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Kaleb Smith Brings Talent And Perspective To The Wideout Room

By John Brice
Special Contributor

Spring semester classes had not yet started at Notre Dame in mid-January, and cold weather, like the snow a month earlier, blanketed the region.

“It snowed,” said Kaleb Smith, “from the second I got here on my official until I left, but I fell in love with here.

“I fell in love with Notre Dame.”

Undaunted by the snow on his official visit in December and likewise disinterested in anything outside of his new football world, Smith – the Fighting Irish’s prized graduate-transfer signee from Virginia Tech – scrolled through his phone to send a text message.

Smith, after all, still had Sam Hartman’s phone number from some half-decade earlier when both players were committed to Wake Forest.

Their paths diverged; Smith went from hard-scrabble Hokies walk-on to team captain before he elected to play his last season of college football in new environs.

Hartman went on to set numerous school and Atlantic Coast Conference records at Wake Forest before he, too, inked with Notre Dame late in 2022 to play his final year of college beneath the arms of Touchdown Jesus.

Effectively, Smith typed “Let’s get this work.”

Soon thereafter, Smith and Hartman unofficially began their Notre Dame football careers inside the cavernous but state-of-the-art Irish Athletics Center.

“Week Zero, maybe, we got here a little bit before everybody else got back, and we were so excited to put on some cleats, break in our new cleats before the first workouts,” Smith said. “So we came out here (to the IAC) and threw a bit.”

How quickly did the two playmakers begin to redevelop their on-field rapport?

“Honestly, probably the first time he threw a ball to me,” Smith said. “It was going again.”

Added Hartman, “Just watching him at Virginia Tech through the years, watching him play, he’s a special athlete. He does a really good job tracking the ball, and I think he’s going to have a big year. I’m excited, and it was great just having a somewhat-familiar face here in a new place.

“I feel like with Kaleb, he’s just going to track the ball well and you just give him a chance.”

Like Hartman, Smith had no shortage of suitors once he elected to exit from Virginia Tech, degree in tow, after his redshirt-senior season.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish - Official Athletics Website

Engaged to Mikayla Mance, a former VT soccer player, the 6-foot-2, 222-pound Smith counseled with his fiancé and parents, James and Kimberly Smith, both former NCAA Division I athletes at the University of Richmond, as he assessed his future plans.

With 42 career games already to his credit, an impending wedding next February and having already clawed his way back from injury that robbed him of his senior season of high school at Patrick Henry High School (Virginia) to become a scholarship player and team captain for the Hokies, Smith hardly reflected the typical NCAA Transfer Portal entrant.

Then again, he had no desire to do so – and he wanted a place, such as Notre Dame, that mirrored his traits on the field and in the classroom.

“As I got older, being a captain at Tech, I wasn’t interested in normal college life,” said Smith, who averaged 15.4 yards-per-catch on 74 career receptions and scored at least one touchdown in each of his four seasons. “My friends say I got engaged fast, but I was just kind of over all that and career focused and ready to that next step.

“It’s cliché-sounding, but it’s that underdog story. My parents were both Division I athletes, and they kind of told me, ‘At the end of the day, you go out and you work for what you want. It’s not always going to be there, but if you keep working towards it, you’ll get to it.’ Once I committed here, I’m wearing that logo and it’s real. I can’t imagine a kid who doesn’t grow up and imagine that iconic Notre Dame helmet and to just be a part of the tradition of college football.”

Here at Notre Dame, after December visits from both new Irish offensive coordinator Gerad Parker and burgeoning star receivers coach Chansi Stuckey, Smith has a simple focus for the ‘Four Portalmen’ of Notre Dame football 2023 – Hartman, Javontae Jean-Baptiste, Thomas Harper and himself – as well as Notre Dame’s bevy of returning, talented playmakers on both sides of the ball.

“We’re both kind of in the same spot, we’ve got one more year to make the best of things,” Smith said of his direct connection with Hartman. “It’s been a tight, close relationship – especially coming here to Notre Dame. I think the group of four transfers have been extremely tight. And anytime Sam wants to come throw, or just getting all acclimated together has been a huge step in that relationship.

“I don’t think anybody commits here to Notre Dame for anything less than a shot at the Playoffs. It’s not an easy goal to achieve, but I feel like everybody here has that mindset, that it’s a realistic opportunity and goal to achieve. We have the talent here to do that.”

Even without anyone around to see, Smith’s been putting that talent on display for two months since his arrival at Notre Dame.