Notre Dame Football: Mitchell Evans Lands Spot on 2024 Mackey Award Watch List

Fighting Irish senior Mitchell Evans has been named to the 2024 Mackey Award Watch List which annually honors college football's most outstanding tight end.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish tight end Mitchell Evans (88) pulls in a pass that he took to the end zone for the game winning touchdown with just over a minute and a half to play in the game. The University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish took on the University of South Carolina Gamecocks in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl game in Jacksonville, Florida's TIAA Bank Field Friday, December 30, 2022. The first half ended with South Carolina holding a 24 to 17 lead but Notre Dame came back and with a late fourth | Bob Self/Florida Times-Union / USA TODAY NETWORK

Notre Dame's Mitchell Evans is one of the nation's premier pass-catching tight ends entering the 2024 season. The Mackey Award, which annually honors college football's best tight ends, agreed by naming the Fighting Irish senior to its preseason Watch List.

Evans was playing like a Mackey Award contender last year, his first as a starter. He had caught a team-high 29 passes for 422 yards and a TD, and he was peaking as an offensive weapon. Unfortunately, that breakout season ended prematurely on Oct. 28 when he suffered a serious knee injury in a rout of Pitt. The 6-5, 260-pound Wadsworth, OH native has been rehabbing that knee ever since.

The good news for the Irish offense is Evans is healthy again this summer and ready to pick up where he left off last fall. He has the sure hands, experience, and frame to add another chapter to Notre Dame's growing legacy as Tight End U. Now he just needs to stay healthy after missing parts of the last two seasons and build rapport with first-year ND QB Riley Leonard.

The Mackey Award was established in 2000 and is named in honor of legendary Syracuse and Baltimore Colts Hall of Fame tight end John Mackey. Georgia's Brock Bowers, a first round pick of the Las Vegas Raiders in April, was the recipient of the award in each of the last two seasons. Evans is looking to become just the second Notre Dame player to capture the Mackey. Tyler Eifert, another first-rounder who spent eight years in the NFL, won the award in 2012.

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