Big picture, bigger plans: Howard Cross III looks forward to 2024 with Notre Dame football

EL PASO, Texas — Sun Bowl trips have become a Cross family tradition.

Former Alabama tight end Howard Cross ended his sophomore and senior seasons with Sun Bowl victories over Washington (1986) and Army (1988). Now his son, second-team All-America defensive tackle Howard Cross III, gets to punctuate this Notre Dame football season with Friday’s Sun Bowl meeting against 19^th-ranked Oregon State.

It’s just the third all-time meeting between the two programs and Notre Dame’s second-ever trip to a bowl that dates to 1935.

“This is the starting point for a very great year,” Cross said before practice on Tuesday afternoon. “I was talking to my dad. It’s like if you want to go into the (2024) season being that guy, this is it. This is where you prove to everybody that you can compete with the best.”

The elder Cross, a sixth-round pick in the 1989 NFL Draft, went on to play 13 seasons with the New York Giants, splitting a pair of Super Bowl appearances. A blocking-first tight end, Cross finished his college career with 41 catches for 459 yards and four touchdowns.

He made one catch for 11 yards as Alabama staged a fourth-quarter rally to clip Army 29-28 in Cross' final college game.

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His son recently announced he would return for a sixth season at Notre Dame, joining multiyear starters Jack Kiser (linebacker) and Rylie Mills (defensive tackle) in what defensive coordinator Al Golden called “an early Christmas present.”

“I still have a lot left in the tank here,” Cross said. “Talking to our coaches, I feel like I can really benefit from one more year. And the other side of that, NFL does stand for ‘Not for Long,’ right? I want to get my master’s done and make sure I get everything I can get done at Notre Dame because it’s a great university.”

Cross plans to complete his Mendoza College of Business work with a master’s degree in nonprofit management.

“I wanted to do science of management, but there wasn’t a lot of time to do that during the season,” Cross said. “So, I stuck with nonprofit management. I like it, I enjoy it. Obviously, it’s a little hard going through a Notre Dame master’s course, but I’m getting through it.”

Cross had just nine career starts before his breakout 2023. He ranks second on the team with 64 tackles, most by an Irish lineman since Trevor Laws’ 112 tackles in 2007.

“Howard, he’s got a big picture of what he wants to achieve the next five years of his life,” Golden said, “starting with getting a master’s in the spring and then being one of the leaders on our defense and then ultimately being one of the best defensive tackles in the country. He’s got big-picture (plans) and he’s not in a rush to do that. He wants to be the best he can be.”

Mike Berardino covers Notre Dame football for NDInsider.com and is on social media @MikeBerardino.

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Notre Dame football defensive tackle Howard Cross III looks to 2024