‘The whole package’: How Notre Dame WR Jordan Faison earned a scholarship so quickly

The Notre Dame men’s lacrosse coaching staff was sitting around a dinner table in Washington D.C. on the evening of Oct. 7. The topic of conversation was not about any of the players that were with them back at the hotel in the nation’s capital for a scrimmage that weekend but rather a player who will soon join them on such road trips once football season is over.

Fighting Irish wide receiver Jordan Faison.

“We had just been talking about the fact that we had heard rumblings that Jordan was going to play this week,” Notre Dame men’s lacrosse head coach Kevin Corrigan told Blue & Gold Illustrated.

Faison, who showed up at Notre Dame earlier this year with a lacrosse scholarship but left Louisville, Ky., on that early October night with one for football, did more than just play for the Irish.

He shined.

Faison caught a 12-yard zone-beater for a first down on third and eight. Two plays later, he ran a slot corner for a 36-yard touchdown. Faison burned right by Louisville defensive back Jarvis Brownlee Jr., tracked the ball over his left shoulder and followed it into his mitts in stride. He caught it just inside the five-yard line and paced into the end zone.

From snap to goal line, which took roughly five seconds, Faison looked like the most athletic guy on the field. All 5-10, 182 pounds of him.

Corrigan could have told you he had that in his relatively lender frame. He saw it first-hand in the recruitment of Faison to what is now a national championship men’s lacrosse program at Notre Dame.

“There wasn’t any question he was athletically gifted,” Corrigan said. “He’s just got good quickness and explosiveness. Just a very athletic presentation.”

Iowa sent Faison his only scholarship offer for football. Penn State and Michigan State showed interest, but they never offered him. That was partly because he was injured for a good chunk of his junior year. As a senior at Ft. Lauderdale (Fla.) Pine Crest, Faison ran for 1,661 yards and 23 touchdowns on 143 carries. He also passed for 280 yards and 6 scores.

He was already committed to Notre Dame to play lacrosse at that point. When the Big Ten came calling, Faison had Corrigan talk to Notre Dame football coach Marcus Freeman about the possibility of preferred walk-on status.

“Thankfully, the conversation was, ‘Coach, I’m getting attention from other schools but I really want to go to Notre Dame,’” Corrigan said. “‘And I really do want to play lacrosse and football if I can.’”

Corrigan said Freeman had no quarrels with the situation. Faison was granted his PWO opportunity. It only took seven weeks of his first football season to shed it. NCAA rules mandate that as soon as a two-sport athlete steps onto the football field, his scholarship switches over to football form from whatever it was previously. That comes with more financial aid.

Much more.

“Money-wise, yeah, it was definitely a good feeling,” said Faison, who rubbed his thumbs and fingers together like Johnny Manziel used to do immediately after scoring.

Former Notre Dame walk-on wide receiver Matt Salerno told him to do that. It took Salerno 35 games to catch his first and only touchdown pass and five full seasons to earn a scholarship. Faison knocked out both accolades in his first ever collegiate action.

He wasn’t just any walk-on. Notre Dame has a true weapon in Faison. Everyone in South Bend has seen it since fall camp.

“He’s been a talented individual from the moment he stepped on this campus,” Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said.

“He was routing dudes up, running by them, and I’m like, ‘Dang, this kid can run,’” Notre Dame junior tight end Mitchell Evans added. “He’s a baller. He’s fast, quick, shifty. He’s got the whole package.”

It begs the question, why didn’t he see the field sooner? It took hamstring injuries to junior Jayden Thomas and freshman Jaden Greathouse for the Notre Dame coaching staff to work Faison into the fold. It’s not like he wasn’t this fast and didn’t possess this sort of playmaking ability from the start of the season.

“I definitely felt like I was doing good in the preseason and all through fall camp,” Faison said. “But it’s more of a thing where it’s like, I’m just humble and just keep trying to get better no matter what the situation you’re facing.”

Notre Dame knows for sure what Faison is capable of now, and hamstring injuries tend to be as nagging as any. In a Notre Dame offense desperate for anyone to be an option for quarterback Sam Hartman, why not let it be Faison — the curly-headed kid who was pinching pennies on a lesser scholarship a few weeks ago but is now enjoying the full treatment of everything being a Fighting Irish football player entails.

Corrigan won’t get his hands on Faison until next semester, but he knows what the Notre Dame football staff is working with until he does.

“He’s very competitive and skilled and just knows how to create havoc,” he said.