Notre Dame men’s basketball already has a face of the program in Markus Burton. The local product of Penn High School in nearby Mishawaka, Ind., lived up to his 2023 Indiana Mr. Basketball title in his freshman season at Notre Dame.
Burton set a program scoring record for freshmen with 577 points and finished third nationally amongst Division I freshmen with 17.5 points per game.
Notre Dame head coach Micah Shrewsberry may have landed the next face of the program Wednesday when four-star recruit Jalen Haralson announced his commitment to the Irish. Haralson, a 6-foot-6, 205-pound senior at La Porte (Ind.) La Lumiere School, picked Notre Dame ahead of fellow finalists Indiana and Michigan State. Haralson was previously considering Auburn, Duke, Gonzaga, Kansas, Missouri and Purdue as well.
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Rivals ranks Haralson as the No. 6 small forward and No. 17 overall in the 2025 class. If his overall ranking holds, Haralson would become the highest-ranked men’s basketball recruit to sign with Notre Dame since Rivals started numerically ranking prospects in the 2003 class.
Point guard J.J. Starling, who transferred to Syracuse following his freshman season at Notre Dame, is the highest-ranked Notre Dame signee to date at No. 22 overall in the 2022 class. Starling also finished his high school career at La Lumiere.
"Haralson is all of 6-foot-6, and his defining trait is versatility,” said Rivals basketball recruiting director Rob Cassidy. “He’s a proven shot creator that can function as a point forward of sorts thanks to his ball-handling ability and fluidity. He's also well suited to play a small-ball four if the situation calls for it.
“He had a bit of an up-and-down summer shooting from long range so it will be nice to see him improve from deep. That said, his physical tools suggest he could be a box-score-stuffing type of player down the road thanks to his offensive game and the fact that he is already an impressive positional rebounder."
Haralson, an Indiana native who started his high school career at Fishers (Ind.) High outside of Indianapolis, has been considered a national-level recruit for the better part of two years. Maryland and Indiana were the first programs to offer him a scholarship in 2021 prior to his first high school game. His recruiting profile only grew from there. Michigan State offered Haralson the following summer. Notre Dame’s offer came in April 2023 shortly after Shrewsberry was named head coach to replace Mike Brey.
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Haralson continued to play for Indy Heat on the Nike EYBL circuit this year. That’s where he teamed with four-star power forward Brady Koehler, an Indianapolis Cathedral product who committed to Notre Dame on Monday. Koehler, ranked No. 111 overall in the 2025 class by Rivals, and Haralson both made official visits to Notre Dame on the weekend of Sept. 7.
In games played in April and May, Haralson averaged 21.2 points, 7.3 rebounds and 2.9 assists per game for Indy Heat. Haralson also played in June and July on the USA National Team at the FIBA U17 Basketball World Cup in Turkey. Haralson averaged 11.1 points, 4.0 rebounds and 2.3 assists in 15.0 minutes per game for the gold medal winners.
Beating Indiana and Michigan State for Haralson is a massive victory for Shrewsberry and his staff. The in-state ties of Shrewsberry and assistant coach Ryan Owens have been valuable as they try to make ground in a state filled with basketball talent. Shrewsberry attended Indianapolis Cathedral and played basketball at Hanover College, a Division III program in the state. He’s coached at several colleges in Indiana prior to Notre Dame as well: Purdue, Butler, IU South Bend, DePauw and Wabash. Owens played at Southern Indiana and coached at DePauw. He also spent time coaching with the Indy Heat and the Indiana Elite AAU program.
Notre Dame’s big recruiting week could continue Friday when four-star small forward Ryder Frost announces his commitment decision. The Exeter (N.H.) Phillips Academy product made his official visit to Notre Dame on the same weekend as Haralson and Koehler. Rivals ranks Frost as the No. 27 small forward and No. 96 overall in the 2025 class. Iowa, Michigan, Penn State, Syracuse, Virginia Tech and Wisconsin are Frost’s other finalists.
The Irish are also expected to host a pair of official visitors this weekend: three-star center Tommy Ahneman from St Paul. (Minn.) Cretin-Derham Hall and unrated but coveted power forward Tre Singleton from Jeffersonville (Ind.) High. Ahneman, originally from North Dakota, has been focused on five schools: Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Notre Dame and Wisconsin. Singleton, who played for Indiana Elite, has been mostly focused on six schools: Clemson, Louisville, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Purdue and Virginia.
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