Martin Soros named 2026 ND valedictorian
By Annelise Demers Notre Dame News Editor
Martin Soros never expected to be named valedictorian of the University of Notre Dame’s class of 2026.
“I didn’t really think about it until I got the email saying I got selected as a valedictorian candidate,” Soros wrote in a statement to The Observer. “I knew my GPA was high, but I imagined that others had higher grades than me.”
Soros will graduate magna cum laude, in the top 15% of his class in the College of Engineering. He holds a 3.966 GPA.
The selection process for valedictorian and salutatorian is coordinated by the Office of Undergraduate Education in the Office of the Provost. The College of Arts and Letters, the College of Engineering, Mendoza College of Business and the College of Science each nominate four students among those with the highest GPAs. The Keough School of Global Affairs and the School of Architecture each nominate two students. Nominees submit a resume and a draft of their valedictory address.
Finalists are selected and interviewed by a committee consisting of representatives from each college and school, the Office of Undergraduate Education, the Division of Student Affairs and student government. A valedictorian and salutatorian are chosen by the
same committee, subject to approval by University President Fr. Robert Dowd.
Now, the Bethesda, Maryland, native will graduate as valedictorian after four years defined not only by academic success, but also by engineering service projects and campus leadership.
Soros majors in civil engineering with minors in theology and education, schooling, and society. During his time at Notre Dame, he served as a resident assistant in Coyle Hall and spent two years with NDSEED, a student engineering organization focused on sustainable development projects.
Through NDSEED, Soros helped design and construct a suspended footbridge in southern Bolivia alongside members of a community during the summer of 2025.
He described the experience as one of the most impactful of his college career.
“After a whole year of arduous work on campus, actually being on site and physically building the bridge was transformative,” Soros wrote. “It taught me what a classroom can’t.”
Soros said many of the experiences that shaped him at Notre Dame extended beyond academics.
One of the moments that best captured his college experience, he said, was attending Mass at the ice chapel he helped to construct on North Quad this winter.
“It was such a deep moment of
community,” Soros wrote. “It felt like the culmination of everything I have experienced in this place. It was overwhelmingly beautiful.”
That sense of community was also central to his experience as a resident assistant in Coyle Hall.
“I didn’t think senior year could get much better, but the community I was able to be a part of was unforgettable,” he said.
Soros added that Notre Dame’s residential life experience fundamentally shaped his understanding of community and leadership.
“The fact that we can bring so many individuals, so different from one another, together, is such a powerful message for the world,” he wrote.
Outside of academics, Soros often found peace walking, running or sitting near Notre Dame’s lakes.
“Being in nature and observing the geese helped calm my mind,” he wrote.
Soros also credited faculty mentors for helping shape his academic and professional goals, particularly Tracy Kijewski-Correa, professor of global affairs.
“She has been an inspiration for me, particularly in the way she combines her engineering background with social impact,” Soros wrote. His own future plans reflect a similar blend of service and community engagement.
After graduation, Soros will move to Buenos Aires, Argentina, to work as a manager at La Nazarena, a
community center serving children and families experiencing poverty that he first served at the summer before his freshman year at Notre Dame.
“This is the place in the world where I feel most at home,” Soros said of La Nazarena.
Although many students feel pressure surrounding life after graduation, Soros said uncertainty does not frighten him.
“I have no idea where I will be in 10 years,” he wrote. “But I find a certain freedom in that.”
Soros said he hopes classmates take away a simple but meaningful message from his valedictory address, which will be delivered at Sunday’s commencement ceremony.
“The change we can hope to make
in the world begins not in grandiose plans,” Soros wrote, “but in the small, personal ways we serve others.”
When reflecting on how he hopes to be remembered, Soros avoided focusing on accomplishments or titles.
“If anything,” he wrote, “as someone joyful, imperfect, who is trying his best to follow God’s will for his life.”
For Soros and his family, the recognition represents gratitude more than prestige.
“It’s a moment of gratitude for everything that Notre Dame has given me,” he wrote.
Contact Annelise Demers at ademers@nd.edu
Abigail Newton chosen for valedictory address
By Berhan Hagezom Saint Mary’s News Editor
Out of the nine valedictorians chosen for the 179th commencement, Saint Mary’s College senior Abigail Newton has been designated to provide the valedictory address on Saturday at Le Mans Green.
A computing and applied mathematics major, she felt Saint Mary’s was the best choice when choosing a college due to its intimate atmosphere while still being near her home in Kirklin, Indiana. What solidified this interest was doing an in-person tour through the College’s STEM Preview Day.
During her freshman year, she decided to switch majors to her current one, following a class that inspired her to think broadly about mathematics. Continuing with higherlevel classes, she witnessed the importance of rigor in the major and how Saint Mary’s
applies such a standard in the classroom.
“During my first year, I took an introductory programming course to fulfill a Sophia requirement and quickly discovered how much I enjoyed computer science as well. That experience inspired me to switch to Computing and Applied Mathematics because it combined both of my interests,” she wrote.
“Throughout the program, Saint Mary’s challenged me academically and pushed me to grow as both a student and problem solver. Some of the higherlevel courses were difficult and required a lot of persistence, but those challenges helped me become more confident in my abilities and taught me the value of hard work,” Newton continued.
Newton has pursued two projects during her time at Saint Mary’s similar to her major. In her senior research comprehensive project, she developed
a method of collaborative filtering for shopping algorithmic systems.
“Using Amazon product review data, I created and compared three collaborative filtering models: user-based, item-based, and matrix factorization. Through this project, I explored how recommendation systems work and how data can be used to better understand consumer preferences and improve personalized recommendations,” she wrote.
In her Business, Industry and Government (BIG) data class, she collaborated with the St. Joseph County Public Library to increase community engagement through analyzing data on display tables and revamping present strategies for long-term impact.
Her time at the Saint Mary’s Information Technology Office for two years, where she worked as both a ResNet Computer Consultant and ResNet
Computer Consultant Manager, allowed her to build a rapport with students and faculty while also continuously developing her troubleshooting skills.
Newton also likes to spend time in various extracurricular activities, including in the Pickleball club and the Puzzle club, where it has “helped me build friendships and find community through hobbies I enjoy.”
She is also an inducted member of Pi Mu Epsilon, the national honor society and has participated in small faith and worship events.
For incoming seniors, she hopes they can take in every moment and still continue using the resources around them as their last year approaches. Newton also encourages students interested in mathematics and computer science to pursue their passion despite the difficulties associated with the majors.
“Do not be afraid to struggle or hit a wall. Those moments are
often where the most growth happens. Mathematics pushes you to think deeply and approach problems from different perspectives. Believe in yourself, work hard, and never hesitate to ask for help because your professors and peers truly want to see you succeed,” she wrote.
She highlighted it is an honor to be chosen as a valedictorian for the Class of 2026 and hopes that her commencement speech “encourages my classmates to look back proudly on how far they have come and feel excited for the opportunities ahead.”
After graduation, she will continue her education at Saint Mary’s through the 4 + 1 Data Science Program to receive her master degree of science in data science. Following the program, she hopes to become a data analyst and solve data-driven problems.
Contact Berhan Hagezom at bhagezom01@saintmarys.edu
Courtesy of Michael Caterina / University of Notre Dame
Martin Soros named class of 2026 valedictorian after a tenure defined by engineering service and campus leadership beyond academics.
HCC names Job Herrmann as valedictorian
By Berhan Hagezom Saint Mary’s News Editor
For the 59th commencement at Holy Cross College, senior Job Herrmann has been recognized as the valedictorian for the class of 2026.
Herrmann transferred to Holy Cross for his sophomore year, after previously attending Bethel University in Mishawaka.
“I transferred, actually, after my first year at Bethel, and I had a good family friend recommend the idea to me, and I was interested in kind of being involved in the tri-campus community and being involved in more of a smaller private school,” he said. “And so when I got to know Holy Cross College, it really seemed like the perfect
fit for me.”
As a business major, he was inspired by his parents, who both pursued similar careers, with his mother in accounting and his father in finance.
He said that at Holy Cross, he was able to encounter professors who challenged students in applying theoretical concepts into real-world scenarios.
“One of the best professors I had, Dr. [Steve] Varela, did a really good job of bringing in challenging real-world problems and having us tackle them hands-on in class, which really caused me to think about business in a different light,” he said.
Outside of the classroom, Herrmann served as president of the business club this year and formerly served as a senator for Holy Cross’ student
government association. He said being involved in these organizations helped him understand how to make an impact through leadership experience.
“Being involved in student government helped me get to know the community I was in and helped me to actually be involved in making meaningful changes and understanding how things worked from the inside,” he explained. “And then I kind of took the leadership experience and knowledge I gained there into the business club, where I was able to help actually bring together guest speakers and put together events that helped me further enhance my liberal arts education by bringing in actual real-world experience.”
Following graduation, he will complete an internship with
professional services network Deloitte in Grand Rapids, Mich. In the upcoming fall, he will head to the University of Notre Dame for a one-year Master of Science in Accountancy through the College’s Pathways program, which offers Holy Cross students preferential admission into graduate and professional school programs at Notre Dame and several other institutions.
Herrmann advises students at Holy Cross to be involved as much as possible and to volunteer. He also said some of his most transformational experiences at the College included interacting with different professors and being a part of the tri-campus community.
“One thing I would say is always try to get involved in the Holy Cross College community.
There’s so many different opportunities and so many great individuals in leadership and faculty that want to be involved in something more for the students,” Herrmann said. “So just as a student going on and trying to serve and help others, even if that means taking 15 minutes of time out of your week, an hour or even something small, just to work towards something.”
On Saturday, he will be delivering the valedictory address for the College, in which he will be discussing Holy Cross’ mission of forming disciples, leaders, citizens and scholars. Herrmann also will highlight the theme of “living a life of purpose.”
Contact Berhan Hagezom at bhagezom01@saintmarys.edu
Sr. Petrini named ND commencement speaker
By Observer News Staff
In a March 19 press release, the University of Notre Dame announced that Sr. Raffaella Petrini, F.S.E., will serve as the University’s primary speaker for the 181st commencement ceremony and receive an honorary degree.
“Sister Raffaella is an extraordinary leader who works tirelessly for the common good and radiates the peace, love and hope of Christ. As the highest-ranking woman in the Vatican, she embodies the future of women’s leadership in the Church, having served Pope Francis and now Pope Leo with deep wisdom, unfailing dedication and true humility,” said University
President Fr. Robert Dowd in the press release.
Dowd continued, “It is a privilege to have her address the members of the Class of 2026 and their loved ones who are sure to be inspired by her words and prophetic witness.”
This will be Petrini’s second speaking engagement at the University. Three years ago, she spoke at a lecture entitled “Integral Human Development Through a Leadership of Care” for the Nanovic Institute’s yearly Keeley Vatican Lecture.
On the occasion of Petrini’s speech at the Nanovic Institute in 2023, then University President John Jenkins said in a press
release, “As a leader rooted in her faith and with a deep commitment to human flourishing, Sr. Petrini has much to teach us.”
In November 2021, Petrini was appointed secretary general of the Vatican City State by Francis. In February 2025, the late Pope appointed Petrini as president of the Pontifical Commission and Governorate of Vatican City State, an appointment which was later reconfirmed by Leo. She is the first woman to hold these two top leadership roles within the Vatican structure of governance.
In this position, Petrini heads the administrative operations of the Vatican including “managing public
services; overseeing security, health care and the Vatican Museums; chairing the Pontifical Commission for Vatican City State; and ensuring that all operations align with the pope’s mission,” the Thursday press release stated.
Additionally, she serves as a member of the Dicastery of Bishops, the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See and the Commission for Reserved Matters. She is a professor of welfare economics and sociology at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas - Angelicum.
Petrini is a religious sister of the Franciscan Sisters of the Eucharist Congregation.
She received her undergraduate degree in political science with a specialization in industrial relations from Luiss University in Rome, as well as a master’s degree of science in organization behavior at the Barney School of Business within the University of Hartford. She attended the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, writing a thesis titled “The Contribution of Franciscan Hospice Care to a Culture of Solidarity.” She wrote her doctoral thesis, titled “Health, Equity and Care Through the End of Life,” in 2014. Petrini has previously received honorary degrees from Gonzaga University and Seton Hall University.
SMC announces speaker and honorary recipients
By Observer News Staff
Saint Mary’s College President Katie Conboy announced the keynote speaker for the College’s 179th commencement ceremony, as well as recipients who will be receiving an honorary degree and the President’s Medal on May 16 at Le Mans Green. The statement was provided to Saint Mary’s students and faculty through an email Monday afternoon.
Anne Thompson, who serves as the chief environmental affairs correspondent at NBC News, will be delivering the commencement speech for the class of 2026 and receive an honorary doctorate of humane letters. She worked as a general assignment reporter at WNDU-TV while a student at Notre Dame, graduating in 1983. Since 2010, she has served as part of the University’s Board of Trustees and in 2019 received the Rev. Edward Fredrick Sorin, C.S.C., Award, one of the University’s highest honors, for her work and service to the institution.
“Anne Thompson has been an inspiring role model for women for many years,” Conboy stated in the announcement. “As a veteran correspondent, her distinguished and award-winning portfolio includes reporting on complex topics ranging from the environment, to the papacy, to the Boston Marathon bombing, among others. Her story, her experience, and her perspective as a leading woman’s voice in broadcast journalism will resonate with our graduates and the Commencement audience. We are pleased to confer upon her the degree of Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters.“
Her stories have been featured on the Today Show, NBC Nightly News with Tom Llamas and NBC News Now, where she covered environmental and economic topics. She has reported on the election of Pope Leo XIV and the 2000 presidential campaign coverages of former Sen. Bill Bradley and former Sen. John McCain.
Thompson was nominated for four Emmy awards during her time as NBC News’ chief financial correspondent from 2005 to 2007 alone and won five others through her position as a correspondent. Other notable accomplishments from Thompson include winning the Gerald Loeb Award and the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her follow coverage on Hurricane Katrina.
Colombian Chemist Jennifer Holmgren, the CEO of LanzaTech Global, a carbon recycling company that uses carbon emissions to create sustainable products, will be awarded a doctorate degree of science for her work. In her role, she has steered the company to develop alternative jet fuel, which led to the creation of LanzaJet. She formerly served as the vice president and general manager of the Renewable Energy and Chemicals business unit at Honeywell UOP, where she oversaw alternative aviation biofuels.
Holmgren obtained her bachelor’s degree in 1981 from Harvey Mudd College and later earned her doctorate from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in addition to her master’s of business administration from the University of Chicago. She is involved in 30 scientific publications as an author and co-author and has served on various boards and councils in leadership or as a member.
Her notable accolades includes the 2021 Edison Achievement Award for excellence in innovative designs, the William C. Holmberg Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Bioeconomy from Biofuels Digest in 2017 and being featured in Time Magazine’s TIME100 Climate 2023 list.
Conboy will also be awarding the President’s Medal to Carmi and Chris Murphy for their work and contributions toward the local community. Carmi has been a part of Saint Mary’s Board of Trustees for 15 nonconsecutive years.
During her two terms, she advised on the 2003 Presidential Search Committee following former President Carol Ann Mooney’s tenure and the Down the Avenue Steering Committee that recognized students in local volunteering. She follows her mother and aunt in being an honorary recipient and serving within these committees. The College made her an honorary alumna, class of 2011, for her contributions to the academic institution.
Carmi and Chris have previously donated funds to the Murphy Faculty Award for Senior Comprehensive Mentorship and toward the establishment of Murphy’s Cafe at Angela Athletic and Wellness Complex. In 2013, they were inducted into the South Bend Community Hall of Fame and were honored with the Rev. Edward Frederick Sorin, C.S.C., Award last year for their involvement and philanthropy in local projects, such as the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art.
Allison Elshoff named 2026 ND salutatorian
By Annelise Demers Notre Dame News Editor
Senior Allison Elshoff did not expect to finish near the top of her graduating class at the University of Notre Dame.
Editor’s note: Elshoff is an opinion columnist for The Observer.
“It was actually a complete surprise,” Elshoff wrote in a statement to The Observer. “The valedictorian nomination process wasn’t ever on my radar.”
Now, the Valencia, Calif., native has been named salutatorian of Notre Dame’s Class of 2026 after earning a 3.950 grade-point average. Elshoff will graduate magna cum laude with high honors, an academic distinction awarded to students whose GPA ranks among the top 15% of their institution.
The University’s process for selecting the valedictorian and salutatorian is overseen by the Office of Undergraduate Education within the Office of the Provost. The College of Arts & Letters, the College of Engineering, the Mendoza College of Business, and the College of Science nominate four students who have among highest GPAs of their students, while the Keough School of
Global Affairs and the School of Architecture each submit two. Selected students then provide resumes and drafts of their valedictory addresses for review by a committee made up of representatives from the colleges and schools, including the Office of Undergraduate Education, the Division of Student Affairs and student government. After interviews with finalists, the committee chooses the valedictorian and salutatorian, subject to approval by University President Fr. Robert Dowd.
A resident of Badin Hall, Elshoff majors in business analytics with minors in impact consulting and the Hesburgh Program in Public Service. During her time at the University, she was involved with organizations such as Innovation for Impact Club, The Observer, Student Policy Network and Women in International Security.
“Those organizations shaped who I am at Notre Dame,” Elshoff wrote in a statement to The Observer. “And for a moment, I got to be the person who said: this place has something to offer you — come see.”
That emphasis on helping others feel welcomed and valued became central to Elshoff’s college experience. She said her
perspective shifted significantly over four years at Notre Dame.
“Freshman year is filled with so much anxious self-absorption,” Elshoff wrote. “But I feel like Notre Dame each year has expanded my peripheral vision.”
She pointed specifically to her work with The Observer, where her writing evolved from an advice column into an interview-style series called “Off the Dome,” focused on conversations with faculty, staff and members of the broader campus community.
“I got tired of hearing myself talk and realized that there was so much more to learn from those around me,” she wrote.
Through the column, Elshoff said she found joy in highlighting people whose stories often go unnoticed, including dining hall employees and professors.
“Every time that I reach out to someone I think is really cool, they are always so surprised,” she said. “Getting to interview them and make them feel seen and heard is my favorite thing.”
Elshoff said she hopes classmates remember her as someone who consistently made people feel valued.
“There’s a quote I love: ‘I will always have time for you, you are what time is for,’” she wrote.
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“I try to embody that every day.”
She credited Wendy Angst, a professor of management and organization, as one of the most influential mentors during her time at the University. Elshoff described Angst as someone who balances impactful work with genuine care for students and colleagues.
“She will drop everything to help someone,” Elshoff wrote.
“Even with all the balls she’s juggling, she manages to be present in the moment and have fun.”
Elshoff said Notre Dame ultimately taught her that leadership is rooted less in achievement and more in service.
“I’ve learned that my life is truly not my own,” she wrote.
“It’s about being there for, and learning from, both the people in your life and the people on the margins of society.”
Although she will not deliver a commencement speech, Elshoff mentioned that the message she would want classmates to carry forward is that meaningful service begins with small everyday actions that will eventually shape one’s character and identity.
“We’ve spent four years being told we’re going to change the world,” she wrote. “But my hope is that people realize they can
CONGRATULATIONS, BUSINESS HONORS PROGRAM GRADUATES!
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give now, that they have permission to start small.”
After graduation, Elshoff plans to move to Washington to work in government consulting for Deloitte. She stated that she is excited to begin a new chapter and explore a new city, even as she recognizes how quickly her college years passed.
“The years really fly here,” she wrote. “You don’t realize it until suddenly you’ve finished your last college final and graduation is a week away.”
Looking ahead, Elshoff hopes the recognition as salutatorian ultimately means more than academic distinction.
“Five years from now, this will have mattered if a Notre Dame student — maybe one who’s quietly doubting themselves — feels like they can reach out to me,” she wrote. “I want to be the kind of Notre Dame alum who’s genuinely reachable.”
For now, she is focused on celebrating the moment with the people closest to her.
“My parents were the first people I called when I found out,” Elshoff wrote. “They’re all ecstatic, and I’m so excited to share this moment with them.”
Contact Annelise Demers at ademers@nd.edu
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Saint Mary’s names nine 2026 valedictorians
By Berhan Hagezom
Saint Mary’s News Editor
For Saint Mary’s 179th commencement ceremony, nine valedictorians have been named to represent the class of 2026. Abigail Newton was selected to give the valedictory address.
The eight valedictorians below said their background and experiences at Saint Mary’s College have shaped them into who they are today and the future plans that they will pursue.
Chloe Emenhiser
From Middlebury, Indiana, Emenhiser has filled her time with various extracurriculars, the national mathematics honor society Pi Mu Epsilon and the math and computer science club. Previously, she was a student grader and teaching assistant for the department of mathematics. She also worked in the stage and scene shop for the program in theater for two years.
She transferred from Butler University to the College to begin her sophomore year. She said she made the transition because Saint Mary’s was closer to home, and she thought the math program was better.
Emenhiser did her senior comprehensive project last semester on quantum mechanics and particle behavior within atoms. She also completed a project for her business, industry and government class where she worked on a team to help the Writing and Tutoring Center determine how to better serve students.
Graduating with a bachelor of arts in statistical and actuarial mathematics, she plans to pursue a master of science in data science through the 4 + 1 Data Science Program.
Emma Heffron
A nursing major from La Porte, Indiana, Heffron chose Saint Mary’s due to the nursing program and the tight-knit community found at the College and how professors and staff assist students with success.
She has been engaged in several research endeavors relating to her field of interest. One includes a paper analysis during her junior year on automated scalp cooling therapy and how it prevents alopecia in patients with breast cancer who are undergoing chemotherapy. In her senior year, she also completed a research project that used AI to create data analytics systems that detect hospitalized patient deterioration for earlier intervention.
Heffron is a member of the Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing. She is also a member of the Friends with Sisters Club, a program that pairs students with the Sisters of the Holy Cross, which she felt was a spiritually impactful opportunity.
“That was a wonderful experience for me in that it not only allowed me to connect on a deeper level with the College’s heritage, but also the Sisters of the Holy
Cross have a deep, running history with the nursing profession. So getting to connect in that way to that part of our history, not only helped me grow as a person but also in my profession,” she said.
Following graduation, she will be a registered nurse in the intensive care unit at Memorial Hospital.
Maura Mack
Mack is a transfer student from Duneland Beach, Indiana, who will receive a bachelor’s degree in biology with a minor in chemistry.
