College football recruiting is as convoluted as ever.
High school prospects aren’t just choosing where they want to spend the next four years of their developmental experience as student-athletes. They’re no longer just signing national letters of intent. They’re signing contracts, as if they’re professionals, with an understanding they’ll need to renegotiate terms with the university annually.
So, on one hand, there is less pressure to put your name on the dotted line because it’s as easy now as it’s ever been to change your mind and move to a new destination at the conclusion of any given season. But there is also precedent for loyalty to shine through and win in the end. The preferred path for any high school senior turned college freshman should still be to stick it out with the same school from start to finish.
That’s the route Thomas Davis Jr. sees for himself.
The No. 18 linebacker in the recruiting class of 2026, Davis Jr. could have chosen to stay in the south — he’s a product of Matthews (N.C.) Weddington High School — and attended any number of powerhouses on the warmer side of the Mason-Dixon Line, from Georgia to Tennessee to LSU. But in a long collection of parameters determining his commitment, geography was low on the list. Davis Jr. was more concerned with his future beyond the time he’ll spend in college. In that case, the institution that most invests in its enrollees as people and players was the one to which he wanted to dedicate himself.
Without question, that institution is the University of Notre Dame.
“The great education there is one thing,” Davis Jr. told The Twins Take Podcast. “They put players in the NFL. They produce great linebackers. And just the people there, some of the best people you’ll meet. It just felt like a family environment and just somewhere I would want to be.”
Going With God
Someone who fit firmly into the category of people Davis Jr. wanted to surround himself with was former linebackers coach Max Bullough. Key word: former.
Bullough was Davis Jr.’s primary recruiter and one of the main reasons Davis Jr. was so sold on Notre Dame. But within days of Davis Jr. signing with the Fighting Irish in December, Bullough took a job at his alma mater, Michigan State.
Davis Jr. won’t ever get to play a down for the coach who was the most influential in him choosing to suit up in South Bend. That’s not something he loses sleep over, though. He’s got a much broader mindset when it comes to the logistics of coaching turnover and whatever other craziness is a given in the sport.
“That happens in college football,” he said. “It’s another thing that, you kind of want to make sure you’re committing to a school and not to a person. You don’t really want to commit based on what kind of staff [is there].
“Coaches in college, they’re kind of similar to us. They want to reach higher goals. If you’re committing because you have a good relationship with this position coach or this defensive coordinator or whatever, they want to be head coaches too sometimes. So you got to commit to a school and not a coach.”
Davis Jr.’s commitment was also heavily rooted in faith and fundamental beliefs. Those are values that’ll always be there no matter what the makeup of a coaching staff is. But they’re not as prevalent at some schools as they are at others.
At Notre Dame, they’re not just prevalent. They’re paramount. It’s a perfect place for someone as intertwined with the church as Davis Jr.
“I can’t go anywhere without God,” he said.
That statement is one Davis Jr. came into close contact with during the COVID-19 pandemic. With nothing else to do and nowhere to go, the Davis family watched sermons together in their living room. Little did Davis Jr. know at the time the living room would become a space of such profound connection to Christ.
His friend, Kamryn Kitchen, invited him to a bible study session after his sophomore year at Weddington. Davis Jr. had a torn up shoulder at the time, and he needed a rejuvenated spirit and something to set him on the right course physically, emotionally, spiritually. All of it.
Bible study was just the thing.
One Sunday with Kitchen turned into every Sunday with a contingent of others from the Charlotte-area community, a movement spearheaded by a pastor’s son Davis Jr. had gotten to know well while growing up. The group’s motto became, “bring a friend.” Ten believers turned into 20 and 40 and so on. Davis Jr. recalls such intense worship assemblies that the floor of his friend’s house would shake.
“Eventually there was 100 people showing up to his house,” he said.
The number is around 500 now, Davis Jr. estimated. The gatherings have moved to a larger warehouse-type space. But they still occur every Sunday evening. Davis Jr. is leaving that behind to pursue his athletic and academic career, but he’s relocating to a place where it won’t be difficult to find folks just like him who put religion at the forefront of daily life — people who can’t live without it. That’s not necessarily found en masse at the other schools he could have chosen, like his father’s alma mater, Georgia. Sure, it’s still big there. But it’s one of many things. At Notre Dame, it’s the main thing.
After all, it is God, Country, Notre Dame.
Creating His Own Legacy
On the topic of Davis Jr.’s dad. Remember one of the first things Davis Jr. mentioned about Notre Dame as it related to why he’d pick the Irish over all of his other options? Notre Dame puts players in the NFL. Thomas Davis Sr. knows a thing or two about the league.
Davis Sr. spent 16 seasons in the NFL from 2005 through 2020. He made it to the Super Bowl with the Carolina Panthers in the 2015 season, the same year he was a First Team All-Pro player. He was the Walter Payton Man of the Year the year before that.
That’s right around the time Davis Jr. was becoming cognizant of his dad’s accomplishments. In the decade-plus since then, he’s wanted to emulate his father. Follow in his footsteps. Therefore, every decision Davis Jr. makes is with wanting to make pops proud in mind.
There aren’t too many moments a parent could possibly be prouder of than when a child is accepted to a program as prestigious as Notre Dame.
As well versed in what it takes to get to the highest level as Davis Sr. is, he knows what a successful college career in South Bend can be parlayed into. The Irish have multiple linebackers from recent rosters currently in the NFL, from JD Bertrand to Marist Liufau to Jack Kiser. There are multiple players on the 2026 Notre Dame roster who could soon say the same, like Jaylen Sneed, Drayk Bowen and Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa.
And Thomas Davis Jr., perhaps? That’s always been the end goal. Notre Dame can help get him there.
“The biggest thing with TJ is he obviously appreciates where he comes from and who his dad is, but he wants to create his own path,” Weddington coach Andy Capone told Blue & Gold. “He’s always been about TJ creating his own path and not using his dad’s name or who his dad is to get whatever he wants. … He wants to create his own legacy.”