Notre Dame GM Chad Bowden leaves for Irish arch-rival USC

That promotion followed the 30-year-old son of former Major League Baseball exec Jim Bowden turning down a position with the University of Michigan’s football program last Feb. 1. Bowden also led ND’s transfer portal maneuvers and scoring and evaluation.

John Brice and Scott Roussel of FootballScoop were first with the news and also reported Bowden had been making between $275,000 and $300,000 at ND since his last promotion.

That is until arch-rival USC hired him away from Notre Dame on Friday for a reported $1 million per year, according to FootballScoop.com. USC announced its hiring of Bowden on Friday evening.

Chad Bowden , the man who has orchestrated Notre Dame’s recruiting efforts since Marcus Freeman became head coach in December of 2021 and whose salary, scope of responsibility and even title has continued to grow since then.

With a big recruiting event Saturday designed to stoke the momentum for Notre Dame football and its building 2026 class, suddenly the biggest news is who won't be there.

“That’s why they’ve given them titles of general manager,” longtime recruiting analyst Tom Lemming said. “They’re the ones who make or break a program now. Obviously, you’ve got to develop the kids when you get them. But whoever is the guy who’s in charge of recruiting is the one who has their finger on the pulse of Notre Dame’s direction, north or south, really.

“You look at the great programs, they’ve got great people in that role — and great groups of people under them. This position is just as important as offensive coordinator and defensive coordinator, really, when you look at it.”

Notre Dame is also without a defensive coordinator at the moment, with Al Golden having left for the NFL’s Cincinnati Bengals earlier this week. The Irish finished No. 2 in the polls — AP and coaches — after their four-game playoff run ended with a 34-23 loss to Ohio State, Monday night in Atlanta.

Bowden and Freeman first worked together at the University of Cincinnati, where Freeman was the defensive coordinator from 2017 to 2020. Bowden began there as a recruiting intern. And when Freeman was hired to be Brian Kelly’s defensive coordinator in January of 2021, Bowden came along with him.

Because Notre Dame had hiring restrictions at the time due to the pandemic, Bowden was technically hired as an analyst, but he was essentially in charge of recruiting for the defensive side of the ball. And when Freeman was elevated to head coach after Kelly’s departure 11 months later, Bowden became in charge of the entire recruiting operation as the director of recruiting.

“He’s elite at what he does, and he’s one of the hardest workers I know,” Freeman said of Bowden in December of 2023 on Wake Up the Echoes, a video podcast produced by Notre Dame’s in-house Fighting Irish Media. “There’s times where I’m actually like, envious of the relationships he has with our recruits — maybe even with my kids.

“My kids, when they come to the office, most of the time they say, ‘Hi, Dad.’ They go right into the recruiting office and spend time with Chad and his staff, because they have a unique ability to bring those kids in and communicate and spend time with them.

“That’s trust. Trust is built over time. That’s why I’ve always wanted to work with him. He’s a hard worker. He’s a really good person. Most of the time he has outside the box ideas. He pushes me. Like one of our things is ‘The Golden Standard’. Challenge everything. You talk about a guy that challenges me to think outside of the box to get outside my comfort zone, sometimes I gotta say no. He is a guy that makes me better.”

And now he’s working for an arch-rival.

Notre Dame signed four recruiting classes since Bowden joined the Irish staff. Each of those classes have been ranked No. 11 or better: No. 6 in 2022, No. 11 in 2023, No. 9 in 2024 and No. 11 in 2025. Notre Dame signed two five-star recruits — linebacker Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa and offensive tackle Will Black — and 16 Rivals100 recruits during Bowden's tenure.

Notre Dame’s Junior Day will roll on this Saturday, as Freeman starts another important search.

“I think getting to the national title game and the way they came back in it, really made quite an impression on recruits in the 2026 class and beyond,” Lemming said. “That’s why making the right hire is going to be so important.

“Notre Dame’s name is out there everywhere and on everyone’s lips. It’s a tough time for Chad Bowden to leave, but Marcus Freeman has a very good track record so far of identifying the right people to hire and then bringing them in.”

Click here to read article