“I chose to pursue biology because, in addition to wanting a career in medicine, I genuinely enjoy learning about biological concepts and the underlying mechanisms that shape both the human body and the environment around us,” she wrote. “There were definitely challenges throughout the past four years, especially balancing demanding coursework, extracurricular activities, and making time for myself and my friends. However, the support I received from my family, professors, and the Saint Mary’s community made those stressful moments much more manageable.”
She was able to pursue an independent research project on colorectal cancer under the guidance of biology professor Rana Abdel-Samad.
Mack served as president of the Future Women in Healthcare Club and treasurer of Biology Club. She also worked in the Writing and Tutoring Center as an MCAT tutor. She previously served on the student advisory committee for the Belles Against Violence Office.
She plans to apply to medical school, with current interests in women’s health and oncology.
Alaina Motes
Earning a bachelor of arts in literature in English and creative
writing, with a minor in gender and women’s studies, Motes has served on the editorial board of Chimes, a student-based literary magazine, vice president of Belles Book Nook and as one of the coaches for tennis club. She will be graduating early by completing her degree in three years rather than four. She hails from Salina, Kansas.
She said graduating early came with its own set of challenges and learning how to manage the course load.
“It was definitely hard, because I was trying to do it in three years. I had to do 18 credits every semester except my second one and this last semester. I had to write so many papers that were all due at the same time. But it worked out. It worked well,” she said.
For her senior comprehensive project she began a novel on a Greek mythology epic called “The Price of Fire” and how the gods’ history has led to humanity’s own downfall, where she highlighted misogyny through Pandora’s box and ableism with Hephaestus.
Upon graduation, she will pursue a master of fine arts in English with a concentration in creative writing at Kansas State University. She hopes to work for a top five publishing company and be able to expand on her literary work.
Sophia Sainato-Pinkie
A communication studies major with psychology and marketing minors from Valparaiso, Indiana, Sainato-Pinkie said that she wanted to attend Saint Mary’s College due to the sisterhood and commitment to academic excellence and rigor.
She originally came into the College as a business major, but decided to switch to communications after taking an introduction to communication studies course.
“I just fell in love with
communication studies because we do so much writing,” she said. “And then I ended up falling in love with marketing through that as well, through my PR and advertising minor and internships.”
For her senior comprehensive project, Sainato-Pinkie compared luxury advertising with fast-fashion advertising. She also conducted a survey for the project which obtained nearly 100 responses.
Sainato-Pinkie served as vice president of Lambda Pi Eta Communication Honor Society and as a member of the International Honor Society in Psychology at Saint Mary’s College. She also volunteered with Best Buddies at the University of Notre Dame, Feed My Starving Children and participated in Friends with Sisters.
After completing her master of science in management with a concentration in marketing at the University of Notre Dame, she hopes to work at a marketing agency in Nashville, Tennessee.
Elizabeth Stack
Stack, a Downers Grove, Illinois native, has a double major in economics and political science. She studied abroad in London during her sophomore year.
Stack worked as an economics tutor in the Writing and Tutoring Center and plans to attend law school after she graduates, with a focus on policy.
Morgan Zack
Following a tour of Saint Mary’s, the Lockport, Illinois local fell in love with the campus. Zack is in a 3 + 1 program in social work. She will begin her studies for her master’s degree after graduating.
“I think one challenge was that I’m the first person to do the 3 + 1, so that was kind of a new experience. And I was kind of the guinea pig in that respect, where they
[didn’t] know how these classes are all going to work together to do in three years,” she said. “And me bringing in a lot of credits is kind of what made that possible. If not, I would have had to take a million summer classes.”
Zack said she was surprised to be selected as a valedictorian.
“It is an incredible honor that I’m really grateful for. And it wouldn’t have been possible without all of the support from staff and also from my friends here at Saint Mary’s,” she added.
Leah Zimmerman
Originally from Fort Wayne, Indiana, Zimmerman transferred from Butler University and played on the College’s softball team for three years. She was interested in the speechlanguage pathology major, as she shadowed speech language pathologists previously and her parents both worked in healthcare. She will complete her education after graduating by finishing her master of science in speech-language pathology through a 4 + 1 program.
For her senior comprehensive project, Zimmerman worked at the Judd Leighton Speech and Language Clinic.
Additionally, she was an executive board member of the Saint Mary’s chapter of the National Student Speech Language Hearing Association and a member of Fiat.
Following her completion of the 4 + 1 program, Zimmerman plans to work in a rehab facility or in a hospital with patients who have neurological disorders.
She said she is grateful to be chosen as valedictorian and that attending Saint Mary’s changed the trajectory of her life.
Contact Berhan Hagezom at bhagezom01@saintmarys.edu
5 salutatorians named for HCC commencement
By Berhan Hagezom Saint Mary’s News Editor
Five Holy Cross College salutatorians have been named for the class of 2026. Hailing from places nationally and globally, students share their experiences at the College and their future plans.
Mark Franco
A senior originally from Whittier, California, attended an all-boys high school, which led to choosing Holy Cross as his second choice following Notre Dame. He was able to obtain the Moreau scholarship, which also allowed him to be part of the Pathways program, where he will go on to earn a Master of Science in finance after graduation. Following the program, he hopes to work for a sports team as a financial analyst.
He shared that one of the most crucial quotes that he remembered from Holy Cross was one given by his freshman adviser, who said, “You’re a big fish in a small pond.” He was able to utilize that to his fullest during his time by becoming a tutor in discrete mathematics, business and finance.
As a business major with a sport, culture and formation minor, he noted that there were some differences between the majors at the College in comparison to Mendoza College of Business, in terms of the fact that Mendoza focuses more on specialization, while at the College, it is broader. He found challenges in having a prerequisite pathway to pursue a master’s degree within the Pathways program.
“For my pathway being at MSF, but also this is for the kids doing the analytics masters, the accounting masters, the nonprofit masters, there was not many classes that were tailored, in a sense, for us to have a prerequisite background,” he said. “There was no formalized prereq pathway for us in the sense, it was more just [that] you’re kind of on your own, in a sense.”
During his time at Holy Cross, he was able to pursue strategic management
research within a business class and played on the men’s golf team.
He shared that it was an unexpected honor to receive salutatorian recognition by the Department of Business and looks forward to carrying the honor in the future.
“Our provost said something that solus, or what salutatorian means in Latin, solus means greeting. And I think a salutatorian goes beyond academia in the classroom, I believe, they’re supposed to be the greeter of wherever they go,” he shared. “If it’s in college, if it’s in the workplace, if it’s in the community, or a charity event for a nonprofit, just anywhere outside of it. That’s what a salutatorian is, someone who’s welcoming, it’s someone who respects others’ perspectives, nationality, ethnicity, in that sense.”
Evelyn Baldwin
A native of South Bend, Indiana, Baldwin was interested in attending Holy Cross after undergoing double brain surgery to ensure that she was near her family due to ongoing health issues. Despite originally wanting to attend Arizona State University, she received a phone call from Holy Cross awarding her a full-ride scholarship.
Baldwin shared a family history with Notre Dame. She said, “One of my greatgrandfathers, he built the head of construction at the stadium. And then my other one was recruited by Knute Rockne.”
Baldwin explained that one of her favorite service opportunities was a weeklong internship trip to Maȟpíya Lúta on the Pine Ridge Renovation in South Dakota — an opportunity communicated to her by educator formation program coordinator Annette Romans. This experience inspired her to work on a bookmobile for a paid internship of three months.
“We traveled across North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska, but our main spot was St. Joseph’s Indian School in Chamberlain, South Dakota, and so we just got to be immersed within the community and to deliver books,” she said. “I just got to play
with kids and read with kids, and then talk to the community members, to the point where I was at a bar and I found a frog in the bathroom, so I made the frog my pet that night … Just being able to be welcomed into the community out there by the Lakota tribe was amazing, and their generosity and their love.”
The elementary education major will be pursuing a full-time teaching position in West Virginia for 2-yearolds following graduation. She has been recognized as salutatorian on behalf of the Department of Social Sciences.
Nicholet Zabuna
A biology major from Uganda, Zabuna attended Holy Cross High School and met Holy Cross College students, who prompted her interest in the College. By going to the College, she felt that she would be able “to continue in the Holy Cross education.”
As she adjusted to the College, she noted some challenges along the way, including a language barrier and educational differences between Uganda and the United States.
“There’s been so many hardships, of course, transferring from Uganda to America. The first thing was language [and] writing [as] English was hard for me, but I learned with time. And then also, the way of learning in Uganda is so different from how things are done here, so that was another thing I had to adjust to,” she said.
Zabuna explained the educational differences as students in the United States are expected to learn or be knowledgeable through textbook materials before attending the class, while in Uganda, students fully learn and immerse themselves within the class space.
Throughout her time at Holy Cross, she has immersed herself in various projects. She was a part of a lead research project, where they tested different levels of lead in stained glass present in chapels around South Bend. She is part of an ongoing biology research project on how melatonin affects the
circadian rhythm in sleep cycles. She worked as an assistant hall director and a cantor in a church, where she learned about how to be out of her shell in the campus community
Additionally, she shared about being president of Laudato Si at Holy Cross, where they are now in the process of establishing their own community garden.
“Me and my fellow leaders were able to be part of the Holy Cross day fundraising money to start a garden, because we saw the garden that Saint Mary’s has and were really inspired to try and do something like that, or something like the Unity garden,” she said. “Of the $4,000 that we’re looking for, we were able to raise about $3,400, so about 74% of it.”
She shared her excitement when she initially found out that she would be named as one of the salutatorians for the class of 2026, specifically for the Department of Natural and Quantitative Sciences.
“I was very surprised, very excited. I cried [and] my mom cried. So all of us are very happy … But that was a very good honor, it’s so rewarding, and I feel like with the amount of work I’m putting, it was well deserved at the end,” Zabuna said.
After graduation, she plans to work at Memorial Hospital in an intensive care unit.
Maribelle Rivera
A first-generation college student from South Bend, Indiana, Maribelle Rivera was looking to stay local and maintain a small class size, and Holy Cross College fit the requirements.
Initially planning to be a psychology major, she switched and became a visual arts major following her freshman year after recommendation from a professor. She will also graduate with a minor in education.
Her portfolio represents her journey through the visual arts major, beginning with an emphasis on food, her work as a junior and senior considers broader theological themes surrounding food, prompted by a Notre Dame
theology course.
“And I took this idea from the class, and I was like, ‘I want to put this into my artwork, somehow,’ because I felt deeply inspired by it,” she said. “I started focusing more on creating pieces that focused on table settings where people were currently eating. Where a meal was finished to sort of symbolize when we come together to share a meal, like we’re brought together in communion, and we’re building these relationships.”
In alignment with her portfolio and major, she also served as the president of the visual arts club, where she was able to collaborate with other organizational leaders and host trips to art museums in Chicago. She is a former communications intern at the Office of Student Activities.
She hopes that for students pursuing a visual arts degree, they will note, “It’s not all just like you get to color for homework. It’s going to take time, it’s going to take hard work and dedication. But once you find your thing, stick to it, don’t be afraid to experiment with different mediums and if you have an idea, go for it [as it] doesn’t have to be perfect.”
In the end, she hopes to become a high school art teacher. In the meantime, she will be a paraprofessional in a third-grade classroom after graduation and may return to obtain a Master of Fine Arts after she builds out her portfolio.
She has been named salutatorian for the Department of Humanities.
Mateo Cruz Mendoza
Mateo Cruz Mendoza is recognized as one of the salutatorians for the Class of 2026 from the Moreau College Initiative.
The initiative is a partnership between Notre Dame and the College to provide undergraduate degrees to incarcerated men at Westville Correctional Facility. Tricampus professors teach courses for students to earn an Associate of Arts or a Bachelor of Arts degree.
Contact Berhan Hagezom at bhagezom01@saintmarys.edu
receives $7.5 million to fund scholarships
By Observer News Staff
Saint Mary’s College has received a “landmark” gift from alumna Lorraine Sheehan Wilson ’85 and her husband, Notre Dame graduate Chris Wilson ’85, to establish the Wilson Sheehan Scholarship Fund. The announcement was made to the Saint Mary’s
community Wednesday afternoon by College President Katie Conboy.
According to Conboy, their $7.5 million investment, the largest cash scholarship gift in the College’s history, “will play a central role” in Saint Mary’s capital campaign Ring Out Ring True. The campaign will publicly launch June 6.
Sheehan Wilson is the vice chair Saint Mary’s Board of Trustees.
The Wilson Sheehan Scholarship Fund will provide need-based scholarships to Saint Mary’s students beginning in the 2027-2028 academic year. Conboy said many recipients would receive support for all four years of their
College tenure. “This leadership gift directly advances our commitment to access, belonging, and student success. Lorraine and Chris have already demonstrated a deep dedication to Saint Mary’s students,” Conboy wrote. “This transformative investment ensures that many more young women will benefit from the
life-changing power of a Saint Mary’s education.”
Sheehan Wilson and Wilson have made significant donations to the College in the past, including an endowment for the Office of Student Empowerment and an endowed scholarship that supports students graduated from Cristo Rey Network high schools.
HCC names Alex Jones commencement speaker
By Observer News Staff
Holy Cross College announced Alex Jones, chief executive officer and founder of Hallow, a Catholic prayer and meditation app, will deliver their 2026 commencement ceremony address on May 16. This will be the College’s 59th commencement ceremony.
“Alex Jones represents the kind of thoughtful, faith-filled
leadership we hope to cultivate in every Holy Cross graduate,” Holy Cross College President Marco Clark said in a press release. “Alex has taken his own journey of faith and transformed it into a global ministry that brings hope, prayer and peace to millions. We are honored to welcome him to Holy Cross as we celebrate the Class of 2026.”
Jones, a Columbus, Ohio
native, earned his undergraduate degree in engineering from the University of Notre Dame in 2015 and later his master’s of business administration from Stanford Graduate School of Business.
He co-founded Hallow with Alessandro DiSanto and Erich Kerekes, both also 2015 Notre Dame graduates.
Hallow was launched in 2018 and has since become the largest
prayer app of any faith tradition in the world with over 30 million downloads in over 150 countries. During the 2025 Lenten season, Hallow reached No. 1 in all apps in the App Store, surpassing other dominantly popular apps such as Amazon, Netflix, TikTok, Spotify and Instagram, according to the College’s press release.
Jones has been highlighted for his app in national and
international media, including NPR, BBC, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Free Press. He also received a range of honors and awards such as the the University of Notre Dame’s Domer Dozen, the Catholic International University Founder’s Award, Forbes 30 Under 30, the Christifideles Laici Award and the Legatus Bowie Kuhn Award for Evangelization.
ND to give 7 honorary degrees at commencement
By Observer News Staff
Holy Cross College announced AThe University of Notre Dame has announced that seven individuals will receive honorary degrees at this year’s commencement ceremony.
Honorary doctor of laws degrees will be awarded to Marguerite Barankitse, Eamon Duffy, Christopher Murphy III, J. Christopher Reyes, Sister Raffaella Petrini and Cardinal Joseph Tobin. Mary Boyce will receive an honorary doctor of engineering degree.
According to the press release announcing the recipients of the degrees, Barankitse is “a humanitarian leader and teacher, is credited with saving more than 50,000 children and providing them with access to health care, education and culture through her organization, Maison Shalom (House of Peace).” Through her work across Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic
Republic of Congo, she has sheltered and supported children affected by war. Since 2015, when she was forced to leave the Democratic Republic of Congo, she has been working in exile in Rwanda.
Duffy is an emeritus professor of the history of Christianity at the University of Cambridge.
“Duffy is a renowned scholar of Christianity in the Middle Ages and the Reformation, the history of the papacy, and Christian material and visual culture. Duffy has written extensively for both scholarly and popular audiences, and two of his books, ‘The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580’ and ‘The Voices of Morebath: Reformation and Rebellion in an English Village,’ are widely credited with reshaping the modern understanding of Catholicism in late medieval England as a vibrant and popular faith rather than a dying institution,” the press release stated.
Murphy is an alumnus of Notre Dame, having received his undergraduate degree here before receiving degrees in law and business from the University of Virginia and Harvard University, respectively. In 1972, he joined with his father-in-law and a group of investors to purchase the First Bank and Trust Company of South Bend, now 1st Source Bank. According to the press release, his work, centered on the banking and business industries, has supported “numerous organizations seeking to address some of society’s most critical needs — including health care, economic development, education and support for the arts — at the regional, state and national levels.”
Reyes is the co-founder and chair of Reyes Holdings LLC — a large global food and drink distribution company.
“Reyes founded the company with his father and brother in 1976, beginning as a small beer distributor in South Carolina, and today delivering 1.3 billion
cases of food and beverages globally each year,” the press release stated.
He has been a member of Notre Dame’s Board of Trustees since 2003.
Tobin was named a cardinal by Pope Francis and serves as the sixth archbishop of Newark — a role he has held since 2017.
“After serving as superior general of the Redemptorists, he was ordained archbishop in 2010 and appointed by Pope Benedict XVI to serve as the Secretary of the Congregation (now Dicastery) for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. From 2012 to 2017, he led the Archdiocese of Indianapolis. In addition to his responsibilities in the Archdiocese of Newark, he serves on the Vatican’s Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, the Synod of Bishops, the Dicastery for Culture and Education, the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, the Council for the Economy, the Dicastery
for Bishops, and the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church,” the press release stated.
Cunningham Boyce is a provost emerita and professor of mechanical engineering at Columbia University, having worked at MIT for 25 years before Columbia.
“A leading researcher of polymeric materials and soft composites, her groundbreaking contributions include creating new modeling methods for the use of engineers in commercial products, transportation vehicles, and biomedical devices, among others,” the press release stated.
An honorary degree will also be awarded to Sister Raffaella Petrini, the principal speaker of this year’s commencement. She was set to receive an honorary doctor of laws degree at commencement last year but deferred her reception of the award following the death of Pope Francis.
ND seniors receive support for career endeavors
By Matthew Morin Associate News Editor
From a Beinecke Scholar, to a Churchill Scholar, to 36 Gilman Scholars and 10 Fulbright Scholars, the class of 2026 has 72 students who have received international awards, scholarships and fellowships.
Throughout the process of applications, Notre Dame’s Flatley Center for Undergraduate Scholarly Engagement, known as CUSE, has worked with students to help them with their scholarly discernment and advise them on opportunities for growth and funding.
“The class of 2026 cohort has greatly impressed me and every other fellowship advisor in my office. Between themselves, they have managed at least one recipient for nearly every major award, and even those who did not win, possessed such an incredible drive that working with them made me feel hopeful for the future,” Elise Rudt-Moorthy, associate director of national fellowships, wrote in a statement to The Observer.
Alex Young
One recipient is Alex Young, a senior who was named as a Truman Scholar in 2025.
The Truman Scholarship is awarded to juniors who plan to pursue a graduate degree and have shown strong public service leadership.
Young said that he initially chose to apply after being recommended to do so by a previous recipient.
“I decided to apply because of the resources and network the Truman Foundation provides for aspiring public servants. I want to serve as a leader in my home state, and I believe the Truman Scholarship will help me achieve academically but also make connections with current and future leaders that will be valuable to Kentucky in the future,” Young wrote in a statement to The Observer.
He described the application process as “intense.” Young said his essays reflected on his experiences and his aspiration for a career in public service.
In his application, he detailed his leadership in a nine-year-long
effort to end corporal punishment in schools in Kentucky, working with state legislators to achieve change and testifying in the Kentucky General Assembly. He also described his leadership in Notre Dame’s Student Policy Network and the College Democrats of Notre Dame.
For two years after graduation, Young will work in local government as deputy chief of staff in the mayor’s office of Louisville, Ky., before attending Harvard Law School in 2028. He said receiving the Truman Scholarship was helpful in his law school applications.
Young majors in political science with minors in public service and constitutional studies.
“I am so grateful for all of the opportunities I have had at Notre Dame, and I am inspired by our classmates who seek to use policy and political service as a force for good in our world,” Young wrote.
Janet Federici
Janet Federici is the recipient of the Boren Scholarship in Japan and the Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Award in
South Korea, one of only six members of the class of 2026 who received more than one nationally competitive award.
Federici was encouraged to apply to both programs by CUSE.
Knowing she wanted to go abroad, Federici chose to apply to scholarships that would allow her to live in another country for an extended period of time after graduation with the hope of improving her language skills. She hopes to work in public service as a translator.
Federici believes her major in Japanese and minor in linguistics contributed to her selection for the Boren Scholarship.
She is declining the Boren Scholarship, however, to accept her position as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to teach English in South Korea.
Emmanuel Uzobuife
Emmanuel Uzobuife is the recipient of a Marshall Scholarship, a program designed to allow Americans to study in the United Kingdom for one to three years, fully funded.
Using his scholarship, Uzobuife will pursue a Master of Science in pharmacology and toxicology and a Master of Science in drug delivery with artificial intelligence at the University of Liverpool before attending medical school. As a physician he says he hopes to treat and advocate for people suffering with substance use disorder and work to ameliorate the opioid epidemic.
Uzobuife initially learned about the scholarship during his sophomore year and applied to this and several other fellowships that would pay for graduate education and provide opportunities to explore his interests.
He noted that CUSE was very supportive in working with him on every applic ation and making sure each application showed his efforts. Uzobuife believes his application stood out because of his “cohesive narrative” and his explanation of how he would use the scholarship to make a positive impact.
Contact Matthew Morinl at mmorin2@nd.edu
Student earns first Fulbright scholarship at HCC
By Annelise Demers Notre Dame News Editor
Jelani Cotton is the first Holy Cross College student to receive a Fulbright scholarship, one of the nation’s most competitive international academic honors. He will be teaching in Asturias, Spain.
Cotton, a senior majoring in business with minors in Spanish and marketing, described his four years at Holy Cross as “transformational.”
“So many doors have been opened because of my decision to attend Holy Cross College,” Cotton wrote. “I feel that I am a completely different person with a whole new world perspective thanks to the experiences I have had and people I have met.”
Cotton said many of his accomplishments stemmed from a desire to become a role model for younger relatives and others in the community.
“A lot of what I have been doing is unfamiliar to my family,” he wrote. “I’m humbled to be able to lead by example, set a path that they can learn from and show them that the sky is the limit.”
He said his long-term goal is to eventually open community centers focused on empowering youth.
