CJ Carr And Sam Hartman Coming And Going At Notre Dame
The cycle of college football means players come and go at a constant rate, and Notre Dame is no different. Most are with a program for the standard four years, stars with NFL aspirations are gone after three years, while others have five and (in the post-Covid college reality) six-year life spans.
But the temporary nature of the game says that players were meant to come and go. It's the circle of college football life. Two cases in point: Sam Hartman and CJ Carr. As one veteran packs his bags to leave a college campus for the last time, the other packs to leave home and land at school for the first time.
Hartman gave college football six years and 60 games before calling it quits. His final 12 games came in his lone season at Notre Dame. One more game was initially in the plans, at least that’s what Hartman said publicly after his last Notre Dame home game against Wake Forest. It’s also what his head coach, Marcus Freeman, said he was planning on after the Irish finished their regular season after a Thanksgiving weekend win over Stanford.
Something changed after that and Hartman announced last week that he would instead skip Notre Dame’s Dec. 29 Sun Bowl appearance in El Paso, Texas to instead prepare for the NFL Draft.
But why the change of course?
"You’ll have to ask Sam,” Freeman said this weekend as his team prepares for his third bowl appearance. "He made the decision that he’s going to opt out and he talked to the people that are in his life and made a decision that he felt was best for him.”
Hartman hasn’t spoken publicly since the season ended but he did attend an Irish women’s basketball game with fellow quarterbacks Steve Angeli, who will make his first career start in the Sun Bowl, and Kenny Minchey by his side behind the Notre Dame bench.
Hartman’s college days are now done though, even if Freeman doesn’t agree with the decision to ditch the bowl game.
"As I’ve told all of the guys that have opted out, I can disagree with your decision and still support you and that’s the same thing I told Sam and every single other one that opted out,” Freeman explained. “I disagree. I think you should play but I love you and I support you and you’re going to do great things.”
While Hartman’s college career has ended, Carr’s is just beginning. The grandson of former Michigan head coach Lloyd Carr left his home in Saline, Mich. (just southwest of Ann Arbor) last Friday and made the two-plus hour trek just across the Indiana state line to South Bend.
It’s not unusual for high school players to enroll in college early, but Carr is taking promptness to another level by joining the Irish in December during bowl preparation. The five-star quarterback on the Irish Breakdown board got his first taste of college practice right away.
"It’s great,” Freeman said of Carr’s arrival at Notre Dame. "I couldn’t imagine being CJ and coming in here by yourself. He was here (Friday) for meetings and walkthroughs, and it was like the first day of school. You’re a new guy. I was able to spend some time with him during practice and after practice. Today he was slinging the ball around. He’s going to be a great player.”
With Hartman gone, Carr joins Angeli and Minchey as the three scholarship quarterbacks working with quarterbacks coach and interim offensive coordinator Gino Guidugli during bowl prep. The short-term impact is likely negligible, but Freeman expects it will payoff in the long run.
"It’s just good to have him here and that comfort,” Freeman explained. "So, as you move into the winter, you move into spring ball, he’s not starting ground zero. He knows what the expectations are, he’ll know where to go, he’ll be able to help those guys that are coming in January (to) figure it out. But I'm glad he’s here and I’m excited for the future of CJ Carr.”
Carr and the rest of the incoming 2024 freshman class will officially sign their national letters of intent this Wednesday. He will go home for a couple of weeks after the Sun Bowl and then return to campus with the rest of the team in mid-January when the spring semester begins.
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