Notre Dame Football: Former 5-Star Quarterback JT Daniels to transfer away from USC Trojans

On Thursday the USC Trojans, the biggest rival for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, announced that former 5-Star quarterback JT Daniels had put his name in the transfer portal.

Daniels ultimately lost his starting job to freshman Kedon Slovis after he [Daniels] suffered a season ending knee injury early in the 2019 season. Slovis had a terrific season in 2019 going 282-392, 3502 yds, 30 TDs, and 9 INT. Against Notre Dame in a 30-27 loss in 2019, Slovis was 24-35 for 255 yards and 2 touchdowns. In Daniels’ only career game against Notre Dame back in 2018, he was 22-39 for 352 yards, 2 touchdowns and an interception in a 24-17 loss to the Irish.

Southern Cal has seen this type of high-profile quarterback attrition before, but because of their proximity to highly-rated high school quarterbacks — it’s all a part of the process.

Daniels should have been a freshman in 2019, but he reclassified his junior year and was able to start college an entire year early — which saw him become the starter for Troy. What should stick out for Notre Dame fans, is that the extremely talented Trojan wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown was perhaps ultimately swayed to USC rather than Notre Dame in the 2018 class because of Daniels who was St. Brown’s quarterback in high school.

Does any of this really matter to ND? I mean, will any USC quarterback over the next few years be able to hold the Jeweled Shillelagh? The Irish are on a 3 game winning streak over Southern Cal and have won 7 out of the last 10.

Twitter @NDFootball