“I wanted to be someone for
them that I felt I needed as a child,” Cotton wrote.
Cotton learned he had been selected as a Fulbright finalist in early April after what he described as an unusually compressed application process.
He and Holy Cross Provost Dr. Michael Griffin discovered the opportunity roughly one week before the deadline.
“Other colleges and universities have departments that walk students through the application process over the course of months,” Cotton wrote. “I completed it in less than a week.”
Despite balancing work, classes and other commitments, he submitted the application minutes before the deadline.
“I was not very confident that I would be awarded this opportunity,” he wrote. “Shortly after the disbelief was a feeling of gratitude.”
Griffin, Cotton said, encouraged him throughout the process and believed he could become the College’s first Fulbright recipient.
“He checked on me every day of the application process,” Cotton wrote. “I was ecstatic to give him a call when I found out the news.”
Cotton will spend the next year in Asturias, Spain, teaching English and other subjects in elementary and middle schools
through the Fulbright Program. He also hopes to launch community-centered projects during his time abroad.
He said his study abroad experience in Italy helped prepare him for the transition.
“I gained so much independence and deepened my global perspective,” Cotton wrote. “My ability to adapt and thrive in Italy showed me that I really can figure anything out when I put my mind to it.”
While he is excited to strengthen his Spanish skills and immerse himself in another culture, Cotton said he hopes the experience ultimately centers on connection and service.
“I want to create a space of togetherness and trust as I teach my students,” he wrote. “I want to be a role model that makes them feel worthy and seen.”
His path to the Fulbright traces through years of work, mentorship and service across South Bend. Since beginning at Morris Park Country Club in 2019, Cotton has worked as a dishwasher, busser, server and eventually director of outside operations for the club’s golf operation.
When Rusty Mason, the general manager and chief operating officer of Morris Park Country Club, first noticed Cotton, the teenager was alone in the kitchen
dish pit after a busy golf outing, carefully scrubbing dishes long after others had left.
“He was the only one left working in the kitchen,” Mason wrote.
“I observed how much care and time he took to do things the right way.”
That moment stayed with Mason.
“To say he earned it is an understatement,” Mason wrote.
“He has the ‘it factor’ that few have, especially at a young age.”
Mason said Cotton consistently sought leadership opportunities and embraced responsibility.
“His thirst to lead was apparent early on,” Mason wrote. “Did he stumble from time to time? Yes. But he learned from mistakes and grew from them.”
For Mason, Cotton’s Fulbright recognition validates what he observed years ago in the kitchen.
“Some people just get it,” Mason wrote. “Wherever he chooses to go in life, you can bank on it being a leadership role.”
Cotton balanced work with academics, volunteering and mentorship throughout college. He volunteered with organizations including La Casa de Amistad, Our Lady of the Road, Cultivate Food Rescue and Unity Gardens while also mentoring high school students through the Community Foundation of
St. Joseph County’s 21st Century Success Fellowship.
Malissa Ayala, the former program director for scholarships and education at the Community Foundation of St. Joseph County, said Cotton immediately stood out when he joined the fellowship as a high school senior.
“He was thoughtful, kind and personable,” Ayala wrote. “As a first-generation student, he knew he could be the spark for others to see that a different path was possible.”
Ayala said Cotton grew into a confident mentor who helped hundreds of students and families navigate scholarship opportunities and envision futures in higher education.
“He is a compassionate leader and makes sure others are seen,” she wrote. “He encourages and creates spaces that are safe for conversation and learning to take place.”
At community events such as “Success Fest,” Ayala said students and families naturally gravitated toward Cotton.
“He inspires,” she wrote. “Those students and families leave confident in next steps and excited for the opportunities that lie ahead.”
Contact Annelise Demers at ademers@nd.edu
McGreevy reappointed as provost for 5 years
By Observer News Staff
University President Fr. Robert Dowd has announced the reappointment of John McGreevy as provost for a second five-year term. Dowd had issued a “highly enthusiastic recommendation” for McGreevy’s reappointment to the University’s Board of Trustees. Faculty were notified of the decision in an email on May 5.
“I am truly delighted that John has agreed to serve a second fiveyear term as Provost. John is an invaluable and deeply trusted partner to me as we seek to achieve our aspirations as the premier Catholic research university in the world. I ask you to join me in congratulating and thanking John for his exceptional leadership, his tireless efforts on behalf of the University, and his extraordinary dedication to our distinctive mission,” Dowd said in the email to faculty.
McGreevy was unanimously reelected by the Board of Trustees and unanimously endorsed by the Board of Fellows, which consists of six Holy Cross clergy and six lay people and is responsible for ensuring the University “maintains its essential character as a Catholic
institution of higher learning.”
The provost’s review committee, which included eight faculty members and two students, unanimously recommended McGreevy be reappointed.
“Over the course of the past four months, the Committee has worked tirelessly to conduct extensive interviews and listening sessions across the University, as well as administer an anonymous survey of faculty, post-docs, and academic staff, to invite feedback about John’s performance to date and, where appropriate, identify areas for improvement,” Dowd said in the email.
According to Dowd, the review committee “highlighted John’s many accomplishments as Provost, praising him for articulating a bold vision for Notre Dame as the University’s chief academic officer, and for being a strategic thinker and accomplished scholar, deeply committed to the University’s Catholic mission and to future improvement.” Dowd said the committee also “identified areas of continued focus for John and the University.” A spokesperson for the University declined to provide a copy of the report or additional details about what the committee identified as McGreevy’s
accomplishments or areas of continued focus.
McGreevy also received support from the executive committee of the faculty senate.
“The Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate met with the Provost Review Committee to share feedback and expressed unanimous support for his reappointment. The Faculty Senate looks forward to continue to work with him on important issues across the campus community,” biology professor Amy Stark, chair of the faculty senate, wrote in a statement to The Observer.
A historian with interests in religion and politics, McGreevy previously served as dean of the College of Arts and Letters from 2008 to 2018. As provost, he helped to develop the University’s strategic framework, Notre Dame 2033, and announced the launch of strategic initiatives focused on democracy, ethics and poverty. McGreevy has pushed for an increased emphasis on research at the University.
Over his tenure, McGreevy has received pushback from Catholic and conservative circles.
Last year, McGreevy was criticized for an email he sent to faculty in which he said hiring a diverse
faculty was as important as hiring Catholic faculty.
“One important goal is to hire Catholic faculty and other faculty deeply committed to our mission to ensure continuity with our past and our future as the world’s leading global Catholic research university,” McGreevy said. “A second overlapping and equally important goal is to increase the number of women and underrepresented minorities on our faculty so that we become the diverse and inclusive intellectual community our mission urges us to be.”
McGreevy also drew backlash for approving the appointment of global affairs professor Susan Ostermann to lead the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, which she later declined. Ostermann’s appointment was criticized by some Catholics and conservatives because Ostermann had publicly advocated for abortion rights.
The Irish Rover, a Catholic and conservative campus newspaper, published an editorial in April titled “Provost McGreevy’s Mission Is Not Notre Dame’s,” which argued McGreevy had resisted ecclesial authority, adopted the values of secular universities, and failed to promote
the University’s Catholic mission. The provost’s review committee was chaired by Eric Sims, professor and chair of economics. Additional members include Marianne Cusato, professor of the practice of architecture and director of the Housing & Community Regeneration Initiative; Richard Garnett, professor of law and director of the Program on Church, State & Society; J. Daniel Gezelter, professor and department chair of chemistry and biochemistry; Maria McKenna, professor of the practice and faculty director of the AnBryce Scholars Institute and the Transformational Leaders Program; Laura MillerGraff, professor of psychology, associate department chair and director of the Shaw Center for Children and Families; Thomas O’Sullivan, professor of biomedical electronics; Ann Tenbrunsel, professor of business ethics and department chair of Management & Organization; Sanchita Chakraborty, PhD student in applied and computational mathematics; and Jack Keller, undergraduate in the class of 2027. Ann Firth, vice president and chief of staff in the Office of the President, also served on the review committee as a non-voting member.
ND considers grade inflation, alternate solutions
By Mara Hall and Henry Jagodzinski
Associate News Editor and Assistant Managing Editor
Recently, elite universities have faced criticism for the growing percentage of A’s awarded in each class. The University of Notre Dame has also seen grade inflation in the last several decades.
During the April Faculty Senate meeting, Ron Metoyer, vice president and associate provost for teaching and learning, noted recent national conversations around grade inflation may prompt a grade inflation working group at Notre Dame.
In a statement to The Observer, University provost John McGreevy said conversations about the matter were ongoing.
“Grade inflation is a complex issue facing many universities, and Notre Dame is giving it careful consideration. A faculty working group is one possible approach, but discussions are still at an early stage and no decisions have been made,” he wrote. Notre Dame declined to share historical grade distribution data detailing the proportion of letter grades awarded each year.
“Reviewing grades over time raises interpretation and sensitivity considerations, particularly across multiple decades of policy and structural change,” Adrea Hernandez, executive director of institutional research, wrote in a statement to The Observer.
“When we refer to ‘interpretation and sensitivity
considerations,’ we’re acknowledging that grade distribution data spanning multiple decades can be difficult to interpret accurately without substantial contextual information. Over time, the University has experienced changes in curriculum structures, grading policies, course formats, student populations, and academic standards. Without careful framing, comparisons across departments or time periods could lead to conclusions that are incomplete or potentially misleading,” she added. “There are also sensitivities related to how such data might be used to characterize academic units or instructors without the full context needed to understand differences in grading practices across disciplines.”
While Notre Dame does not make grade distribution available, it does publicly list historical data on the minimum GPA required for students to make the dean’s list, an honor given to students with a GPA in the top 30% each semester.
Over the last two decades, the cutoff for the dean’s list has risen across all colleges at the University. The minimum GPA to make the dean’s list for the College of Science, for instance, has risen from 3.69 in 2002 to 3.95 in 2026. The minimum for the College of Engineering has risen from 3.6 to 3.87 over the same time period.
The cutoff for the dean’s list has increased over time. Data courtesy of the University of Notre Dame, graph by Mara Hall.
The increase in GPAs for the Mendoza College of Business has
been more modest. Since Spring 2010, Mendoza has implemented a policy in which the average GPA for the class, across sections, must be between 3 and 3.5. Despite this, the GPA cutoff for the dean’s list has continued to rise for Mendoza students from 3.69 in 2010 to 3.85 this year.
GPA requirements for Latin honors have also increased over time. Since 2005, students whose GPAs are the top 30% of their school or college are awarded cum laude, the top 15% are awarded magna cum laude, and the top 5% are awarded summa cum laude. Notably, the cutoff for summa cum laude in the College of Science hit 4.00 this year, the first time that students in any school or college at the University receiving this honor have all had exclusively A’s on their transcript.
The cutoff for summa cum laude has increased over time with the College of Science hitting 4.00 this year. Data courtesy of the University of Notre Dame, graph by Mara Hall.
Conversations about grade inflation are not new. Notre Dame’s Academic Council discussed the matter as early as 2000, and professors have sharply differing views on the issue.
Fr. Edward Malloy, University President Emeritus, objected to references to rising GPAs as “grade inflation.”
“Grade inflation suggests that it is something unacceptable or that it has a momentum of its own that is not desirable,” he said. “I think the quality of the Notre Dame student body has gone up significantly in my time
The cutoff for summa cum laude at Notre Dame has increased in the last two decades, with the College of Science hitting 4.00 this year.
here, and if that is the case, you would expect those students to do better.”
“Some people lament grade inflation. I think it is more a reflection of the quality of the student body and the willingness of the faculty to reward that than it is a great crisis point,” Malloy added.
Anthropology professor Susan Blum said she thought the system for student evaluation needed a radical overhaul.
“We should get rid of grades. That’s what we should do. Grades are not informative.
They have never been informative. They have never been good at motivating students. They motivate through fear,” she said.
Blum said she does not support requirements for faculty to limit A’s or to grade on a curve.
“It never works. Students hate it. Teachers hate it,” she said. “This is a favorite topic, often of people with certain political positions who want to complain
about students and teachers and say that students are not learning well, and that we need to be stricter.”
Blum said she believes grading on a curve effectively predetermines student success before students ever set foot in a classroom. She suggested that portfolios of student work or narrative descriptions of student performance would better represent students’ abilities.
In her classes, Blum uses a system she calls “ungrading” where she meets with students and lets them share what grade they think they deserve. She reports that many, but not all, believe they have earned an A.
“I don’t have to agree with them, but I often do,” she added.
Blum said she would quit before going back to a traditional system of grading.
Editor’s Note: This is an abridged version of this story. Read more at ndsmcobserver.com
Mara Hall | The Observer
Outstanding Senior Award to Giselle Martinez
By Soledad Castellanos Associate News Editor
During the Alumnae Association Champagne Brunch on Wendnesday, the Saint Mary’s College Alumnae Association Board of Directors honored senior Giselle Martinez with the 2026 Outstanding Senior Award for her academic and professional excellence. Held Wednesday at Noble Family Dining Hall, the board of directors publicly announced Martinez as the recipient and welcomed current students and alumnae to recognize their accomplishments on and off campus.
Martinez viewed the event as celebratory, as she reflected on the past four years of her collegiate career as a student, mentor and active community member.
In an interview with The Observer, Martinez spoke about her journey navigating
school and the community she found within Saint Mary’s.
From volunteering at Our Lady of the Road, where she leads students every Friday morning, to serving as vice president for both the Student Diversity Board and La Fuerza, she said that it was the direct opposite of her original perspective that the college experience would only be lectures and studying.
A double major in psychology and gender and women’s studies with a minor in sociology, she noted that her senior composition has served as a culmination of her studies.
“My focus of study was looking at how Latina and Hispanic American women navigate dual cultural gender expectations in higher education,” Martinez said. Her work highlights how internal work interactions “affect their stress and coping mechanisms, especially in a college setting.”
Currently, she is in the
process of publishing her research with the help of psychology and gender and women’s studies professor Bettina Spencer. Martinez has worked with her as an adviser for the past four years and served as a teaching assistant for Spencer’s psychology of belonging class.
“I am working on publishing that right now with my faculty adviser, Dr. Bettina Spencer, who I’ve grown super close with these past couple years. I’ve had her every year. She’s been my adviser throughout the whole process,” Martinez said.
Martinez has presented her research at conferences across the country and internationally, including Chicago, Austin and Mexico.
Martinez says her collaboration with psychology professors Marjorie Schaeffer and Alissa Russell was pivotal in her academic career.
“I think in a combination
of making my own comprehensive study and working on theirs, it’s really allowed me to grow in quantitative, qualitative writing skills and proposal analysis and just really understanding the process in which research is done,” she said.
In her junior year, Martinez decided that she wanted to continue her studies after undergrad. Her return to campus at the start of senior year marked the beginning of her journey to apply for graduate school.
“I just really enjoy the process of continually learning, and I feel like you can never have too much knowledge. Knowledge is power. So I knew I wanted to continue higher ed,” Martinez said.
“I just noticed that there’s just such a community here that is so supportive and wants to uplift you. And I wanted to be a part of that,” Martinez said.
Martinez says she will leave Saint Mary’s with a desire to pay forward the support that she received throughout her academic career.
“In high school, there was a slogan we had. It was called, ‘protect the dream’ and your dream was whatever you wanted it to be. And I really feel like for me, my dream was being the first in my family to receive a bachelor’s, and so I just constantly carried that and I constantly protected my dream,” Martinez said.
Contact Soledad Castellanos at scastellanos01@saintmarys.edu
Having this support throughout her time at Saint Mary’s, Martinez reflected on her experience as a firstgeneration college student. In Belles Connect, a program for underrepresented students, she served as both a scholar and leader, providing guidance that she once received as a freshman.
Graduates pursue service work with ACE and JVC
By Annelise Demers Associate News Editor
As commencement approaches, several Notre Dame seniors are preparing to begin postgrad service programs, carrying lessons from their time at the University into classrooms, parishes and new communities across the country.
Patrick Dolan, Evelyn Van de North and Jack Nelson will serve through the Alliance for Catholic Education, a twoyear teaching program that places graduates in Catholic schools. Maddie Colbert will serve through Jesuit Volunteer Corps, working in faith and justice ministry at St. Vincent’s Parish in Baltimore.
This year, ACE will welcome its 33rd cohort of teachers, who will serve in 91 Catholic schools across 37 dioceses and archdioceses, according to Michael Comuniello, senior associate director for recruitment for ACE Teaching Fellows, who wrote in an email to The Observer. The cohort includes 93 teachers from 46 colleges and universities across the United States, as well as three international students. Comuniello wrote that ACE received about 380 applications this year and had a 28.2% admit rate.
ACE will also begin a new partnership with the Diocese of Columbus, where four ACE teachers will serve. Two of those teachers, Emily Williams and Max Feist, are current Notre Dame students.
For Dolan, an economics major with minors in data science and sociology, ACE will take him to Oakland, California. He will teach high school math. Dolan said he first became
interested in ACE after participating in PATH, a teaching internship in Tucson, Arizona, where he taught rising sixthgrade math students.
“The first day I was in the classroom, I loved it,” Dolan said. “It felt so natural to be up there working with students.”
Dolan said the program appealed to him because it allows him to bring more than his academic skills into his work. He said ACE felt like a place where he could bring his faith, personality and full self to his postgrad plans.
“I thought everything that makes me me was able to be brought to ACE,” Dolan said. “That’s really what sold me on it the most.”
Van de North, a biochemistry major with minors in science, technology and values and musical theater, will teach high school science in St. Petersburg, Florida. She said she had considered teaching before, but became more serious about the possibility after years of working with kids and tutoring at the Robinson Community Learning Center.
“I would be having the worst day ever, and then I’d get there, and I’d see my kid,” Van de North said. “I was like, ‘This impact. I want to keep having this.’”
Van de North said her own science teachers helped shape her decision to pursue teaching. She said she hopes to help students see science as something exciting and accessible.
“I kind of wanted to be like, ‘Look, this is something that can be cool,’” Van de North said. “Maybe there’s that one kid who’s never been exposed to it before but really likes it.”
Nelson, a neuroscience major with minors in compassionate care in medicine and musical theatre, will teach high school chemistry and math in Los Angeles through ACE. He said his interest in the program began freshman year, when ACE Executive Director John Staud encouraged him to consider teaching before medical school.
“Ever since then, there’s always kind of been a little bit of that voice in the back of my head,” Nelson said.
Nelson said ACE connects to his Notre Dame experience through a call to serve others. As a resident assistant, he said service has already been an important part of his time at the University.
“ACE just feels like another big way to give back,” Nelson said. “I’ll be [in] a place that I don’t know very well but a place that I’m excited to get to know and become a part of.”
For Colbert, a global affairs and theology major with a minor in peace studies, postgrad service will take a different form. Through JVC, she will work at St. Vincent’s Parish in Baltimore, primarily with the parish’s faith and justice ministry. Colbert said her work will include doorbell ministry, helping receive homeless people and connect them with services such as food, clothing, furniture donations and community meals.
Colbert said she became interested in JVC through professor Jerry Powers’ peace-building and theology class. She said she was drawn to the program’s emphasis on simple living, community and accompaniment.
“They really emphasize accompaniment with people,”
Colbert said. “That is something that is very important to me.”
Colbert said her decision to pursue a year of service was deliberate, not a placeholder because she was unsure what to do after graduation.
“I think there is this idea that a year of service is just like, ‘Oh, I don’t know what I want to do with my life, so I’m going to serve,’” Colbert said. “I don’t think that’s it, because for me, it was a very deliberate decision.”
Colbert said she hopes JVC will help her learn how to accompany people without trying to solve every problem.
“I want to learn from experience, on the ground, how to properly accompany people that are leading such different lives than I have,” Colbert said.
For the students entering ACE, teaching emerged as both a professional path and a form of service. Dolan said he is most excited to meet his students in Oakland.
“All I’m doing is for them,” Dolan said. “The main reason here is for the students.”
Van de North said teaching is service because teachers accompany students through both academic and personal experiences.
“It’s both physically serving, like you’re physically there, you’re engaging your students, but also, on an emotional level, you’re supporting them,” Van de North said. “You are walking with them as they go through whatever they’re going through that year.”
Nelson said he hopes to be remembered not only for what he teaches but for how he helps students grow.
“I don’t necessarily care if
I’m remembered as a teacher of someone who’s like, ‘Oh yeah, I remember chemistry super well,’,” Nelson said. “I want to be the teacher who the kids think back on in a few years, like, he was tough, but he was fair, and he pushed us to be better people.”
All four students said Notre Dame shaped their decisions to pursue service.
Dolan said that hall Mass in Duncan Hall helped him understand faith as communal, which he hopes to bring into Catholic education.
Nelson said the University pushed him to become a better version of himself.
While each student expects challenges, including moving to new cities, living in community and entering unfamiliar service settings, they also described those challenges as part of what drew them to their programs.
Van de North said she expects teaching to include hard moments but hopes to learn how to push through them.
Colbert said she is nervous about living in Baltimore, a city she has never visited.
Still, the seniors said they are looking forward to entering new communities after graduation.
“I think overall I just want to be taken out of my comfort zone,” Colbert said.
For students considering postgrad service, Colbert said they should not be afraid to take the step.
Nelson said teaching can be a vocation worth discerning.
“Don’t immediately count it out,” Nelson said. “Give it some time. Give it some thought.”
