Notre Dame football: Fighting Irish lose top receiver to injury

Notre Dame football wide receiver Kevin Austin suffered a fractured foot but the hope is he won’t have to miss too many games due to the injury.

As preparations are being made by individual teams and conferences in hopes that they will be able to carry out an altered college football season this fall, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish are in a very peculiar spot.

The Irish are an independent program that is not officially members of any football conference but is aligned with the ACC. With all Power 5 conferences either significantly cutting down non-conference games or canceling them altogether, Notre Dame was brought into the ACC schedule and will only play one out of conference game. The Notre Dame football schedule will be released on Thursday, Aug. 6.

On top of having to play an unusual schedule, which includes a matchup against a very talented Clemson squad, the Irish were dealt a major blow to their receiving core with junior wide receiver Kevin Austin fracturing his foot.

Austin recently had surgery but could be back later in the season

After suffering the injury in late July, Austin had surgery on Aug. 3 and is expected to fully recover in about six weeks. That timeline, along with the delayed start to the college football season means Austin may not have to miss too much game action. In a normal season, he would likely have missed a chunk of games.

Austin saw the field right away as a freshman in 2018 where he caught five passes for 90 yards. He was then expected to take a step forward last year but was suspended for the entire 2019 season for violating team rules.

Despite having limited playing time, many had high expectations for Austin in 2020, including former Notre Dame wide receiver Chase Claypool who said that Austin is a “special talent.”

Coming out of high school, Austin was a very highly regarded prospect and was rated as a four-star wide receiver by 247Sports. And many thought that he would finally be able to show off his talent with the Irish.

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