven’t exactly had great success in keeping kids from places like California, in any sport. South Bend has a lot of good players and local interest is good for both attendance and player retention. Basketball is also the one sport where Indiana has a boatload of talent. Notre Dame shouldn’t have to go all the way to Tulsa to find Parker Friedrichsen, nor expect him to stick around.
It's tough recruiting in IU/PU territory. But the good news is that ND offers something entirely different. And Indiana has a good pool. It's a shame that ND let Butler creep in as a legit competitor for that pool.
with how well Painter is doing at Purdue. Let's see what Shrews can do.
Probably a Hail Mary, but love the effort