Contact Annelise Demers at ademers@nd.edu
Justin Aguiar
Nicole Aguirre
Adam Akan
Madelyn Alford
Emma Allen
Annabelle Alton
Maximilian Amend
Mason Atwell
Theo Austin
Tess Barrett
Carlos Basurto Martinez
Jalisa Batemon
Charlie Battendieri
Suplicy Mason
Ava Batz
Sofia Benigno
Evan Birks
Elizabeth Borowiak
Tess Brennan
Matthew Broder
Jennifer Cadet
Will Calder
Vincent Calzante
Jaclyn Camp
Gabrielle Canzoniero
PJ Carroll
Sarah-Jane Carten
Annie Chen
Chloe Chun
Nick Cichoski
Martha Cleary
Annie Coffey
Rocío Colón Cotto
Lizbeth Cordova Lopez
Joseph Cresson
Kaden Cunningham
Cade Czarnecki
Rachel DeGaugh
Carolyn Dell
Amanda Dempson
Eric Derr
Elena Ding
Matthew Dirlam
Amy Dorgan
Frazier Dougherty
Max Dow
Clare Duffy
Catie Ellis
Saif Elmaleh
Ashley Estelle
Christian Evans
Janet Federici
Maxwell Feldmann
Andrés Fernández Diep
Faiza Filali
Nolan Fletes
Spencer Foote
Gabrielle Ford
Brandon Foster
Madison Fraizer
Olivia Francis
Avery Gahler
Kennedy Gallaher
Mason Gallo
Libby Garnett
Lupe Garvey
Greg Gehring
Sam Godinez
Kyla Goksoy
Anne Griffin
Molly Griffith
Charlize Guerrero
Marcelo Guzman Aguirre
Kathryn Haertzen
Pierce Hand
Drew Harrell
Ty Harrington
Kathleen Healey
Olivia Heldring
Thomas Helm
Ben Herbst
Stephanie Hernandez
Nayla Hernández Ramírez
Alexis Hill
Liliana Hobday
Dylan Hockx
Carson Hruskoci
Jue Huang
Thomas Huberty
Grace Huguley
Madeline Huie
Ava Hyde
Anna Jang
Andrew Jitendran
Ella Johnson
Emily Joseph
Sandy Kang
Emi Kartsonas
Connor Kaufmann
Mary Elizabeth Kees
Jack Kelleher
Sarah Kerber
Tess Kesler
Kate Kirwan
Jacqueline Klein
Vivie Koo
Ryan Lally
Meghan Lang
Kat Lauinger
Jun Wei Lee
Emma Leedy
Cindy Liu
Maddie Long
John Majsak
Tommy Marino
Maeve Mastri
Bjorn Mauritsen
Thomas Mazzurana
Kelly McGlinn
Madeleine McGovern
Jimmy McHugh
Connor McKenna
Claire McKenna
Coby McKeown
Jonathan Mendez
Alondra Meza Camarillo
Jonathan Mikovits
Jane Miller
Maeve Miller
Kait Milleret
Tia Mittle
Mireya Monterroso
Daniel Mooney
Michael Mora
Aryana Moreau
Charlie Morris
Ryan Murphy
Aidan Murray
Patrick Murray
Edward Nagler
Jackie Nguyen
Avery Njau
Brendan Nolte
Lara Novaes Victor
Abby O’Connor
Grace O’Neill
Yara Obeidi
Kephas Olsson
Angela Olvera
Elizabeth Orchen-Bake
Naz Palines
Charlie Pehl
Matthew Potter
David Rae
Tommy Rafacz
Kate Rafford
Reid Ragsdale
Diego Ramos
Alejandra Ricardo
Miriam Rice
Bridgette Rodgers
Anna Rohrer
Nicholas Rotondi
Olivia Ruffalo
Quinn Sanderson
Carley Sapp
Monica Schleg
Noel Shabu
Kathryn Sherman
Kiki Shim
Peyton Shrader
Gabriela Sierocka
Hannah Alice Simon
Kali Spalding
Allison Srp
Anna Izabella Stachniak
Keira Stenson
Claire Stinson
Richard Sutliff
Richard Taylor
Jack Theobald
Matthew Thorn
Dorothy Tomko
Sophia Torcelino
Nicolas Tsypin
Colly Urdan
Electra Vaitsas
Mark Valenzuela
Izabella Vasquez
Joshua Velasquez
Sam Viner
Aidan Walsh
Arjun Wasan
Colson Wells
Sara Wheeler
Eva Williams
Christopher Winter
Gabi Woodward
George Enshu Xu
Taemin Yoon
Maxine Zamora
Sonia Zhang
Rain Zhang
Zach Zieleniewski
By Luke Foley Scene Editor
The light at the end of every grueling school year is the slate of summer films (or maybe that’s just me). Hollywood saves their splashiest films for this release window, making it a very exciting time for moviegoers everywhere. So what does Hollywood have in store for us this year?
“Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu” (May 22)
“Star Wars” has been in the gutter. The once legendary franchise that transported audiences to a galaxy far, far away with unparalleled cinematic gravitas has now become a television novelty act. Ever since the controversial “The Last Jedi” and pathetic “The Rise of Skywalker,” Disney has been left dumbfounded on how to move forward (the brilliant “Andor” withstanding). The only thing that has really dazzled the general public is “The Mandalorian” on Disney+, but even that started to falter with a weak Season 3. Nevertheless, Disney is now counting on it to revive the franchise at the box office with “Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu,” which is set to hit theaters May 22. The trailers have looked decent, but I think the first “Star Wars” theatrical film in seven years needs a little more pizazz; it still ultimately looks like a television episode I could catch on Disney+. But if you’re a fan of the show or itching to watch “Star Wars” on the big screen again, this will probably be worth watching.
“Backrooms” (May 29)
Internet urban legends are the defining folklore of the 21st century. Cursed figures and horrifying stories born in the dark corners of the internet have ingrained themselves in the public imagination of those who grew up online — the playground rumors of old have now moved to YouTube comment sections. So it makes perfect sense that A24 is now adapting one of these stories for the big screen with “Backrooms.” For those who don’t know, Backrooms describes a type of haunting liminal space: abandoned rooms that stretch forever, with no sign of civilization in sight. Kane Parsons helped popularize the urban legend through his YouTube videos and is now directing this film, due May 29. The fact that he is directing an A24 film at only 20 has made me feel a lot of things about what I’m doing with my life. But putting that aside, “Backrooms” looks unlike any other horror film I’ve seen, with the central concept of the backrooms exuding a haunting
2026 summer movie guide
allure. I’d recommend you watch this not only for its mysterious novelty, but also to understand what the future of cinema will look like as Gen Z assumes the directorial chair.
“Scary Movie” (June 5)
We are currently living in a post-woke moment, with many people eager to indulge in dark humor after years of aggressive institutional endorsement of progressive values. “Scary Movie” is back to capitalize on this trend, constantly flaunting edgy jokes and mocking political correctness in its trailers. I personally find this style of humor to be grating and lazy; making a pronoun joke the big punchline in your trailer demonstrates the same comedic instincts as a fifth grader. Perhaps the trailers are overplaying this style of humor, and the film will primarily focus on sending up horror films, which is kind of the whole point of the franchise anyway. But if you’re exhausted from woke, and you need a Hollywood film to tell you it’s OK to laugh at marginalized groups again, then “Scary Movie” might be perfect for you. And try to catch it sooner rather than later, as Woke 2.0 will soon take over and destroy all copies of it.
“Disclosure Day” (June 12)
Interest in aliens has surged in recent years, as if people are so tired of humanity and this world that they hope an advanced species out there will either come to save or destroy us. Here to add fuel to this wildfire of speculation is Steven Spielberg and his newest film about aliens, “Disclosure Day.” Spielberg is no stranger to the topic, having directed films like “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” However, this film seems much more urgent and serious than those, almost as if Spielberg is genuinely wrestling with what the existence
of aliens means for humanity. At CinemaCon, Spielberg said he “truly believe[s] that this movie is going to answer questions and cause you to ask a lot of questions” and that the film is “way closer to truth than to fiction.” Did he capture real footage of aliens for this film? The only way to find out is to see it in theaters. And even if you’re not that interested in the topic of aliens, any film from a masterful director like Spielberg should be seen on the big screen.
“Toy Story 5” (June 19)
I know many people groaned when Pixar announced they were making “Toy Story 5”. The previous installment, “Toy Story 4,” was already met with a heavy amount of skepticism, as many claimed it was a shameless cash grab after the perfectly satisfying ending of “Toy Story 3”. But I will always defend this franchise continuing after the third installment because these new films have something worth saying. “Toy Story 4” smartly evolved the themes of purpose and responsibility from the previous films, and “Toy Story 5” seems set to critique our increasing dependence on technology that has been creeping deeper and deeper into childhood. I know Pixar has been inconsistent this decade, but I trust them to cook with their most cherished property, and you should, too.
“Supergirl” (June 26)
Last year’s “Superman” was a great time, but the real test of James Gunn’s new leadership of DC Comics will be this summer’s “Supergirl.” While Superman is a wholesome Boy Scout, Supergirl is a belligerent party girl, and the gritty style of the film reflects this. The film centers around Supergirl going on a revenge mission for her dog, Krypto, a la John Wick. Director Craig Gillespie is a reliable journeyman, and from what we’ve seen so far, Milly Alcock is a great Supergirl, so I’m confident this will turn out to be a
memed trailer for the film, we see Peter struggling with the fallout of everyone on Earth forgetting who he is after the magic spell in “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” He is profoundly lonely, and even worse, he is forced to watch MJ, the love of his life, move on as if he never existed — these emotional stakes give the film the potential to reach the heights of the Raimi trilogy. Also, Sadie Sink will be playing a superhero villain! The film will be a perfect midsummer pick-me-up if you have any baseline interest in Spider-Man.
solid entry in the burgeoning DCU.
“Moana” (July 10)
How low can corporate greed go? Disney is trying to answer this age-old question with the live-action “Moana.” Yes, Disney is really doing a live-action remake of “Moana” only 10 years after the animated original came out. Why, you may ask? Well, there’s something called money, and Disney wants a lot of it. Even better, the footage from the trailers looks as soulless as the film’s existence sounds. The film is an abomination devoid of any artistic merit. It will probably make a billion dollars.
“The Odyssey” (July 17)
Ladies and gentlemen, this is it. The definitive movie of the summer is Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey.” After the success of “Oppenheimer,” Nolan was given a blank check to adapt Homer’s “The Odyssey,” among the most important stories in the Western world. Even though the sprawling epic was written almost 3,000 years before Nolan was born, it feels like it was made for his directorial style, with its non-linear storytelling and time as the driving conflict. It also features an all-star cast that’s the result of every actor in Hollywood vying for a spot in Nolan’s biggest film yet. Previews so far have been promising: As long as you’re not obsessed with historical accuracy, I think this film will live up to the hype.
“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” (July 31)
No matter how bad superhero fatigue gets, nobody will ever get tired of Spider-Man. Underneath all the spider superpowers is Peter Parker, an immensely relatable young guy who struggles with money and love just like everyone else. It seems that “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” will be leaning heavily into Peter’s grounded personal problems. In the widely
“One Night Only” (Aug. 7) You ask, “Who loves romcoms?” and the entire room raises their hands. You then ask, “Who wants to watch a rom-com in theaters?” and most of the hands go back down. The genre has been consistently struggling at the box office as audiences are satisfied getting their romcom fix from TV shows or athome movies. But there have been some exceptions, including “Anyone but You,” starring Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell. Rom-com expert Will Gluck was behind that film, and he’s back again with “One Night Only”. It’s a high-concept rom-com in the style of “The Purge,” taking place in an alternate world where pre-marital sex is only legal one night a year. It also stars two beautiful people, Monica Barbaro and Callum Turner, so it should be a fun if slightly bizarre time at the movies.
“The End of Oak Street” (Aug. 14)
“Jurassic Park” holds a monopoly on dinosaurs in movies, which is rather unfortunate, as they are marvelous creatures. However, the last big release of the summer is stepping up and taking a crack at them. “The End of Oak Street” is currently shrouded in mystery, but the basic premise is that an entire neighborhood street is magically transported to a world with dinosaurs. Indie darling David Robert Mitchell is behind the film, and seeing a director like him getting a summer blockbuster is super exciting. The trailers also look great, making this a very promising finish to the summer.
Overall, the box office is looking incredibly healthy this summer. We have original blockbusters from auteurs, new entries in beloved franchises and a solid diversity of genres. Now it is up to us, the audiences, to show up and tell Hollywood with our wallets what kind of films we want from them.
Contact Luke Foley at lfoley2@nd.edu
BEN HICKS and ELLIE COLLINS | The Observer
By Matt Norton Scene Writer
Before I ever set foot on campus, Eddy Street Commons had already made an impression on me. My parents brought me to it during my only campus visit — the Navy game my freshman year of high school. It seemed kind of picturesque: a walkable strip right off campus with restaurants and shops, clean sidewalks and Touchdown Jesus visible in the background. It looked exactly like what a proper college food scene was supposed to be. I remember thinking: this is where I’ll spend a lot of time with friends I hadn’t even met
The Eddy Street of Theseus
yet. I was right about that. But I hadn’t realized that the Eddy Street I’d come to love was the culmination of years of change.
Talk to people a few years older than me and the picture they paint of the old Eddy Street is consistent: OG Chipotle before post-pandemic price jumps, a Five Guys that wouldn’t bankrupt you, Blaze Pizza and McAlister’s. It was a reliable rotation of fast-casual chains that could get you fed in 20 minutes without making a single compelling decision. It was a private-equity-fueled corridor that had the energy of an airport terminal: functional and efficient, meant to move you through it rather
than keep you there. For underclassmen who didn’t yet know the town and were still figuring out which dining hall had the better daily rotations, it was exactly what they needed. It had lots of options for everyone’s tastes, and cheapish burritos, along with good post-tailgate food.
What they also describe, for many, is the slow unraveling of that version of Eddy Street. The first signals were easy to miss — a storefront goes dark, construction paper covers the windows, a leasing sign appears in the window. McAlister’s closed. Blaze Pizza followed this fall. The Urban Outfitters corner went to plywood. For a stretch
of years, walking down Eddy Street felt like watching a surgery in progress: vital organs removed before viable replacements were even ready for the icebox. It painted a picture of decline. The gaps sat long enough to make people wonder what, if anything, was actually coming. By the time I arrived in the fall of 2025, the answer was becoming clear. JINYA Ramen Bar had just opened that summer — upscale ramen, sushi, artisanal cocktails the kind of place that assumes you’ll sit for at least an hour, which was kind of a revolutionary change with all of the fast food places there (besides Brothers and
O’Rourke’s). I walked into it during my first week without any sense of the novelty it represented. Barrio arrived that fall as well, with craft cocktails, a customizable Chipotle adjacent menu and a nicer semi-fast-casual vibe. BIBIBOP Asian Grill is taking over the old Blaze space — basically another Chipotle clone. CAVA is coming (a better Chipotle). Osteria Amici is moving into the old Urban Outfitters corner. Basically, I showed up just in time to inherit something that older students are still adjusting to.
Editor’s note: This is an abridged version of this column. Read more at ndsmcobserver.com
A soundtrack for graduating college
By Cate Stephens Scene Writer
I truly did not understand the meaning of bittersweet until I reached the end of my time at Saint Mary’s. For all tri-campus seniors, seeing the fruits of our labor and either going home or traveling to a new place is exciting. At the same time, leaving the closeknit community that you have established and accepting change is unsettling, especially for someone that does not do well with nostalgia. One second, I am filled with impatience to start my next chapter, and the next, I just want to freeze time and hug my friends extra tightly. Therefore, I strung together mini playlists for the stages of graduation seniors might be feeling (and needing!)
By Danica Szabo Scene Writer
I am a pro graduate. “What does that mean?” I hear you squabble intelligibly. Well, well, well, you sweet simple soul, I have several graduations under my belt. I have graduated from elementary school, middle school, high school, Notre Dame’s International Safety 101, the policy academy, flight school, clown school, Alcoholics Anonymous, my first marriage and more. From those graduations, I have learned lessons that I thought were common sense, but as I look around to my peers I see the same thing: failure. I see people getting jobs, starting families, buying homes, brushing their teeth. And I just find myself wondering, “Where did it all go wrong?” I cannot see another person fall down that dangerous
The feels
When we encounter the end of college, it’s overwhelming to close that door and face the change. It feels like a chase of time, and we have disbelief and lots of tears towards leaving it all behind. These songs encapsulate the denial and fear of this change for when you need to relish in the feels. The tracks: “Last Goodbye” by Post Animal, “Breakdown” by Jack Johnson, “Bitter Sweet Symphony” by The Verve, “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac and “Clocks” by Coldplay.
Nostalgia
You know that feeling in your stomach you get when you hear a song from a time of your life?
That feeling is all around in the last couple weeks of school. For the friends who love to chat about their favorite memories and the
uneasy feeling of reminiscing, this is for you. The tracks: “As It Was” by Harry Styles, and “Night Changes” by One Direction, “DtMF” by Bad Bunny, “See You Again” by Tyler, the Creator and “Viva La Vida” by Coldplay.
Acceptance
For the moments where you sit and realize, well, it’s happening. You might want to stop the time, but it keeps going. This is music that helps you take that next step and hesitantly welcome the future ahead. The tracks: “Yes I’m Changing” by Tame Impala, “You’re On Your Own Kid” by Taylor Swift, “It Might Be Time” by Tame Impala, “My Way” by Frank Sinatra and “I’ll Always Remember You” by Hannah Montana.
Gratitude
As that phase of acceptance
HUMOR
comes into effect, you transfer the feeling of denial into a grateful embrace. College is not a solitary journey. Thanking family for their support and reflecting on the childhood memories that led you to this moment is important. Also, you feel the appreciation and excitement towards meeting the lifelong friends that held you throughout your path and beyond. The tracks: “Back on you” by Djo, “28” by Zach Bryan, “It’s Not Living (If It’s Not With You)” by The 1975, “You’ll Be in My Heart” by Phill Collins and “The Best Day” by Taylor Swift
Hope
These are songs for when you envision your end goal and all you have been working for — we celebrate graduation for a reason. We hug change with all our might and walk through
What to do after graduation
path, so, seniors, I am writing directly to you. In this article, I will steer you in the correct life path in order to protect you from being cringe for the rest of your short life. I am an expert, after all.
1. Pick up a new hobby
Now that you have all this newfound free time, it’s good to keep busy with a fun, new hobby. However, it should not just be any lame hobby, like pottery, crocheting or even worse, pickleball. You need to pick up a hobby that helps you get your money up. I have undertaken the legal hobby of dropshipping. If you don’t know what dropshipping is, it’s like stealing. Now that we have explained that, there are many hobbies like dropshipping that you seniors can partake in that will provide similar results. Hobbies, such as multi-level
marketing schemes, black hat hacking, armed robbery and tap dancing can yield positive results that not only give you some fun, but bring in money to fund your new life.
2. Cut off everyone that you know
After my high school graduation, I knew that I had to cut off all the dead weight in my life. My “friends,” my “family,” my socalled “sponsor,” all needed to be out of my life ASAP. Firstly, they all knew me when I was fat, and future employers cannot know that I was fat or they will call me fat boy. Secondly, they were a reminder of the past and you need to focus on the future. You don’t need a “mom” nagging about your gambling “problem” because that is an investment into your future. Or a “girlfriend” complaining about your “consistent cheating”
because that is you getting to know your future peers. Or even a police officer who is threatening to arrest you because you were “going 135 mph in a school zone” because that is you just trying to get to where you need to be faster. And you know what that place is? Exactly. Your future.
3. Go to graduate school Leaving college is sad, so what if you never leave? I’m going to be honest with you, I don’t know what life with employment looks like, and quite frankly, I am horrified of it. So I just keep going to school! I can never be employed if I am still a student. It’s just great to see all my past friends grow and change without me because I am in 31st grade. I’m just like that Taylor Swift song, “I get older but your lovers stay my age,” but instead of lovers (because I am celibate), it’s peers! I am just
this next step with confidence. We happily motivate ourselves and feel the liberation of the future ahead. The tracks: “Homecoming” by Kanye West, “Pursuit of Happiness (Nightmare)” by Kid Cudi, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears, “High School Musical” by High School Musical and “Alive” by Empire of the Sun
Whether you need a mix of these stages for a group playlist with friends or to dwell in one of them in your room, do what you need to do. The journey ahead might be scary, but gratitude and growth cannot happen if we stay stagnant. Embrace the emotions, freedom and the unknown; it’s what makes this phase of life irreplaceable.
Contact Cate Stephens at cstephens01@saintmarys.edu
like Taylor because I am 36 years old and constantly surrounded by teenagers (quote me on that).
4. Become a Scientologist #YOLO LOL. Sure, those people might be insane, but at least you’re guaranteed friends.
Thanks for reading, seniors! Apply these tips and prosper. Ignore them and fail. Whatever endeavor you end up doing, just remember, Scientology is always there for you. For the small price of $200, you can unlock the secrets of the universe. Just remember to use my referral code so I can move up a rank. Happy Ron Hubbard’s birthday to all who celebrate (which should be all of you)! And happy commencement week too, I guess.
Contact Danica Szabo at dszabo2@nd.edu
Ferris Bueller couldn’t take his day off in 2026
By Harry Penne Scene Copyeditor
“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” one the most iconic films of the 1980s, is about to celebrate its 40th anniversary. Writer and director John Hughes spun a classic story: Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) realizes life is too short to watch it go by, so he and two friends, Cameron Frye (Alan Ruck) and Sloane Peterson (Mia Sara), decide to skip class and spend a day having fun in Chicago. While doing so, Ferris’s sister Jeanie (Jennifer Grey) and Dean Rooney (Jeffrey Jones) are hellbent on exposing Ferris and his truant ways.
Ferris Bueller does what each of us would like to do. How incredible would it be to completely skip a day of school or work and go into an amazing city with two of your closest friends and mess around all day with no consequences whatsoever? Would it even be possible to take a day off like Ferris and not get caught in 2026? Unfortunately, I don’t think so. Well, at the very least, it wouldn’t be as easy.
Practically everything we do is documented online. For the trio to not get caught, it would require all parties involved to go off the grid in terms of social media with no posting about their adventures, either during or after. It would also require their friends to keep quiet online should they find out about it. Furthermore, anyone can be tracked at any moment in time. Think about applications like Life360 or Apple’s Find My; how many people’s locations are you able to see right now? Ferris would have to leave his phone behind at home, but that raises many other problems. So many tickets are digital and tied to our phones, so leaving it at home would be impractical. Also, should he turn off location sharing, his parents would see this and find it suspicious. Calling in the fake illness would also be harder, as schools have stricter absence policies today. Most classes at Notre Dame require proof of illness, such as a doctor’s note or proof of medical appointment, for an approved class absence. Even in high schools today, parents must sign their children out on a clip board to pick them up from school. Ferris would be unable to stand at a distance when Rooney walks Sloane out of school; he would have to risk blowing his cover by going up to Rooney and physically forging Mr. Peterson’s signature. In a post-Covid reality, it’s easier than ever to work from home. Ferris’s mom likely would have been able to work remotely, and her constant presence would have made
it increasingly difficult for Ferris to sneak out. Also, because of Ferris’s nine-time absence track record, it is not far-fetched to assume that the high school would have required him to work remotely, calling into classes and submitting assignments online.
