Notre Dame has finished up 12 sets of fall camp practices following a full media viewing workout inside the stadium on Saturday. As we head towards the home stretch of camp before the opener at Louisville here’s the top story lines surrounding the Irish football team.

The Receiving Corps is Thinned Out

Bad injury news struck again as Michael Young reportedly broke his collarbone and joins tight end Cole Kmet with the same injury. It’s a big blow to two out of the top 4 projected pass catchers heading into the season. To begin the season we should see a ton of passes to be thrown towards Claypool and Finke, even more than expected. Not the worse thing in the world, particularly as Claypool had one of his best performances to date on Saturday.

This does open up the question as to who will start the season at the outside “X” position left vacant by Young. By all accounts, Lawrence Keys has been the fourth best receiver during camp but at a hair over 5’10” he’s unlikely to see a bunch of time anywhere but the slot.

Normally in these situations, the offense could rely more on two tight end sets but with Kmet’s injury that seems less than likely.

Still Waiting for a Running Back Breakout

In my last practice report I briefly mentioned that Jafar Armstrong wasn’t taking off as the unquestioned starter at running back in a way that was obvious to the media. In fact, through 12 practices it seems like Armstrong is the 1B option to Tony Jones as much as the other way around.

Sometimes the reports are coded and other times not. This group just does not exude much confidence in their ability to be explosive which doesn’t come as too much of a surprise knowing what we did about the group heading into camp. This offense could really, really use 2020 recruit Chris Tyree in the mix right now. Can he reclassify in the next couple weeks?

This is where the receiver injuries hurt a lot more. We are expecting a ton of throws this fall and early in the season I’m not sure the running backs are ready to see an increase in touches before Kmet and Young return. This isn’t the first time Tony Jones has received a lot of praise during practices, I’m still not sure I’m ready for him to carry the ball 15 times in Athens and expect a top offensive performance.

Jurkovec’s Development is Humming Along

It’s been several practices in a row–plus plenty of praise from Brian Kelly–all pointing toward the good news that Phil Jurkovec is now officially comfortable enough to be a quality backup level quarterback. The wobbly passes are severely reduced, accuracy is improved, and his deep passes still look awfully nice.

It would be unwise to even think about a quarterback controversy at this point. However, as much as Ian Book has the starting job locked down we can say Jurkovec has reduced the gap to a considerable degree. That gap may still be quite large yet Jurkovec has to be gaining a ton of confidence while knowing he can stay patient this year and keep developing in this backup role.

This might be the biggest story line for the offense during camp.

We May Have a Starting Lineup at Linebacker

While rotation continues to define the linebacker corps during practice it’s been a while since Drew White and Asmar Bilal weren’t opening workouts as the starters at the inside positions. It’s probably to the point now where it would be a late surprise if White (Mike), Bilal (Buck), and Owusu-Koramoah (Rover) weren’t trotting out against Louisville together.

The biggest question from here on out is how much rotation there will be used during games. Both Jack Lamb and Shayne Simon seem like they are in the mix. Backup Rover Paul Moala is too although he just had thumb surgery and according to Brian Kelly will be back early this upcoming week.

Crawford & Hamilton Could be the Duo We Need

While we’ve been watching Kyle Hamilton turn into a stud during practice I’m dreaming of a situation where Shaun Crawford can stay healthy all season, return for a 6th year in 2020, and pair up with Hamilton to start at safety. I’m already chalking this up as one of the biggest needs for a year from now.

This does point out by the way that while Gilman and Elliott give the Irish their best pair of safety starters in a long time the depth being built by Hamilton and Crawford makes this position as strong for 2019 as I can remember over the last 30 years or longer. One of the interesting bits from the off-season Notre Dame Hall of Fame Pyramid was how few safeties made the list. It’s possible the top 3 for this fall will all be on the Pyramid when there Irish careers are over, so that’s pretty cool.

By the way, Hamilton was “only” the 60th best prospect for 2019 according to the 247 Sports Composite. Right now, how many of the players above him would you bet he’ll have a better career than? You could talk me into as many as 50 as the early returns on Hamilton have the fingerprints of a future Jim Thorpe Award winner.