Today, many businesses are electing to go cashless. As we see in the film, Ferris goes on a bit of a spending spree, and digital tracing would blow his cover. There would be a log of every transaction he made, from lunch to the Art Institute and Cubs tickets, and his parents could see this. Now, either he lies about his card getting stolen, or he is in a tough place to talk himself out of why he wasn’t at school.
One of the best running gags of the film is how Ferris’s medical condition rapidly escalates by word of mouth.
Students sport “Save Ferris” shirts and companies are quick to put it on their marketing and billboards. Today, inevitably, this would become a fast trending #SaveFerris. While it is humorous that, in 1986, the parents did not see any “Save Ferris” signage, it would be near impossible for them not to in 2026. Communication is far easier today; Ferris’s parents would likely have concerned family and friends reaching out to check on him. Even opening up Instagram would likely cause Ferris’s parents to realize something is up.
The scene where Ferris commandeers a street parade and
sings “Twist and Shout” is one of the greatest in the film, but is also one of the riskiest, as
it easily could have done him in. Today, as soon as he got on that float, a minimum of ten
YouTube livestreams would have documented the whole ordeal, and it would have been trending before the song even concluded.
One of the funniest and most tense scenes of the film is when Ferris is running home, trying to beat his parents and sister so it looks like he was in bed all day. Throughout the pseudo-chase scene, he sneaks through houses, jumps over fences and crosses through front and back yards. Even this is an opportunity, today, for someone to track Ferris. So many people have doorbells with cameras that are constantly recording. Many neighborhood communities are also connected via a forum or Facebook page. Inevitably, several people would post: “Who is that crazy kid running through our yards?”
In 2026, more than ever do we need to take the Ferris Bueller perspective that “Life moves pretty fast.” In such a fast-paced, online world, it is imperative we stop and take everything in, else it passes us by. While it may not be feasible to skip work or school and not get caught, we can still foster his attitude of making the most out of every moment.
Contact Harry Penne at hpenne@nd.edu
BEN HICKS and ELLIE COLLINS | The Observer
Best of the Year
The photography department’s best photos from the 2025-2026 academic year.
Photography by Jonathan Karr, Abraham Medina, Kevin Sanchez, Keira Jones and Mariella Taddonio
By Redmond Bernhold Opinion Editor Emeritus
Hey, Dad, did you feel emotional the last time you visited Notre Dame?
I did, and I wanted to tell you. I thought you would be here to celebrate graduation. All the sidewalks I’ve walked for four years, the Grotto, my dorm room, The Observer’s newsroom, LaFun. The whole thing.
I want to tell you: I love you. Thank you.
I wish we could visit Fr. George Rozum, your rector, again. Oh, how 45 years can fly by. I wish we could break into Alumni again, for you to see your old rooms, for you to smile. I wish we could walk God Quad again, our eyes scanning the glimmering dome. I wish we could watch another Blue-Gold Game again, eating salty popcorn in the stands and watching rain drops darken your “wheat” blond hair. I wish we could listen to the Beatles on the toll road again, when it was all said and done.
Remember that time we met Rudy in LaFun?
Death. Grief. Confusion. Pain. Sorrow. Nostalgia. It hits in crashes and waves, wrangling
Thank you, grief
the chains of your heart and mind. Even the most joyous place can be a haunting, crushing reminder of loss. Since Jan. 29, that’s been the case for me. Nobody wants their senior spring to be their worst semester. Mine was. Along with my dad’s passing, I spent more hours sobbing at the Grotto than thinking about chemistry. I walked campus like a zombie at 3 a.m., paralyzed by loss,
obsessive thoughts and the fleeing moment of four years breezing away. I scored 41% on a biochemistry exam. I stood in garages, backyards and corners of parties — unable to breathe — feeling like my entire life has fallen apart.
People abandon you at your lowest. Others morph around the pit in your heart.
Notre Dame, and college, have been extreme privileges.
I’ve had many moments of joy, smiles and laughs that I’ll remember for the rest of my life. But there are moments of confusion, weakness and searing pain that I think are breezed over, too often disregarded as important parts of the college experience. Those are more significant. Thinking back to Welcome Weekend in 2022, the image of Notre Dame promised security and smiles. Something near
What I observed
So this is how my columnist career ends, not with a bang, but with a “best of” article relying solely on the success of my previous work — a typical move for an artist who knows they have already peaked.
I joined The Observer to do what I do best: be a follower. Two of my friends were going to the beginning-of-year meeting, and like the sheep I am, I joined them. But while they didn’t last two weeks, I’ve remained, weathering several editors’ regimes, the great writer’s block of 2025 and the rebrand of Viewpoint into Opinion that turned me into a nomad with no home for my articles. But it’s finally time for this “oracle of The Observer” to sign off once and for all and join Warren Buffett in retirement.
Before joining The Observer, I wrote obnoxiously long Yelp reviews. This was extremely rewarding. I earned the distinguished honor of being a Yelp Elite Squad member, a clear mark of superiority that obviously made me immensely popular in high school. Unfortunately, my reviews kept getting taken down because they were “unrelated to the business I was reviewing.” I’ve appreciated the permanence and lack of censorship I’ve been
accorded under The Observer. To the seven people who do more than skim my articles — thank you! I genuinely appreciate it. For you, I have several updates that may or may not be of interest. For everyone else, I think you can tell I don’t write about anything too deep; you should be able to catch up to speed real quick.
Updates:
1. PETA was quick to respond to my article about goldfish ownership with several concerns. Yet despite heeding none of their
advice, my goldfish is still alive! Having survived winter break, tax season and that week in February when my roommate and I each assumed the other one had been feeding him, I am convinced our fish is invincible. I love our fish very much and am so glad he is part of my life. On an unrelated note, if anyone wants a goldfish starting May 15 or sooner, contact me.
2. After losing the Holy Half by 22 minutes, no one believed that stopping to spit on Caroll Hall had cost me the race.
perfect bliss. A few people said the experience would be the “best” four years of my life. Did these four years match that expectation?
No.
Instead of the best four years of life, it’s been full. Full of emotion, experience and becoming. The years are not always joyful, but they’re full.
I can’t thank vulnerability enough. Loneliness. Failure. Disappointment. Pain. Grief. What would the highs look like without lows?
Of course, I formed friendships, succeeded in classes, watched home games and enjoyed many fond memories. I will always cherish these moments.
What a privilege it is — to experience.
Thank you, Mom and Dad. Thank you, Marcia, Xavier, Quinten, Alma, Major, Rachel and Gavin.
Thank you, friends.
Thank you, grief.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
Contact Redmond Bernhold at rbernho2@nd.edu
3. The serial double daters never did go on another double date. Applebee’s stock is down 12% year to date. I believe our failures are responsible for this.
4. I still have not found the labeler. After reading my article, one helpful detective alerted me that she checked every room in Farley Hall and found no trace of the labeler. Though potentially an invasion of privacy, this certainly narrows the search. However, some readers noted something interesting about the original article.
5. The astronomy professor read my article “The waning moon does not exist” and attempted to expose it as a fallacy in his Descriptive Astronomy lecture. Still, no one has been able to produce a waning moon IRL, so I rest my case.
6. Two weeks after writing about how much I adore my 2003 Honda Civic, my friend left its sunroof open for two weeks during which South Bend received significant rainfall. This may have been karma for not telling my friends I brought a car to campus, and then tricking them into thinking I stole a stranger’s car.
7. Feb. 26 came and went without a single Fighting Irish fan celebrating Notre Dame conception day. I’ve been debating combining Notre Dame conception day with ND Day to create one epic day of Irish fan base mega-mobilization. This may be necessary for the first few years until this holiday becomes canon.
Progress report:
1. One new person addicted to Minesweeper
2. One fourth grader had a problem with my take on chess not being a sport
3. Two Notre Dame employees who appreciated my love of the dining hall, as opposed to
see “Observed” on page 19
REDMOND BERNHOLD | The Observer
By Allison Abplanalp Columnist, “Under Further Scrutiny”
DUNCAN STANGEL | The Observer
The author’s dad and older brothers, Xavier (left) and Quinten (right) standing outside of South Dining Hall.
Observed
Continued from page 18
the other entitled students who complain too much
4. Five breakups facilitated
5. Zero chipmunks have been killed since the last incident
6. Zero Fall 2025 predictions come true
7. Zero appearances on The Observer’s “Best of the Week”
8. The data doesn’t lie. Such progress is an inspiring testament to the power of the pen. But I would like to take a moment to appreciate my article ideas that never saw the light of day and probably shouldn’t have:
1. Why Notre Dame needs to implement mutual assured
destruction
2. I participated in the Fisher Regatta, and all I got was swimmer‘s ear
3. Be the change, boycott Bookstore Basketball
4. Walk the Walk Week — ableist?
5. Notre Dame is the college equivalent of Oklahoma City
6. Is Campus Ministry too big to fail?
7. They dug him up! Notre Dame unearths Knute Rockne’s grave
8. Why Lyndon B. Johnson would have lived on North Quad
9. Class of 2030 admitted, here are their stats (spoiler — 90% from the suburbs of Chicago)
10. ND Day is the soft underbelly of Keynesian economics
OPINION
Though generally averse to introspection or reflection, I’ve managed to take away a few lessons from my tenure at the Observer: Don’t use people’s full names. I am deeply sorry to the victim for whom, when you search “[Victim’s Name] Notre Dame,” the quote “Hammocking is akin to being on drugs and in the womb all at once” appears under the fourth link. Despite asking nicely, The Observer refuses to remove their last name from the article. Note: despite this digital footprint, the victim still secured a job offer (an impressive feat in this job market).
The Glynn Family Honors
Program is harder to take down than I anticipated.
Students are hesitant to participate in my amazing opportunity to make money primarily by recruiting new members who pay upfront fees for the chance to receive returns, which are funded by subsequent inve stors rather than profit. If you are interested, message “PYRAMID” to aabplana@ nd.edu.
The first idea for an article is not the best idea, but it is the idea I will use because I don’t start my articles until far too late and don’t have time to think of something better. Still, I’ve never managed to turn in a single article on time, but this hasn’t
seemed to matter.
No matter how many times I try to sneak in an Oxford comma, The Observer editors are too alert (dare I say observant) for my tricks.
Insert something cheesy about taking time to be creative and yada yada yada that I would like to mention but would rather not write about, as not to mess with my plan to employ ironic detachment to help get me through graduation.
That’s all she wrote.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
Contact Allison Abplanalp at aabplana@nd.edu
Off the Dome: Commencement Edition
By Allison Elshoff
It’s Saturday, May 17, when two trucks pull up to Grace Hall just before sunrise. Notre Dame’s General Services team climbs out and meets the staff from the Office of the Registrar on the sidewalk. They have a lot of work ahead of them.
Meet Shawn Thomas, assistant manager of General Services, who is no stranger to the task. He has been at Notre Dame for 21 years — a legacy, like a lot of domers at this University. His father, Robert, was superintendent of the football stadium, and his brother works in Notre Dame landscaping. You could say a love for this place definitely runs in the family, when Shawn was a little boy, he told his parents: “If I don’t go to college, I want to work at Notre Dame.”
The teams cover the truck floors with blankets for protection. The Registrar’s team hands General Services color-coded boxes, sorted alphabetically, which the General Services crew loads carefully into the trucks, front to back, being careful to preserve the order. In the end, Thomas and the rest of the crew stare at all 3,000+ boxes. The loading work is just the beginning — they are about to spend the next hour and a half delivering all the boxes to each of Notre Dame’s colleges.
That, my fellow seniors, is how our diplomas will find their way to us on Commencement Weekend. Although it may seem like it, graduation doesn’t just magically happen: There are countless individuals dedicated to making it the best possible experience it can be for us seniors, families and faculty.
For the final edition of “Off the Dome,” I had the privilege of interviewing a few of these individuals.
Take one of Thomas’ coworkers Austin Mahoney. As the project coordinator at General Services, Mahoney handles the intake for all commencement work orders — including diploma deliveries, mini-graduations and sub-graduations.
“This campus is ... like a whole little mini-city in itself,” he tells me. With so many moving parts and parties to please, the weekend should feel chaotic. But Mahoney doesn’t feel that way: “The way that it’s put in place, and the people that are in the positions that they are … it goes way smoother than imaginable.”
Mahoney isn’t fazed by the long hours and late nights, either. It’s easy when you’re working with a team that feels like family.
“You come to know these guys like brothers,” he tells me.
While General Services serves as the boots on the ground to put on commencement, the Office of the
Registrar is the main team behind planning and execution. “We start preparing in January, right when we come back to school,” says Chuck Hurley, the Registrar’s assistant vice president. “It’s close to about 100 events that are taking place between Wednesday and Sunday night that we run with an office of 25 people,” he explains.
Executing such a feat requires intense commitment on the actual weekend. During the 12 days leading up to graduati on, Hurley and the team are often working 10- to 15-hour days. He shares some extraordinary stories of the staff’s dedication, times when they went above and beyond the duties in their job description.
Take Stephanie Ross, the registrar’s communications & senior reporting specialist. No one who knew Ross was surprised when, one year, she directed huge semi-trucks through the stadium tunnel in the brutal heat. She did it without a single complaint, standing there without AC, covered in construction
dust. “Do you remember Mary Poppins?” Hurley asks, recalling seeing Ross that day. “Poppins after the chimney sweep? She looked like that,” he said.
Or one year, when Paul Ullrich, the Registrar’s Technology Development Team lead, was expecting his wife to go into labor any minute during the weekend. He worked through the entirety of commencement Sunday when, immediately upon returning home after an 11hour workday, his wife went into labor. Ullrich wasted no time: he took a 20-minute nap, put his daughters to bed and drove his wife to the hospital — where his son, John, was born 40 minutes later. Or Amika Micou, deputy registrar. Her dedication was never more apparent than in 2021 when, after being diagnosed with cancer, she soldiered through the Saturday and Sunday of Commencement Weekend just to show up, bone-tired, to her second round of chemo Monday morning.
Listening to these stories, I’m reminded of a quote from Kahlil Gibran’s 1923 novel, “The Prophet.” The novel’s section titled, “On Work” argues that work is inseparable from love; not only is it necessary, but a joyful, spiritual task that allows us to participate in eternity — to add our thread into the tapestry of life.
Gibran says, “When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music … And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving. Work is love made visible.”
To our graduating class: commencement weekend is the product of thousands of invisible acts of love, all woven together to produce a beautiful celebration. Yet, the faces behind these acts don’t have to stay invisible.
Instead, when you hold your hard-earned diploma on Sunday, try to remember the hands it passed through to get to you. Try to remember Shawn Thomas, Austin Mahoney, Zandy Eckrich, Chuck Hurley, Paul Ullrich, Amika Micou, Stephanie Ross and the many more whose names would max out this word count.
This column is dedicated to those who bring Commencement Weekend to life. To those who give so much of themselves so that we seniors can close our last chapter here. Their selflessness, their hard work — that is truly love made visible. And with humble gratitude, the Class of 2026 says: thank you.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
Contact Allison Elshoff at aelshoff@nd.edu
Columnist, “Off the Dome”
MARIELLA TADDONIO| The Observer
OPINION
I love Notre Dame, even
Growing up in a proud Notre Dame family, my acceptance in March 2020 felt like a dream come true. Now, as my time here draws to a close, I find myself reflecting on that dream — and the reality of my experience at Notre Dame.
The reality is that I’ve experienced some of the most difficult moments of my life while at Notre Dame. Over these six years, I’ve navigated two years of health leave, two mid-semester hospitalizations, a spinal cord surgery, numerous emergency room visits and countless medical appointments. My experience has been more complicated than I could have ever envisioned.
Throughout these challenges, one of the most painful realizations was how Notre Dame failed to support me. During my first year, I nearly died due to episodes of anaphylaxis caused by a denied housing accommodation — an issue the University already knew about, as it had approved the same accommodation for subsequent years. During my second year, after a late-semester hospitalization, I struggled to finish coursework while facing resistance from unaccommodating professors. Throughout my time here, I’ve navigated countless access issues — on campus, in class and in the community. These obstacles have cost me thousands of dollars in preventable medical bills and weeks of lost academic and social time.
I don’t share these stories to suggest that Notre Dame is irredeemable. I
when it hasn’t loved me
wouldn’t have spent my undergraduate years fighting to make this campus more accessible if I didn’t believe it was worth the effort. I share this because I know that Notre Dame can do better. Becoming the beacon of belonging we claim to be is within our reach. Through my work with Access-ABLE and Accessibility Leadership Fellows, I’ve fought to dismantle the systemic barriers that leave disabled students isolated and excluded. However, the responsibility of this work cannot fall on students alone. Notre Dame must take institutional action to ensure that disabled students aren’t left behind.
Notre Dame has clear legal obligations under the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 to ensure equal access for students
with disabilities, including physical access to campus facilities. Beyond the law, we have a moral imperative. Our Catholic tradition calls for the full inclusion of disabled people in Church and everyday life, necessitating the removal of barriers that prevent their participation. It hurts to see the University fall short of its Catholic mission.
The disconnect is most visible during our winters. The University advises students with mobility needs to utilize “Accessible Entrances.”
Sara Bea provides bandaid accommodations like peer notetakers and false promises of “priority snow removal.” Yet, this “support” is woefully insufficient. At the start of this semester, I was forced to forgo my mobility scooter on
numerous days because of impassable snowy sidewalks. One day, I slipped on ice and dislocated my hip at the “Accessible Entrance” of a classroom building — only to be forced to navigate 5 miles of treacherous, unplowed paths to attend class and meet my basic needs. When a spokesperson argues that clearing 71 miles of sidewalks is “challenging,” it rings hollow to those of us living the reality of it. That “challenge” cannot compare to the physical danger disabled students face every time we leave our dorms and the isolation we face when we can’t.
These aren’t unsolvable problems; they’re failures of prioritization. For years, disability student leaders have proposed feasible solutions that remain unimplemented.
There are amazing students and staff working on these issues, if only the University would listen.
The University must implement a dedicated, on-demand campus paratransit service. This isn’t a revolutionary request; it’s standard practice at many peer institutions that value student safety and inclusion. By providing reliable, accessible transportation for students with mobility needs, Notre Dame can bridge the gap between its professed values and the lived reality of its disabled students. We are a University that prides itself on being a tight-knit community, yet we routinely fail to provide the basic infrastructure required for disabled community members to thrive.
I write this reflection because I’m a devoted Domer who believes Notre Dame is capable of better. I leave with a deep love for this community, but I also leave with a call to action: Notre Dame m ust match its rhetoric with tangible action. We deserve a campus that doesn’t just claim to be inclusive but proves it.
I’ve loved my time at Notre Dame — challenges and all. I hope to leave this place more accessible and inclusive than it was when I arrived. Our disabled students and our Notre Dame community deserve nothing less.
Meghan Ellis Class of 2026 mellis7@nd.edu
Here’s to everything still left to learn
By Ana Prestamo
In honor of my last hurrah before graduation (my final piece in the Observer), I thought I’d close with four small takeaways from college. While I’m no one to give advice, I think they may speak to more than just the professional.
First: Listen to your mom. Freshman year, I was set on econ. I spent the entire semester convincing myself — and everyone around me — that I loved macro and micro (I didn’t). I practiced case studies and pictured myself in finance. All the while, my mom kept telling me, quietly and persistently, that I wasn’t being honest with myself. Of course, at 18 and
newly untethered, listening to my mom was the last thing on my list. Until I realized that — as with everything else — my mom was right. So, had I listened to my mom earlier — about this and many other things — instead of insisting I could figure it out alone, I am certain my troubles would have been far fewer and much shorter-lived. Listen to your mom.
Second: Being uncool is cool too. This took me a while to learn. There is enormous pressure to perform a certain version of college life. The parties, the effortlessness, the “not-caring-too-much.”
At some point, I realized that pretending not to care about things I genuinely cared about was its own kind of loss. Some
of the best things I did in college looked boring from the outside. Some of the most interesting friends I met didn’t fit any obvious mold. Sometimes, being uncool is cool too.
Third: Be open, be flexible, be curious — don’t be afraid to reinvent yourself. I came into college convinced that I already knew myself — what I valued, what I believed, where I came from. The most important thing I did throughout these four years was open myself to questioning everything. Whether that was through a philosophy class that dismantled assumptions I didn’t know I had, a conversation with someone whose life looked nothing like mine, a professor who pushed back when I was
certain I was right or simply sitting alone long enough to ask myself harder questions. This way, I either strengthened my beliefs and values or re-evaluated them. While setting my ego aside was hard, doing so made room for the person I actually wanted to become. So, be open, be flexible, be curious — don’t be afraid to reinvent yourself.
Fourth: Lead with the heart. There will always be something technical demanding your attention — a paper to submit, an exam to study for, an application to send — the to-do list never stops. But alongside it, make room for what actually moves you. The friendships you show up for, the places that make you feel something, the work that means
something beyond the grade. What made my time at Notre Dame irreplaceable wasn’t any single achievement; it was the moments I chose presence over productivity. The lessons stay in my head, but the people and the moments — those live somewhere deeper. Lead with the heart. And while my takeaways are innumerable, these are a –few worth saying out loud bwwefore I set down my pen — or, well, close my laptop. So one last time, Go Irish! And here’s to everything still left to learn.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer. Contact Ana Prestamo at apresta2@nd.edu
Columnist, “Mind the Gap”
BEN HICKS | The Observer
By Liam Kelly Editor-in-Chief Emeritus
For much of my years, going to Notre Dame had been the ultimate goal in my life. In a column I wrote in this newspaper my freshman year, I compared my dream of attending Notre Dame to Jay Gatsby’s dream of reaching the green light on Daisy’s dock in “The Great Gatsby.” The Golden Dome, which I first set eyes on in eighth grade on a visit with my family, seemed to represent all that I had ever wanted and could become. As a prospective student, I would look across the lake at the light of the Dome, stretching out my arm at my dream as though I could hardly fail to grasp it.
I asked myself what would happen when I finally reached that light, grasping what Gatsby could not. I decided then that even once I got to Notre Dame I never could never fully reach that goal I had been striving for, that I would always be searching and grasping for more. What had been most important was the transformational effect which working toward my goal had had on me.
During my time here, this
Under the Dome
challenge of the climb has defined how I have lived my life. It has been a flurry of activity, one challenge after another, success and joy, failure and defeat. I remain as thankful as I was then for the positive effect which chasing a dream had on me. At the end of it all, however, I wish I had understood what Gatsby failed to. That the dream was not in front of him, but “that it was already behind him, somewhere
back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.”
There is a time for activity. There is a time for ambition. There is also a time to take stock of what you have. To not rush toward the Dome grasping for what is beyond it, but to pause for a moment, to sit under its light and marvel at it and to give
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thanks to the God who inspired it. Sometimes the answer is not an advancement, but a return, a rest and a sense of peace.
During the past few weeks, I’ve been trying more and more to do that and to rest under the light of the Dome. I feel most of all a sense of gratitude. First, for my family for making it possible for me to come here, for introducing me to this wonderful place, for supporting
me and allowing me to succeed while here. I am grateful for the friendships I have made, the incredible people who have laughed with me, toiled with me, challenged me, and, I hope, changed me for the better. I’m grateful for the amazing professors I’ve had, the great books I’ve read and for the Sunday homilies which always brought me back to what mattered.
Above all, I thank God for the opportunity to come here. For refusing to allow me to give in to despair, even when I failed, but instead to look at the Dome, pick myself up and live with hope. Whether I am sitting under the Dome or leaving it behind in the rolling fields of the republic, I know that that ultimate hope can never fail to be grasped. That dream, unlike all the others, is always present, always within reach and always delivers.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
Contact Liam Kelly at lkelly8@nd.edu
LIAM KELLY | The Observer
By Declan Lee Photographer
There are only three things in life my grandfather loves more than Notre Dame football: His family, his faith and his Notre Dame education. Growing up, he came over to my family’s house every Saturday afternoon to sit down with my mother and watch that week’s football game. He would wear one of his dozen 100% cotton plain ND shirts purchased at the outlet store or, if he got cold, one of his Notre Dame Adidas jackets my mother had bought him when ND signed its apparel over to the company.
He had lived through the Parseghian era of dominance, sent his daughters to Notre Dame to witness Lou Holtz defeat Miami and West Virginia to claim the 1988 title, struggled through the Charlie Weis era and followed along as Brian Kelly rebuilt the program, only to watch in disbelief and horror from the stands in Hard Rock Stadium as Alabama and Nick Saban pummeled Manti Te’o and the rest of the team one game away from another title. Through it all, he raised his two daughters and three grandchildren to appreciate the majesty of the blue and gold.
When I was young, he used to pay me and my siblings $5 to read books that he considered classics. You know, “Moby-Dick,” books from the Bible like “Acts of the Apostles” or “Job,” and “Notre Dame Football Golden Moments.” At the ripe age of 7, he was exposing me to ND football lore with stories like the “first ever” forward pass vs. Army in 1913, Knute Rockne’s 1924 cross-country championship team, and Notre Dame’s 1957 snapping of Oklahoma’s historic 47-game win streak.
Growing up in metro Detroit, my grade school would have a no uniformday whenever Michigan and Michigan State would play where you
My grandfather’s Irish pride
could “pick your side.” On those days, mixed in with a sea of kids in maize, blue, dark green and white, you could find me sporting one of my Kelly green Notre Dame shirts — much to my classmates’ chagrin. When I’d walk out of school on those days, he’d be especially happy to pick me up wearing his trademark black ND leather jacket, with its golden “Fightin’ Irish” stitched on the front. Before the 2012 national championship, he bought me a custom Notre Dame football jersey with my name and number on it. It was huge on me and drooped like a hand-me-down ballgown. I was confused as to how he could mess up the sizing by so much (even with my mother’s help!), but he said that one day I’d grow into the jersey, just about when I needed itmost.Justoveradecadelater,I’dwear that same jersey to my first ever Notre Dame game as a student. It wasn’t just on the football side that he kept his grandkids prepared, however. He took great pride in our intellect and never once doubted our ability to get into Notre Dame and succeed there. To be absolutely sure, though, he would quiz us with SAT vocab flashcards so that we weren’t tripped up in the reading comprehension sections. This started in second grade, and by the time we took the SAT, vocab comprehension was no longer on the test. He would correct our English papers and help us review grammar concepts, and he and my grandmother would tutor us in math and science. He invested everything he could into our education, and considering that every one of his grandkids ended up enrolling at Notre Dame, I’d say that it worked.
I am an anthropology major today due in large part to the time he would spend with me when I was sick watching the National Geographic show
“Unearthed,” and he always loved to tell me that if he didn’t have to worry about money, he would have studied Egyptology and archaeology when he was in school. He was thrilled when I told him that I’d be studying those subjects at his favorite college. I also minor in Irish studies and Irish language and literature due to the interest he passed on to me in his fifth favorite thing — his 100% Irish heritage. Last summer, I traced our lineage back to dozens of legendary Irish high kings and even the mythical giant Finn McCool.
Since I’ve been at Notre Dame, he does his best to visit whenever he can. All throughout my years of college, he would drive down to see me around football games or at personal events, like my performances with the Notre Dame basketball pep band or Irish traditional music band. Whenever he would prepare to depart from campus, he would always pull me aside to tell me how proud he was of me, and how excited he would have been living in Cavanaugh Hall in his senior year of 1960 if he had known all of his children and grandchildren would attend the same university he loved so much.
When I graduate from Notre Dame, he will be on campus and I’ll be sure to see him and catch up. It’s been too long since we’ve chatted. And while he doesn’t like long phone calls anymore, it’s still my fault we don’t talk as much as we should. In fact, anyone at Notre Dame can talk to him whenever they want. If you walk south on Notre Dame Avenue past the bookstore, hang a right through the iron gate, go past Knute Rockne, Arian and now Lou Holtz, stop and the second granite mausoleum on the right with the other veterans, there he is. He’s on the right side, facing
the street. “Richard A. Meaney, 1936-2024.” When I cross the stage in Purcell Pavilion ready to receive my diploma, I’ll be doing it wearing the class ring he left me. When I drive home that night, I’ll be wearing the same leather jacket he used to pick me up from school in, “Fightin’ Irish” emblazoned on my chest the same way it was on his all those years ago. I’m going to cry a lot that weekend. Hell, I’m crying right now writing this.
Growing up, he always told me that his one goal was to make it to my college graduation. He wanted nothing more than to be there clapping as I crossed that stage at Our Lady’s University. The
day before he died, as I kneeled by his bedside, and I told him I loved him, he told me that he’d still be there for me. And while it won’t be in the traditional sense, I know he will be. He never misses a chance to support his grandkids — certainly not while they’re at Notre Dame. I miss you, granddad. I hope you’re proud of me.
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
Contact Declan Lee at dlee35@nd.edu
How Catholics can participate in politics
By Maggie Powell Columnist, “Powell’s Perspective”
With recent events such as President Trump criticizing Pope Leo IV on social media and posting deepfake photos depicting him as Jesus, many Catholics have spoken out against President Trump. When CNN visited campus April 15, the University of Notre Dame quickly found itself in the national spotlight. As a prestigious Catholic university dedicated to the dignity of every human being and promoting social justice, all eyes are looking to see how the Notre Dame community responds. And what are we to say?
I want to first turn to Pope Leo XIII, whose “Rerum Novarum” provided the framework for Catholic Social Teaching and emphasized the importance of unity within the Church.
“Rerum Novarum” called for social reforms, especially regarding the care for the poor and the rights of the “working man.” But is Washington currently trying to help the working man? I think many would say no. With the “Big Beautiful Bill,” which I would argue is not so beautiful, gutting welfare spending and giving tax breaks to billionaires, the current administration seems to ignore the needs of those who are suffering most.
Although it may seem that students who share the same Catholic faith would share the same political affiliation, political polarization within the Catholic Church has driven a wedge between Catholic students. Many students are astoun ded, furious and outspoken against the current administration, but just as many are defending the Trump
administration. The political divide between Catholics extends beyond Notre Dame’s campus. With varying opinions on topics such as abortion and sexual identity driving people apart, can the Church overcome the hatred and division found in America today?
Let’s rewind to one of the Catholic Church’s most influential documents from the Second Vatican Council: “Gaudium et Spes.” The Church acknowledged the growing divide between peoples: “Never has the human race enjoyed such an abundance of wealth, resources and economic power, and yet a huge proportion of the world’s citizens are still tormented by hunger and poverty…Never before has man had so keen an understanding of freedom, yet at the same time new forms of social and psychological slavery make
their appearance. Although the world of today has a very vivid awareness of its unity and of how one man depends on another in needful solidarity, it is most grievously torn into opposing camps by conflicting forces. For political, social, economic, racial and ideological disputes still continue bitterly, and with them the peril of a war which would reduce everything to ashes.”
Sound familiar? The concerns of the Church in the 1960s are even more exacerbated today as roughly half of Americans live paycheck to paycheck while tech giants accumulate more money than anyone can dream of spending. We cannot ignore the social, economic and racial inequality in our nation. From impulsive executive orders to inhumane deportations of people to the raging war in the Middle East,
is America still the “land of the free”? Answering the increasingly asked question of whether our democracy is in crisis can be daunting, and it can be easier for young people to turn away from the overwhelming political world thinking that someone else will come to save them. But to quote “Les Miserables,” “the time is now, the day is here.” Liberating our nation from hatred and polarization is not a hopeless endeavor, but it will not happen overnight nor without hard work. I believe the Catholic Church can be a beacon of peace and unity if we let it.
However, we cannot be apolitical. The time for saying “I am not a political person” is over.
Editor’s note: This is an abridged version of this column. Read more at ndsmcobserver.com
DECLAN LEE | The Observer
The author, 2 years old, with his grandfather at the Morris Inn in 2006.
Male Athlete of the Year: Jeremiyah Love
By Ben Hicks Sports Editor
Consensus All-American.
Unanimous All-American. Doak Walker Award Winner. Heisman Finalist. Top-3 NFL Draft pick. Jeremiyah Love. You could spend hours listing the Notre Dame running back’s career accolades, accomplishments and highlights. From hurdles against Army, USC and Miami to 90-yard sprints against Boston College and Indiana to the grittiest two-yard rush in football history against Penn State, the St. Louis kid has provided Irish fans with countless memories and moments to cherish. Now, three years after arriving in South Bend as a reserved and restrained backup, the greatest running back in Notre Dame history has graduated to the National Football League as the highest-paid ball carrier in professional football history.
Long before he ever imagined hearing his name called in the first three picks by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Love arrived at Notre Dame as an unassuming back in a long line of highly touted prospects recruited by coach Deland McCullough. “Coach McCullough set the foundation for me at Notre Dame,” Love said in a post-draft interview.
A consensus four-star recruit, Love made an immediate impact
in McCullough’s backfield during his freshman campaign in 2023.
The second leading rusher on the team, Love finished year one with 385 yards and one touchdown.
His role and stardom skyrocketed in his sophomore season.
With Audric Estime off to the NFL, Love assumed the starting role and wasted no time establishing himself amongst college football’s premier workhorses.
In game one in front of a raucous crowd of 100,000 strong in College Station, Texas, Love sprinted his way to 91 yards, including the game-winning go-ahead score over Texas A&M with under two minutes to play to silence the Aggie crowd. He followed that up with his first 100-yard performance two weeks later in the dominating win at Purdue.
Fast forward two months, and Love had run the Irish past the NIU setback and into College Football Playoff contention. Through those first 10 games, Love found paydirt in every single one. He then hurdled his way through the Army defense to the tune of 130 yards and two scores. A week later, the touchdown streak continued, as his 99 yards and another hurdle beat rival USC to secure a spot in the playoffs.
Love’s versatility and durability are two factors that separate him from other running backs,
and that distinctiveness shone bright in Notre Dame’s marvelous Playoff run. It’s also the same powers that Marcus Freeman believes will make Love a gifted professional running back. “He has the ability and the skillset and want-to to make that come to fruition,” the Irish head coach said leading up to the draft.
Love’s quick burst and uncatchable speed were on display in the first round against Indiana. The 6-foot, 214-pound stallion slashed his way through a hole on the left side of the line to break off a 98-yard touchdown run through the heart of the Hoosier secondary. That opening touchdown, the longest in Irish history, set the crowd for college football’s first-ever on-campus Playoff game into a frenzy.
Two weeks later, Love showcased that durability in the Orange Bowl against Penn State. With the Irish battling back from an early 10-point hole, Love clawed through a restrictive knee brace and five Nittany Lion defenders for a powerful goal-line score to give Notre Dame its first lead. After shedding seemingly the entire defense, Love extended for the goal line before throwing up his signature heart sign in celebration. “I love being physical. Just going out there and trying to run people over,” Love said.
All told, Love finished his
sophomore season as Notre Dame’s most critical offensive weapon, racking up 1,362 scrimmage yards and a mammoth 19 touchdowns.
His breakout campaign garnered extensive attention, yet Love still opted to lead a modest lifestyle away from football. His personality off the gridiron is arguably just as impressive as his performances on it. Love was commendably open about his unique temperament that led doctors to tell his parents that he is likely on the autism spectrum. His many interests include anime and comic books, which he combined in the offseason to create a digital youth comic series called “Jeremonstar.”
An inspiration for Irish fans across generations, Love entered the 2025 season with lofty expectations for both him and the team. Love found the end zone twice in the second game of the year against A&M, before setting a new career high with 157 rushing yards in week three against Purdue. He followed that up with four touchdowns in the first half at Arkansas. The following week, it was 103 rushing yards and a score against Boise State. Then, a modest 86 yards and two touchdowns against NC State.
Love’s magnum opus came in the week eight rain-soaked rivalry showdown with USC at Notre Dame Stadium. Love dominated
the testy, sloppy battle with the Trojan defense, taking 24 carries for a Notre Dame record 228 yards and two scores. He added 37 receiving yards for a total of 265, the most by a Notre Dame player against USC. After that monstrous output, Love characteristically deflected all praise to his teammates, saying, “I wouldn’t have that performance without my team. The O-line, CJ, my receivers blocking on the perimeter.”
As the Irish once again had to overcome early-season struggles to make a postseason push, Love only elevated his performance. With the rest of his offense half asleep against lowly Boston College, Love erased any chance of an embarrassing defeat with a 94-yard touchdown run late in the third quarter.
Against Navy a week later, Love scored twice more, one of which came from 48 yards out after he narrowly avoided a tackle for loss. In a critical ranked matchup at Pitt in mid-November, Love scurried for 147 yards on 23 touches. He opened the scoring with a 56-yard sprint after a nasty spin move to exhibit the depth and filth of his skillset. He once again defied all odds in his final game in Notre Dame Stadium, taking just eight carries for 171 yards and three touchdowns against Syracuse. In sum, Love bested his previous marks with 1,652 scrimmage yards and 21 touchdowns, en route to earning the Doak Walker Award as college football’s best running back. He was also a consensus and unanimous All-American. For good measure, he was one of only four players nationwide invited to New York as a Heisman Trophy finalist.
Throughout his storied career, Love also possessed a rare respect for his fans and university in the increasingly transactional landscape of college football. “This is my first home. Notre Dame is where I made the name Jeremiyah Love,” Love said when he returned for the annual Blue-Gold Game less than 48 hours after being selected by the Arizona Cardinals.
As Jeremiyah Love closes the Notre Dame chapter of his story, fans in South Bend and beyond will always be grateful that they got to experience one of the greatest players and greatest people in Notre Dame football history. Amassing 228 yards against USC, 98 yards against Indiana and 2 yards against Penn State doesn’t happen without the character, class and one big heart of Jeremiyah Love. So, after all the hurdles, all the touchdown sprints and all the accolades, one thing remains true.
All you need is Love. Contact Ben Hicks at bhicks2@nd.edu
MARIELLA TADDONIO | The Observer
Junior running back Jeremiyah Love splits Panther defenders during Notre Dame’s dominant 37-15 victory over Pittsburgh on Nov. 15 at Acrisure Stadium. The eventual third overall pick to Arizona in the 2026 NFL Draft amassed 147 rushing yards in the win on his way to 1,327 for the year.
Female Athlete of the Year: Hannah Hidalgo
By Ellie Collins Associate Sports Editor
Certain types of players grace a program only once in a lifetime. In basketball specifically, to reach “generational” status, an athlete must display a unique kind of sterling leadership on the court to match such talent. Last season, Irish junior guard Hannah Hidalgo did just that.
After two years in South Bend, Hidalgo’s junior campaign marked her first as Notre Dame’s centerpiece. In her freshman and sophomore seasons, the New Jersey native was able to float around and showcase her skillset on the foundation laid by surrounding upperclassmen like Sonia Citron and Olivia Miles. With a majority of familiar star power gone this past season, however, everyone knew it was Hidalgo’s time to take control. For better or worse, the team’s pulse beats in her.
“As a person, this team has made me so much better,” Hidalgo said, following Notre Dame’s season-ending 70-52 defeat against UConn in the Elite Eight on March 29. “Just taking this team kind of on my back and just learning each and every single one of our players — who they are as a person, who they are as a player. I was a lot more intentional with that.”
Given her talent, Hidalgo’s potential destiny always included heroics as the hub for the squad from the day she walked on campus. In her debut donning the blue and gold against No. 6 South Carolina in the 2023-2024 season opener, Hidalgo amassed 31 points and 3 steals, announcing herself to the college basketball world. She tallied 21 points and 6 steals in her first home game against Northwestern two weeks later.
A young, fearless gun on every court she graced, the freshman First Team All-American closed the season averaging 22.6 points per game. She notably led the Irish with 22 points in their 55-51 win over No. 2 NC State in the ACC title game, and also averaged 4.3 steals per NCAA tournament contest during a Sweet 16 run. With 4.6 steals per contest across the season, it also marked the first of three consecutive campaigns in which she led the ACC in steals.
“All credit to my teammates, because, you know, I wouldn’t be able to do it without them,” Hidalgo said when asked about being named the ACC Tournament’s Most Valuable Player following the Irish victory against the Wolfpack. “It’s truly a blessing just to be here in this position.”
Heading into her sophomore year, with the return of Miles
and forward Maddy Westbeld from injury, Hidalgo’s status as the fulcrum on the offensive side of the court could have been adjusted. However, she improved her scoring output to 23.8 PPG on her way to a second straight All-American campaign. Along with Citron, Miles and Westbeld, Hidalgo helped the Irish to a 16-2 conference record and regular-season ACC Championship. The team, however, ultimately came up short in their bid to make the Final Four and bowed out in the Sweet 16 with a 71-62 loss to TCU.
“Having [Miles] on the floor just opened so much,” noted Hidalgo after the Irish’s 7655 NCAA Tournament second round win against Michigan.
“She was able to find shooters or dish it down to the post to get a layup, and so having her back is always crucial for us.”
All of this to say, Hidalgo was ready to fill the lead backcourt role once Citron departed for the WNBA and Miles opted to spend her fifth year with those very same Horned Fogs. The only question remaining was whether or not she could be the team’s leader in the locker room to pair with her on-court prowess.
Her leadership was tested countless times during stretches of the season, as the Irish entered the year ranked 15th and fell out of the AP Poll entirely from Jan. 19 through March 8 due to uneven play in the ACC.
Through it all, Hidalgo showed herself to be a bulwark in the face of adversity and keyed a five-game winning streak to end the regular season. She later carried the Irish during an Elite Eight run with spectacular play and on-court fire in the tourney.
“I think her maturity last year was tremendous,” said head coach Niele Ivey. “Her maturity from a leadership standpoint was so phenomenal — I was so, so impressed and so proud of her.”
Hidalgo broke school records with 25.3 points and 5.6 steals per game, additionally averaging 6.9 rebounds and 5.2 assists per contest. In Notre Dame’s 7866 win against Stanford in Palo Alto on Feb. 1, Hidalgo dropped a season-high 37 points, adding 9 rebounds and 4 pilfers; in the second half, she went 7-7 from the floor and 5-5 from the free-throw line. As for steals, in Hidalgo’s 27 minutes on the court in the Irish’s 85-58 home win against Akron, she recorded a career-high 16 steals, setting the Division I record for the most steals in a game.
“Defense first; defense wins championships,” said Hidalgo on her historic production against the Zips. “You know, I make sure that I bring the energy for my team defensively so that we can get out in transition and get buckets.”
Hidalgo’s most memorable regular-season performance came in the final show when the
Irish upset No. 10 Louisville in a 65-62 win that portended the squad’s and Hidalgo’s impending tournament heroics. She notched 30 points, 8 rebounds, 7 assists and 5 steals, including a game-sealing swipe. After reaching the ACC Tournament semifinals a week later, Notre Dame entered the NCAA tourney as a No. 6 seed. Facing No. 3 Ohio State in the second round in Columbus, Hidalgo posted 26 points, 13 rebounds and 8 steals to slay the Buckeyes 83-73 on their home turf and send the Irish to their fifth consecutive Sweet 16.
On a quest for their first Elite Eight berth since 2019 in Fort Worth, Texas, the Irish faced a powerful second-seeded Vanderbilt team paced by First Team All-American guard and Hidalgo counterpart Mikayla Blakes. After being relegated to Second Team All-American for the first time in her career, Hidalgo proved a point against Blakes, besting her and keying the 67-64 win over the Commodores with 31 points, 11 rebounds, 10 steals and 7 assists in the 67-64 victory. Hidalgo became the first player to record a triple-double including steals in tournament history and set the record for most steals in a single tournament with 16 on her way to 19 overall.
“I’m going to still go out and play the same way I’ve been playing,” Hidalgo said about her
Second Team honors. “I’ve been playing consistently this whole season and since my freshman year, and right now, it’s about winning. So I don’t care about any of the accolades. I didn’t care about them going into this year, and I’m, you know, here to win.”
The glorious tournament run ended for Hidalgo and the Irish one game short of the Final Four, as top-seeded powerhouse UConn proved too deep and talented. Though Notre Dame battled until the final whistle, the Huskies notched a 70-52 win. Hidalgo ended her campaign with a 22 point, 11 rebound and 3 assist performance.
Hidalgo earned the praise of the legendary UConn coach despite the loss. “She probably causes more problems for [the opposing] offense than any player in the country,” Geno Auriemma said. “I just love watching her, and I asked her after the game if she was old enough to go pro, and she said, ‘No, I want one more shot at you guys.’”
Hidalgo indeed will return for her senior year in South Bend with a chance to add to her growing legend. A truly unique and awe-inspiring talent, Hidalgo has already amassed a career for the books. Fortunately, she will write more chapters beginning next fall.
Contact Ellie Collins at ecollin9@nd.edu
MARIELLA TADDONIO | The Observer
Junior guard Hannah Hidalgo attemps a fadeaway jump shot during Notre Dame’s 83-73 win against Ohio State in the second round of the NCAA Tournament March 28 at the Schottenstein Center. Hidalgo’s 26 points and 13 rebounds helped secure the Irish’s fifth consecutive Sweet 16 berth.
Declan Lee Photography
Senior photographer Declan Lee’s best photos from the past two years. Thank you, Declan, for your years of service to The Observer.
Photography by Declan Lee
Irish win 10 straight but miss Playoff
By Noah Cahill Sports Editor Emeritus
The 2025-26 Notre Dame football season will go down as one of the greatest whatifs in program history. After a nightmare 0-2 start, head coach Marcus Freeman’s team rattled off 10 straight victories, seemingly en route to another College Football Playoff bid. However, despite having the fourth-best odds to win the title, the Irish missed out on the 12-team field entirely, falling behind No. 9 seed Alabama and No. 10 seed Miami during the final week. The decision colored a third straight 10-win season, one which saw junior running back Jeremiyah Love become a Heisman Trophy finalist and freshman CJ Carr emerge as the quarterback of the future.
An uphill climb
When Notre Dame’s schedule was released for the 2025-26 season, everyone circled weeks 1 and 2. Notre Dame was slated to open the season on the road against preseason No. 10 Miami, before returning home to face No. 19 Texas A&M, the two most difficult games of the season, with a quarterback who hadn’t taken a snap as a starter. It looked dire in week one when the Hurricanes took a 21-7 lead midway through the third quarter. To that point, the Irish were owned along the trenches, outgained by over 100 yards on the ground. They showed life in the fourth, however, eventually evening the score at 24 with just over three minutes remaining. It would prove to be too little too late in the end. Quarterback Carson Beck got Miami into field goal range, and Carter Davis nailed the go-ahead field goal from 47 yards. With no timeouts and a minute left, the Irish failed the tall task of tying the game and fell to 0-1. This set up a mustwin game against the Aggies inside Notre Dame Stadium.
Freeman’s group had an early bye week to prepare for the home opener. Part of this preparation included getting the junior running back duo of Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price more involved. The talented tandem combined for just 78 yards against Miami but more than doubled it with 162 between them in Week 3. The offense, however, was not the issue this time around.
Quarterback Marcel Reed and company lit up the Notre Dame defense to the tune of 488 total yards and 41 points. But despite their defensive struggles, the Irish took the lead with under three minutes remaining, scoring six after a methodical, six-minute drive. That’s when it all fell apart. A botched snap led to a failed extra point,
LEE | The Observer
is probably playing as well as anyone right now, have won 10 straight games in a row, I think all of them by double-digit points, and you want the 12 best teams now,” Freeman said after the win. “It’s hard to argue we’re not one of those teams.”
Falling short
Heading into conference championship weekend, the Irish fell to No. 10 in the penultimate College Football Playoff rankings, with Alabama taking over at No. 9. All Marcus Freeman and his team could do was sit back and hope that they would stay there. But despite neither Notre Dame nor No. 12 Miami playing over the weekend, Miami earned the final spot in the 12-team field. Shocking would be an understatement.
“My feelings and the feelings here are just shock and, really, an absolute sense of sadness for our student-athletes,” athletic director Pete Bevacqua said after the rankings reveal on Sunday. “Overwhelming shock and sadness. Like a collective feeling that we were all just punched in the stomach.”
which proved to be the difference as Texas A&M scored in the dying seconds, tacking on the extra point to seal the win.
The devastating pair of losses raised questions about even the possibility of a playoff berth. Was Notre Dame eliminated in the second week of September?
“The future is uncertain,”
Freeman said following the loss. “I don’t know what the playoff number is. It doesn’t matter. We need to focus on getting better and getting ready for next week.”
Gaining momentum
That’s exactly what Notre Dame did. One game at a time, it restored its defensive identity while evolving into an offensive powerhouse. In the two games following A&M, it laid 56 on both Purdue and Arkansas and held the Razorbacks to just 13 points. That game began a stretch of three straight second halves holding opponents scoreless as Notre Dame cruised past Boise State and NC State at home, winning 28-7 and 36-7, respectively. First-year defensive coordinator Chris Ash was heavily criticized after his group’s terrible start, which represented a fall from grace after last season’s dominance. However, he responded to the adversity with flying colors, proving himself to be a worthy successor to the great Al Golden.
On the other side of the ball, Carr was quickly developing into more than just a serviceable starter. He exploded for 300-plus yards against Arkansas and NC State, connecting on several highlight-reel throws while minimizing turnovers. But beyond the production, the freshman was already showcasing the necessary intangibles.
“There’s very few people that you come in contact with that are blessed with that leadership, competitive trait.
I’m talking like not normal,” Freeman said about Carr.
As well as Carr was playing, though, Jeremiyah Love was the star of the Irish offense. After an anomaly against Miami, he proceeded to score at least one touchdown in every single game of the season. His signature moment came in what may have been the last Notre Dame-USC game for some time. He totaled 228 rushing yards, the most ever by a player inside Notre Dame Stadium, and found the end zone to help the Irish to a 3424 rivalry win. After the second bye week of the season, the Irish eked out a 25-10 victory over Boston College on the road. Love’s 94-yard touchdown was the decisive moment in an uninspiring Holy War. At that point in the season, the Heisman conversations were already in full force. They
got even louder the following week, when Love broke off a jaw-dropping touchdown run, miraculously avoiding the ground on the back of a Navy defender before scampering into the end zone. True to form, he remained humble amid all the talk.
“I don’t go out there and do anything on my own,” Love said. “I think of the Heisman buzz as a credit to how good this team is.”
Finishing strong
In the final three games of the season, Love bolstered his Heisman case, setting program records and helping his team finish the year on a 10-game win streak. ‘College GameDay’ made the trip for a top 25 matchup at Pittsburgh, undoubtedly Notre Dame’s toughest remaining test. Love set the tone from the jump with a 56yard touchdown run to open the scoring. He went on to tally 147 yards in a statement 37-15 victory for the Irish. A week later, he tied Jerome Bettis’ record for most touchdowns in a single season (20), finding the end zone three times in a resounding 70-7 win over Syracuse. He would eclipse the record in the regular season finale, scoring his 21st touchdown of the year against Stanford. Notre Dame dismantled its longtime rivals 49-20 to cap off a 10-2 season.
“You talk about a team that
One day later, Love was announced as one of four Heisman finalists, a minor consolation after the season’s abrupt end. He would finish third in voting, behind Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia and Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who brought home the award. Despite losing the superstar running back and his partner in crime, Jadarian Price, the Irish will reload on offense next season. Carr will have the keys behind one of the best offensive lines in the country and a talented group of pass-catchers, strengthened by transfer portal additions Quincy Porter and Mylan Graham. The defense also returns a large majority of talent, including captains Drayk Bowen and Adon Shuler, as well as star cornerback Leonard Moore. Interior defensive line was the biggest question mark on that side of the ball until Francis Brewu and Tionne Gray joined via the portal. The combination of new and returning talent will have Notre Dame in the inner circle of contenders. Based on preseason projections, the Irish will face their most difficult matchups later in the season, including at BYU in mid-October, a rematch with Miami in early November and SMU in the penultimate game. With more manageable games under their belt, they should be playing their best football by then. Hungry to prove last season was a mistake, the message for Freeman’s team will be clear: “Leave no doubt.”
Contact Noah Cahill at ncahill2@nd.edu
DECLAN
Freshman quarterback CJ Carr scans the secondary during Notre Dame’s game against Boise State on Oct. 4 at Notre Dame Stadium. Carr finished his standout season with 2,741 yards and 24 touchdowns in the air.
Irish men’s basketball suffers crippling season
By Henry Lytle Associate Sports Editor
In head coach Micah Shrewsberry’s third season at the helm of Notre Dame’s men’s basketball team, the Irish finished 16th in the ACC and 13-18 overall, missing the conference tournament. The Irish battled season-ending injuries and heartbreaking defeats in a challenging season following the highest recruiting class in school history. Although the year left much to be desired, some players shined and earned big paydays in the transfer portal.
The offseason has been so tense that both Shrewsberry and the Notre Dame Athletic Department have declined to comment on the season, after doing so for each of the last two seasons.
Statistically, junior guard Markus Burton led the Irish in scoring for a third consecutive season despite playing only the early half of the year. The Preseason First-Team ACC selectee averaged 18.5 points through the first 10 games before suffering a season-ending ankle injury against TCU on Dec. 5. Burton paced the Irish in their 76-71 victory over Missouri in the previous contest, contributing to the team’s hot 6-3 start with three losses to eventual tournament teams out of conference.
The Irish improved to 9-3 after defeating Idaho and Evansville at home, led by freshman forward Jalen Haralson, who netted 20 points in both matchups. However, Shrewsberry suffered arguably one of his worst career losses on Dec. 21 against Purdue Fort Wayne at home. The Irish fell 72-69 to the Mastodons, shooting 40% while turning the ball over 15 times compared to only 8 from Purdue Fort Wayne. Next, Shrewsberry’s team headed 3,000 miles to take on Stanford and Cal over Christmas break, and managed to defeat the Cardinal in a game that resembled basketball from the 1960s.
The Irish earned its first ACC victory of the season in the low-scoring, 47-40 affair, holding the Cardinal to a mere 23% shooting from the field.
The Irish fell in the next five consecutive games, none more notable than Cal to begin the next year. Junior guard Braeden Shrewsberry led the Irish with 21 points on five three-pointers, but the Irish came up short in the final seconds, fouling a three-point shooter to lose on a four-point play. The game is remembered more for a reaction to the foul call by Micah Shrewsberry, who charged the official responsible for mediating the deciding play of the game. Shrewsberry received a public reprimand from the ACC for his actions, but no financial penalty or suspension.
Notre Dame hosted Clemson and Miami at home for the first home ACC contests of the year, and lost 76-61 and 81-69, respectively, to the two eventual March Madness threats. The schedule’s brutality did not let up, as Virginia Tech and North Carolina became two more conference losses. The Irish earned their second ACC win of the season in the next home matchup against Boston College to break the fivegame skid. Braeden Shrewsberry scored 22 points, and Haralson chipped in 17 to lead the Irish over the Eagles to move to 2-5 in conference play.
Hoping to build momentum, the Irish geared up for another ranked matchup against Virginia on Jan. 27. Despite leading by as many as 17 points in the first half, Notre Dame squandered a major lead and allowed the Cavaliers back into the game late, but fought back to send the game into overtime. At the end of the first overtime, UVA guard Sam Lewis sank a miracle three-pointer as the shot clock expired, tying the game and giving the Cavaliers major momentum. The Irish ran out of gas in the second overtime to still remain winless in ranked games under Micah Shrewsberry.
The game, however, yielded a career-high 34 points from sophomore Cole Certa, who began to see an extended starting role following Burton’s absence.
Shrewsberry’s team managed another five-game losing streak after the deflating Virginia loss, falling to Syracuse, Louisville and SMU on the road and Florida State at home. Against the Seminoles, the Irish erased a double-digit deficit in the second half and narrowed the margin to one possession at the end of the second half. Certa was unable to connect on the potential overtime forcing an open three-pointer, and the Irish lost another heartbreaker at home.
The team turned it around on Feb. 14 at home against Georgia Tech in one of the bright spots of the season behind a new career high from Certa. This time, the sophomore sharpshooter knocked down seven of his 11 three-point shots, helping the Irish finish 50% from that mark. It was a much-needed bounceback game without Haralson, who suffered a minor ankle injury in practice leading up to the matchup. Braeden Shrewsberry chipped in 20 points, and junior guard Logan Imes added 14 points and nine rebounds. The Irish headed to a struggling Pitt next, and lost a close 73-68 game.
On Feb. 24, Notre Dame hosted No. 1 Duke, who dismantled the Irish inside Purcell Pavilion. ACC Player of the Year Cameron Boozer amassed 20 points and nine rebounds in the first half. Duke led 54-22 at the break and never looked back, thoroughly leveling Notre Dame 100-56. This was the largest loss for the Irish since 1898, when the team fell 64-8 to the Chicago First Regiment. Micah Shrewsberry tore his Achilles on the sideline during the game and spent the remainder of the season on a scooter and in a boot.
The Irish rebounded in the penultimate game of the season against NC State in a thrilling
overtime contest. Certa and Haralson led the scoring effort, combining for 48 of the Irish’s total 96 points. Certa added another 30+ point masterpiece to his resume, tallying three in a nine-game stretch. Certa was key to the game as he sank three clutch deep shots in overtime to help the Irish overcome the Wolfpack. As one of the best statistical free-throw shooters in the country, Certa swished two to ice the game. Sophomore guard Sir Mohammed also chipped in 10 points off the bench, as a key spark plug for Micah Shrewsberry’s struggling offense. The Irish didn’t lead until overtime, and only tied the game in the final 19 seconds as Haralson knocked down clutch free throws.
The senior day victory was followed by a pair of losses, split between home and away, where Notre Dame missed the ACC conference tournament altogether for the first time in school history. Since the format has been altered to include only the top 15 teams in 2024, the Irish’s third-to-last finish, alongside Georgia Tech and Pittsburgh, left them out of the competition. The disastrous season resulted in disappointment for many fans, but it was only the start of the future struggles for Shrewsberry to maintain the roster.
The offseason has mirrored the Irish season’s woes. Notre Dame saw Burton, Certa, Haralson, Mohammed, Ryder Frost and Garret Sundra leave for the transfer portal. Losing the top three offensive weapons, Shrewsberry is faced with the difficult task of retooling an already depleted and limited Irish roster around Braeden Shrewsberry, Imes and Brady Koehler. Notre Dame will lose five of its top six point producers to the portal and graduation, the largest loss it has seen under Micah Shrewsberry.
Notre Dame’s name, image and likeness budget is a large culprit for the mass exodus to the portal. According to Tom Noie of
the Irish Tribune, the University reportedly spent $3-5 million on its basketball roster — a fraction of the $10 million average for an ACC team that made the NCAA tournament.
The Irish have brought in four-star point guard Jonathan Sanderson as their top recruit, and Gan Erdene Solongo, a threestar 7-foot center from Indiana. From the portal, the program has added 6-foot-10 graduate center Logan Duncomb from Winthrop, who averaged 18 points and nine rebounds per game in the Big South conference. Rising senior guard Braeden Smith has transferred in, posting five points and nearly four assists per game last season at Gonzaga. Ethan Roberts from UPenn has also committed, compiling 16 points per game in the Ivy League. Additionally, 6-foot-9 junior forward Bryce Dortch from Rutgers, and 6-foot-6 guard Devin Brown have signed to wear Blue and Gold. While these players each contributed at different levels than the ACC, their roles will see a dramatic increase in responsibility as Shrewsberry will be forced to rely on experience, with his core recruits departing for more money and other opportunities.
The offseason also brought news for Towt, who has elected to pursue a future in football as a tight end. Signed by the Colts on March 17, the 6-foot-7, 250-pound forward earned a free agent contract with no competitive football experience in high school or college. Towt aims to follow in the footsteps of other Colts multi-sport tight ends such as Mo Alie-Cox.
Notre Dame will be forced to rebuild a roster devastated by the transfer portal and season-ending injuries. As the Markus Burton era comes to a close, Shrewsberry aims to turn the page on a forgettable season and to a new chapter of Irish basketball.
Contact Henry Lytle at hlytle@nd.edu
Saints women secure fifth straight winning season
By Dan Kilcoyne Sports Writer
Holy Cross women’s basketball entered the season with high hopes of challenging for the top of the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference. While the 15-14 record isn’t anything to scoff at, the Saints will hope to use the year as a jumping-off point for the future. The Saints quickly realized that rising the rankings would be a longer project and that their young, inexperienced side would need time to gel and click. Despite this, Holy Cross was able to improve significantly over the season to
secure a record of 15-14.
The Saints got off to an underwhelming start, beginning the year just 1-5. However, they won their last three games in November and went 4-1 in December to head into the new year feeling confident. This run of good play continued into January, with impressive wins over St. Xavier and IU South Bend in the same week. The Saints did falter toward the end of the season, losing their last four to finish No. 7 in the CCAC. Despite this, the team still secured a fifth straight winning season.
The Saints proved formidable
at home, with an 11-5 record on their own court. Speaking on their excellent home form, head coach Tom Robbins said, “The players had a lot of confidence at home, you could see it in their shooting, in the way they played together, the risks that they were willing to take, the focus that they had. We had a very competitive mindset at home.”
The season saw some excellent individual campaigns, notably from sophomore forward Allie Caldwell, who finished third in the conference for points per game with 18.7 and earned Second Team AllConference honors. Speaking
on her personal success, Caldwell stated, “Once the team started meshing, I was able to feel less pressure and just perform and do what the team needed.” Freshman forward Sincere Coleman-Francis also had an excellent freshman year, earning CCAC AllFreshman team status, and the Saints’ only graduating senior, point guard Audrey Tallent, recorded 66 steals on the year, the third-highest mark in the conference.
Robbins also spoke on how his program can make the next step from perennial winner to perennial champion. “It’s time
to get to 20 wins, it felt like a key for it was the focus we had this year on understanding who we were, that we were young, and this was probably going to be a longer process than we wanted. We wanted to get those 20 wins this year when we started out the season, but it became obvious that we were pretty young for that,” he said.
With Holy Cross returning every contributor sans Tallent, 2026-27 could be the start of the Saints’ upward trajectory toward the top of the conference.
Contact Dan Kilcoyne at dkilcoyn@nd.edu
HCC WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
Hockey makes strides in first year under Sheahan
By Tyler Reidy Sports Editor Emeritus
For Notre Dame hockey, the first year under Brock Sheahan was never going to be an easy one. An alumnus of the program, Sheahan took over for 20-year head coach Jeff Jackson at the end of the 202425 season after a year in waiting. That 2024-25 team was 4-19-1 in Big Ten play, the season bolstered at the end by a conference tournament upset against Minnesota.
Since his introductory press conference, Sheahan has spoken at length about bringing a new style to the Irish. The team would play at a greater pace and entertainment level, and the year-round focus would remain on the process of improvement, not on-ice results.
As expected, it took a while for 2025-26 Notre Dame to find its identity and achieve it consistently during gameplay. After a 3-2-1 start in October nonconference play, the Irish lost their first 13 Big Ten games. In November, they couldn’t sync high-level offense with quality defensive play. In December and January, they shot themselves in the foot with endless penalties, taking misconducts and suspensions they could not afford.
However, beginning with a Jan. 23-24 series against Ohio State, something clicked. After coming from behind and nearly winning the Friday game, Notre Dame blasted the Buckeyes for a 6-1 victory on Saturday night. The Irish played even-paced hockey from there on out, staying right in the thick of every game until the final horn. They even ended the regular season with three consecutive overtime wins, marking a first in program history.
Even though the year ended bitterly with a blowout loss at Michigan in the single-game Big Ten quarterfinal, Sheahan liked what he saw from the stretch run.
“We did make progress in our game,” Sheahan said. “On ice, I think you could see the style of play that we want as a staff, how aggressive we are and our guys [were] starting to figure it out.”
Heading into 2026-27, the Irish return the bulk of their personnel. Cole Knuble, the team’s leading point-scorer in 2024-25, signed with the Philadelphia Flyers to depart after his junior season. Among the five exiting seniors and graduate students, just two or three played key minutes on any given night. And the three losses to the transfer portal combined to dress in only 24 games this past season.
Most importantly, the young, new coaching staff of Sheahan, Mike Garman, Tristan Musser and Andrew Oglevie now knows what a year of coaching this style of Notre Dame hockey entails.
Rising seniors lead returning class
Although Knuble’s NHL signing is an impressive feat, his loss will undoubtedly be felt on the scoring drive for the Irish. Notre
Dame returns two extremely valuable playmakers in junior center
Danny Nelson and junior defenseman Paul Fischer. Both NHL draft picks, the two were captains and ranked among Notre Dame’s top five point leaders in 2025-26.
“Those two are going to be extremely important for us,” Sheahan said.
Another critical rising senior is speedy winger Evan Werner.
At 5-foot-8-inches, the former Michigan Wolverine skates with an engine few players in the Big Ten can match. No player in the Irish blue and gold could offensively heat up quite like Werner last year, and he now has three consecutive 20-point seasons in college hockey after posting a team-best 17-17--34 scoring line in 2025-26.
“I expect [Werner] to hit the ground running and be one of the best players in our conference next year,” Sheahan said.
On Werner’s line, the Irish could potentially bring back another high-impact transfer from Sheahan’s first offseason as head coach. Graduate center Sutter Muzzatti led Notre Dame in assists as an elite playmaker last season, totaling 32 points. With one year remaining in eligibility and no set plans as of yet, he could don the Irish uniform for another year.
Three more double-digit point-getters will be back in the persons of freshmen Cole Brown and Pano Fimis, who got better as the team did late last season, and consistent junior Brennan Ali.
On the back end, the Irish have lost important senior defensemen Axel Kumlin and Michael Mastrodomenico, but expect junior Henry Nelson and sophomore Jaedon Kerr to succeed in larger roles next season. The man behind them, sophomore goaltender
Nicholas Kempf, is in a great spot to take a leap forward. After sitting in a timeshare with the more experienced Owen Say as a freshman, Kempf started every game he was available for the last season. Kempf’s .893 save percentage and 3.55 goals against average weren’t what he expected, but that’s likely more a product of his team’s situation than his play, and the value of the experience he gained as the full-time starter cannot be overstated.
“It was awesome,” Sheahan said of Kempf’s sophomore season. “I know it‘s a tough year result-wise, and we leaned on him and stressed him out a little bit, but I think that all of what he went through this year is gonna set him up to be one of — I still think he‘s one of the best goalies in the game, in college.”
Now, in spite of the strong finish, 2025-26 was still one of Notre Dame hockey’s worst seasons in modern team history. The Irish finished with a single-digit total for the first time since 2004-05, the final year before Jackson took over and massively elevated the program.
Part of that 2004-05 squad was a freshman by the name of Brock Sheahan, who now sees parallels to his current team and his team from two decades ago. Just like the 2025-26 squad, the first-year Jeff Jackson team of 2005-06 found their game in the second half of the season. They’d go on to win a preposterous 33 games in 200607 and reach the national championship game in 2008.
Repeating that level of improvement would be a big ask of the current group, but they’ve got the future in their hands.
“It changed in my time here,” Sheahan recalled. “Enough was enough at some point, and those
guys in the locker room coming back — they‘re gonna drive that.”
Incoming freshmen and portal grabs
Based on confirmed portal activity and Sheahan’s updates from the end of March, we know of eight Irish newcomers who will join the lineup in 2026-27. For now, the four freshmen are forwards Sammy Nelson and Beckham Edwards, defenseman Danny Klaers and goalie Patrick Quinlan. If you’re wondering, yes, there will be three Nelson brothers wearing the Notre Dame sweater next year. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Danny, Henry and Sammy, and it’s a big reason why Danny elected to return to South Bend. Sammy played against his brothers with the United States National Team Development Program in October and ended up posting 19 points in 21 games with the U18s in 2025-26.
Edwards will be the fourth Canadian Hockey League player to join the Irish since the NCAA began allowing CHL prospects last season. He comes off back-to-back 45-point seasons with the Ontario Hockey League’s Sarnia Sting.
The third incoming freshman skater, Klaers, spent the last three campaigns with the Muskegon Lumberjacks United States Hockey League, winning regular-season and postseason championships in 2025.
Quinlan is another USNTDP product who spent last season with Edwards in Sarnia. Like Kempf, he struggled by the stat book in 2025-26, but Sheahan attributes that more to his situation. Quinlan and Kempf both suited up for the NTDP in 2023-24, Kempf for the U18s and Quinlan for the U17s.
Sheahan enjoyed massive
success with his two transfer skaters (Muzzatti and Werner) last season, and he’s got four coming in for next season. Sophomore forward Hagen Burrows has been to two consecutive national title games with Denver, where he won it all in Vegas a month ago. Freshman forward David Klee (North Dakota) and sophomore defenseman Michael Quinn (Miami) also come from NCHC programs and are hoping to create something meaningful in the Irish uniform.
Notre Dame’s fourth portal addition is an in-league transfer from Minnesota, sophomore defenseman Leo Gruba. After playing a combined 77 games in his first two seasons in the Twin Cities, Gruba saw Golden Gopher head coach Bob Motzko fired at the conclusion of 2025-26. He heads to South Bend with the big-game pedigree to make a major impact on the blue line under Sheahan’s guidance.
Overall, Sheahan draws excitement in the group he has assembled for 2026-27, but he knows that a return to the national picture won’t come easily in the always-loaded Big Ten.
“I believe we have the guys in here that want to do it, and the guys that we’ll be bringing in are going to help with that,” Sheahan said. “But it does take time … It’s gonna be day to day, game to game as how we’re playing consistently. That’s going to be the change.”
Notre Dame hockey will open its second season under Sheahan in early October. Expect the nonconference and Big Ten schedules to be disseminated between June and August as Notre Dame prepares for another highly anticipated season.
Contact Tyler Reidy at treidy3@nd.edu
Irish fall short in tourney after special campaign
By Ben Hicks Sports Editor
Despite a gut-wrenching double-overtime defeat at the hands of Ohio State in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, Notre Dame women’s soccer authored arguably the greatest season in program history this past fall. Spearheaded by a mix of savvy veterans and talented underclassmen, eighth-year head coach Nate Norman’s Irish navigated a grueling schedule nearly unscathed, all while earning numerous program and individual accolades.
Norman has overseen staggering success in South Bend, both on the pitch and on the recruiting trail, but perhaps his best work came in identifying and developing the recruiting class of 2024, this past season‘s sophomores. As freshmen, the core of forwards Izzy Engle, Annabelle Chukwu and Ellie Hodsden; midfielder Grace Restovich and goalkeeper Sonoma Kasica steered Notre Dame to the Elite Eight.
That early success, coupled with the consistent presence of seniors Carolyn Calzada, Leah Klenke and Laney Matriano, manifested into sky-high expectations for 2026. In lieu of this, Norman and his staff tried to break down the season to minimize pressure on his group.
“We try to split the season up into miniature seasons with goals. As soon as you start looking at the broad spectrum, you’re like, ‘man, how are we gonna beat Stanford, and Florida State, and Virginia, and North Carolina?’ It can feel overwhelming, but with smaller ‘seasons’ it is easier to navigate,” he said.
Notre Dame started that first “season” with a bang, blitzing through the nonconference portion of its schedule. Aside from a competitive 2-2 draw at No. 6 Arkansas, the Irish outscored their opponents 20-1 across the first six matches of
the season. The ACC, consistently the nation’s deepest and strongest soccer league, didn’t seem to provide much resistance either. Notre Dame’s relentless attack and sound backline ran through opponents big and small, including victories over No. 3 Duke, No. 22 North Carolina, No. 23 Louisville and No. 5 Florida State.
When asked how his team was able to maintain elite form throughout the weekly gauntlet, Norman was blunt, saying, “The reality is we have good players. We have talented players that can win us games and score goals. It‘s having this ruthless mentality where every team you play, you want to impose your will.”
He was especially complimentary of the aforementioned seniors. Matriano was a staple in the midfield, with her keen playmaking ability leading to 3 goals and 8 assists across her final collegiate campaign. “Laney was one of the unsung heroes of our team for the last four years. She always had players around her who would get more of the publicity, but if you look at each
game, she kept our rhythm, helped our tempo, almost like a quarterback for us. She essentially played almost every minute of every game for four years,” Norman said.
His review of Calzada was equally glowing. “We only had Carolyn for a season, but she did a great job bringing stability to the center back. She brought a great energy. Very resilient kid. If we had a tough game, she was always very positive, re-motivating people.”
Despite unassuming statistics, Klenke’s storied career ranks among the all-time best in South Bend. The MAC Hermann Trophy semifinalist and consensus AllAmerican earned All-ACC first team honors for the second straight year to accentuate her legacy. “Leah was very similar to Laney by playing almost every minute of every game. They were both the model of consistency. We moved her all around the field and used her as a versatile player that could do a lot of different things,” Norman stated.
Looking ahead to 2026, Norman believes that “The biggest thing we
have to replace is their leadership.”
At the same time, he is optimistic that the rising junior will carry that mantle forward. “They’ve been good peripheral leaders, but helping them now define what it means when it becomes their team now and they are the vocal leaders. In some ways, they do feel like seniors because they’ve been playing so much from day one,” Norman assessed.
He also noted that Notre Dame can be insulated from the rapid changes occurring throughout college soccer, namely the transfer portal. While not taking a single undergraduate transfer during his tenure, he concurrently sees a significant benefit in roster stability year-over-year. “This is the advantage of not being in the transfer portal. We’re talking about players that really know our program, know the culture of our program, and the model of how we play. You’re not re-teaching things, but you’re tweaking things. You’re optimizing the way you play instead of retooling every single year,” Norman said.
That next wave of Irish leaders is
headlined by Engle, whose two-year accolades include ACC Freshman of the Year, ACC Offensive Player of the Year and Mac Hermann Trophy finalist. The Minnesota native led the ACC and ranked second nationally with 19 goals en route to consensus All-American recognition.
Her partner-in-crime up top was the Canadian, Chukwu, who finished her breakout sophomore campaign with 12 goals and 3 assists to earn an All-ACC first team selection. Along with rising senior Morgan Roy, the backline will be piloted by Kasica and rising junior defender Abby Mills. “Those two are absolutely crucial to our success. They’re the foundation of our team. Abby and Sonoma have been consistent, solid players back there. I think they can become leaders on and off the field to make our team stronger because they are the main communicators and organizers back there,” Norman said of Kasica and Mills.
So as Norman and the Irish turn the page to 2026, he hopes that his talented core of returners can grow from the crushing conclusion to 2025 that late November night against the Buckeyes. “I think the goal is hopefully we learned a lot of lessons from it and grew from it. We did lose some very good players, but we did return a good chunk of our team.”
Norman knows that this group has the makeup of a champion, but that the requisite mindset and leadership are still to be enhanced. “You start doing those things and getting close to those goals and you should set yourself up for a very high seed in the NCAA Tournament. Then, you’re going after that ultimate goal of a national championship,” he concluded.
Contact Ben Hicks at bhicks2@nd.edu
Irish bring impressive season into NCAA quarters
By Jack Muething Associate Sports Editor
After winning two national championships in its previous three seasons, the Notre Dame men’s lacrosse has a chance at a third. The team finished the 2026 regular season 10-1 and won the ACC regular season title. They ultimately fell in the first round of the ACC tournament to the Virginia Cavaliers, heading into the NCAA tournament as a 10-2 team and the No. 2 overall seed.
Notre Dame spent most of its season ranked inside the top 5, spending many weeks as the No. 1 team in the country. The Irish did that on the back of an amazing defense, anchored by junior defenseman Shawn Lyght, a Tewaaraton Award finalist, and senior LSM Will Donovan, who led the team in caused turnovers. Both earned first-team All-America honors from USA Lacrosse, and Lyght is
the first defenseman to be nominated as a finalist for the Tewaaraton Award since Notre Dame’s own Matt Landis was nominated in 2016. Senior goalkeeper Thomas Ricciardelli also had a stellar season between the pipes with 146 saves and a 56.5% save percentage that leads the ACC. The Connecticut native earned second-team AllAmerica honors.
The Irish returned every starter from a defense that had an impressive 2025 season, and head coach Kevin Corrigan emphasized the importance of that defense for this year’s success. “Everyone is growing their own game, but they’re also growing together, and their communication, everything becomes easier and more nuanced,” he said. The defense operated incredibly well as a unit this season, only allowing 8.8 goals per game heading into the tournament, good for seventh-best in the nation.
The Notre Dame offense has also been solid this season, but in a different way than has been customary for Notre Dame lacrosse. In the past few seasons, Notre Dame has had a clear star, and it has oftentimes been someone with the last name Kavanagh. However, the graduation of Pat Kavanagh, the youngest of those brothers, ended that era for the Irish, sparking questions about how the offense would replace them this season. The dense held up, averaging 13.2 goals per game. The offense was led by sophomore Luke Miller and graduate Josh Yago, the latter an honorable mention All-American. Both of them have more than 20 goals this season. Two offensive midfielders in sophomore Matt Jeffrey and senior Will Maheras were also named honorable mention All-Americans, with Maheras collecting 15 goals and 14 assists and Jeffrey adding 15 goals and 8 assists. Addressing the
versatility his offense has, Corrigan said, “That’s become a strength for us, the fact that in any given game, you could pick a handful of guys or more who could be our highest scorer for the day. That comes from a lot of guys playing good lacrosse, not one guy playing great lacrosse.”
The Irish played a tough schedule, especially toward the end of the season, with each of the team’s last six games against programs that qualified for last year’s NCAA tournament. Both losses came at the hands of Virginia, which was ranked No. 5 in the tournament. Despite their Cavalier troublers, the Irish beat five tournament teams this season in Georgetown, Richmond, North Carolina, Duke and Syracuse.
The Irish picked up back-to-back wins against Richmond and North Carolina while each was ranked No. 1 in the country. Corrigan addressed this tough schedule and will help the team in the future,
adding, “We think that for us to be at our best at the end of the year, we need to challenge ourselves throughout the year.”
Notre Dame started their tournament run on Sunday with a dominant 18-5 victory over Jacksonville at Arlotta Stadium. With Johns Hopkins knocking off defending national champion Cornell, it will be a blue-blood battle next week in Hempstead, N.Y., with a Final Four trip at stake. According to Corrigan, the key for success in the tournament is to “be smart and fundamentally sound and play with great energy and a kind of relentless competitiveness.“ The Irish have shown their ability to seriously contend for a national championship, and they will only need three more wins to bring the trophy back to campus.
Contact Jack Muething at jmuethin@nd.edu
ND MEN’S LACROSSE
KEIRA JONES | The Observer
Junior midfielder Morgan Roy strikes the ball during Notre Dame’s 1-0 loss to Ohio State in round two of the NCAA Tournament on Nov. 20 at Alumni Stadium. The top-seeded Irish’s season ended with a 15-2-3 mark.
Hidalgo’s heroics carry Irish to March miracles
By Ben Hicks Sports Editor
The clock inside Fort Worth’s Dickies Arena read 14.2 seconds to play. Notre Dame star junior guard Hannah Hidalgo pointed at the hardwood and told her teammates, “One stop. Right here.” This was the fifth consecutive Sweet 16 appearance for the Irish under Niele Ivey, a national champion as a player under Muffet McGraw. The previous four trips ended right there, but Ivey couldn’t ask for a better scenario with Hidalgo, the nation’s best defender, needing one stop to propel Notre Dame over the hurdle.
In what was an up-and-down season for the Irish, it was only fitting that this Sweet 16 battle with Vanderbilt was an up-and-down affair. Yet, after Ivey and Hidalgo both faced immense criticism following 2025’s collapse, they had just 14 seconds separating them from a March miracle for the history books.
Already sitting on a triple-double of 31 points, 11 rebounds, 10 steals and 7 assists, Hidalgo’s relentless pursuit and energy forced two Commodore misses in those final 14 seconds. As the buzzer sounded, Hidalgo launched the ball in the air and sprinted for an embrace with Ivey at midcourt. “It was such a magical moment,” Ivey said.
That magical moment, with the weight of the world lifted off her shoulders, seemed impossible for Ivey just two months prior, and even a year earlier on the exact same stage. “Every year, I’m thinking, ‘how do I get over this hump?’ It’s really hard getting to the Sweet 16, so you never discredit the work we’ve done, but we definitely had hit
a wall,” she said, looking back on the previous season’s crushing Sweet 16 defeat to TCU.
That 2025 Irish team arguably possessed the greatest collection of talent in program history, yet Hidalgo and senior forward Cassandre Prosper were the only returners heading into this past season. Despite some institutional restrictions, Ivey had to navigate the transfer portal to fill out a competitive roster. “I’ve been here for so long, so I’ve got experience identifying the right type of player that can be successful at Notre Dame. Identifying fit is number one, but you have to find players that value and understand the magnitude of a Notre Dame education,” Ivey stated. She also [needed] positional fit with the voids vacated by stars Sonia Citron and Olivia Miles. “I needed another ball handler — Vanessa [De Jesus] fulfilled that. I needed somebody off the ball that could be a three-level scorer — Iyana [Moore] did that, and brought some SEC experience. And then I needed some depth and versatility in the frontcourt — Gisela [Sanchez] and Malaya [Cowles] did that with the back-to-the-basket presence.”
Looking back at the transfer class as a whole, Ivey asserted, “I thought they all brought a level of culture for us; very much underdogs with a chip on their shoulders. I thought that was complimentary to the three returners that we had.”
Although Ivey was high on her group, the national expectations for Notre Dame were dampened heading into the season. The early reports of Notre Dame’s demise seemed to be accurate, as the Irish were bludgeoned 93-54 by
Michigan on Nov. 15. Following that lifeless performance, the Irish had six days to prepare for No. 11 USC at home. Ivey recounted how her team responded to the Michigan embarrassment, saying, “You have to learn from it. We had to grow from those moments, and I always stress having the right approach of getting better and getting back to work.”
They certainly learned from it, and once again led by Hidalgo’s heroics, the Irish came from behind to stun USC with a 61-59 victory. A game-winning shot with less than two seconds remaining punctuated Hidalgo’s 22 points, 7 rebounds and 5 steals.
Notre Dame steadied the ship to end the calendar year, but a rough start to conference play left the Irish with a 3-6 record at the end of January. Once again having to battle external noise, Hidalgo’s leadership willed the Irish off the NCAA Tournament bubble with a blazing hot February. Hidalgo’s performance on both ends of the court is apparent to all, but Ivey was struck by her off-the-court improvements, saying, “Her maturity and leadership last year was phenomenal. This year, she’s gonna come in with an even bigger hunger because she got that taste of the Elite Eight.”
Following that tumultuous January, the Irish won 12 of their final 15. They knocked off Miami and NC State to reach the ACC Tournament semifinals, and also bested Fairfield and Ohio State before toppling Vanderbilt in the NCAA Tournament. While Hidalgo’s season averages of 25.3 points, 6.9 rebounds and 5.6 steals earned her ACC Player of the Year
and Naismith Defensive Player of the Year, the late-season surge was complemented by many of those ancillary pieces. Prosper finished her season with averages of 13.9 points and 6.5 rebounds, and the 12-3 finish coincided with the return of senior guard KK Bransford from injury.
Ivey attributed the success to her team trusting the process of improvement. “With a new roster, everything takes time. It takes time to trust each, and we started to build that over time, started finding success and stringing wins in a row,” she said.
Although Notre Dame was outclassed in the Elite Eight by the juggernaut UConn Huskies, Ivey is confident heading into 2027, and for good reason. “We have the best player in the country coming back,” she said.
Notre Dame has also hit the portal hard again, as they look to add impact pieces to pair with the star-studded incoming freshman class. “We’ll have depth in different positions. We’ll have size and athleticism with our incoming freshmen,” Ivey said of recent additions, which include Anaya Hardy from Louisville and Madison St. Rose from Princeton.
“We’re hungry. The Elite Eight is inspiring for us. I know that’s motivating Hannah, and our freshmen, and the players that just joined our program. They want to be a part of it, they want to contribute, and everybody’s gonna have the right mindset,” Ivey said.
But before they can return to the madness of March, a summer of work and a winter of consistency will have to precede. The opening
test will be on Nov. 1 in Rome, as both the men’s and women’s programs will head just miles from the Vatican for a doubleheader with Pope Leo XIV’s alma mater, Villanova. “I’m all about having the student-athletes have a great experience while they’re in college and to do things that they normally might not have the opportunity to do,” Ivey said of the trip to Italy.
Once they return to home soil, the Irish will embark on yet another highly anticipated campaign with Niele Ivey and Hannah Hidalgo at the reins. But they don’t view it as pressure; rather, they see it as an opportunity. “The standard is the standard. Every year, there is always the expectation to win championships. I’ve had the opportunity to do that as a player and an assistant. So I don’t think it’s pressure. When you recognize the standard as the legacy you’re a part of, in a way that’s healthy,” Ivey said. She continued to say, “I’m gonna push them in a way that will have them prepared to go into battle. I want it to be intense, but in a healthy way where we focus on the work, focus on the process, and focus on your habits, and the rest will take care of itself.”
That battle will be a six-month process spanning from Rome to Columbus, the site of the 2027 Final Four. And if the rest takes care of itself, Notre Dame will return to its position atop the college basketball world and atop the ladders, cutting down the national championship nets.
Contact Ben Hicks at bhicks2@nd.edu
Irish fencing solidifies spot in the history books
By Chris Dailey Sports Writer
UCLA basketball. Alabama football. UNC women’s soccer. UConn women’s basketball. All are dynasties that have left an indelible mark on collegiate athletics.
After claiming the crown in both men’s and women’s fencing this season, Notre Dame is undoubtedly among them. In the modern era of college sports, Irish fencing’s 16 national championships now trail only Alabama football’s 18 and North Carolina soccer’s 23.
What’s more, they only seem to get better year after year.
Following the Irish’s 2025 title, the NCAA, for the first time since 1989, split fencing into separate men’s and women’s championships, marking a new era for the sport. Led by head coach Gia Kvaratskhelia, Notre Dame captured its 15th and 16th national championships in March.
The Irish have now won 8 of the last 10 national championship offerings — failing to do so only in 2019 and 2024. In 2024, many
on the team were training for the Olympics.
The best part of it all? Notre Dame hosted the 2026 NCAA Championships and had the chance to deliver under the bright lights of Purcell Pavilion.
“It was incredible excitement,” assistant coach Christian Rascioni said of the crowd. He noted that although fencing isn’t the most “visible sport,” opportunities like the NCAA Championships are a prime opportunity for them to grow the game.
With a golden opportunity at hand, Notre Dame met the moment. On the men’s side, junior foil specialist Chase Emmer and freshman epee specialist Kruz Schembri finished in second place individually. Meanwhile, sophomore Ahmed Hesham took home gold in saber – becoming just the fifth Irishman to do so.
In women’s action, sophomore saber specialist Magda Skarbonkiewicz earned silver while senior epee specialist Eszter Muhari won gold for the second year in a row.
Muhari, who missed her sophomore season to train for the Olympics, has won the individual title in all three years she has been able to compete. Her senior year triumph cements her as one of the greatest Notre Dame fencers of all time. A feat made even more impressive when considering the legends that came before her.
“She has an incredible feeling. She has the feeling of the touch, of the timing, and when to execute the right action at the right moment that is really extraordinary – probably one of the best in the world,” Rascioni said. “When the situation is getting tough, she has this incredible ability to tunnel and really focus.”
Muhari’s excellence is the culmination of everything Kvaratskhelia has been building since taking over the program in 2014. Widely considered one of the best coaches in all of intercollegiate athletics, Kvaratskhelia’s passion is unmatched.
“He’s the reason we’re constantly having these back-to-back titles,” Skarbonkiewicz said. “It’s the
character, the grit, the personality and his infectious positive energy he brings in every day. It’s not just a team, it’s a family. One team, one heartbeat is his motto.”
Skarbonkiewicz is no less passionate about the sport of fencing herself. Just as Kvaratskhelia brings the constant energy, so does the superstar sophomore.
“Fencing is, of course, mostly individual, but it’s the ability to bring all her individual energy into the team environment. She’s really the soul of the women’s team,” Rascioni said of Skarbonkiewicz.
If Skarbonkiewicz is the soul, her lifelong friend and classmate sophomore Siobhan Sullivan is the backbone. Sullivan tied for third place in saber, helping the Irish move within reach of a team national championship.
And when it mattered most, it was Muhari who delivered. As Notre Dame and Columbia battled for the crown, she stepped up with a crucial pool-play victory that ultimately secured the title.
“It was amazing to experience
doing it just as a girls’ team and knowing that we earned the trophy a couple days before we originally would,” Skarbonkiewicz said. “Last year, we were the ones that had to close the seasons for both men’s and women’s. This year, we got to do it just for women’s. It’s a really big and empowering step to be able to do it as our team and then also watch the guys do it for their own title.”
The men’s team followed suit with ease. Hesham, Emmer and Schembri starred as Notre Dame ultimately beat second-place Columbia by 10 points.
“We are the most hard-working team in the country,” Hesham said following the National Championship. “Every single one of the individuals that fenced and did not fence put so much effort in every week, and that’s why we’re the best.”
The statistics don’t lie; Notre Dame fencing is the standard of excellence.
Contact Chris Dailey at cdailey2@nd.edu
