By John Brice
Special Contributor
The entire journey had been a leap of faith.
Paddy Burns grew up playing soccer, entrenched a soccer-centric family, and knew that he wanted to continue his playing career, as well as his education, at the best possible destination.
Site unseen, the Crumlin, Northern Ireland-native penned a letter to Notre Dame coach Chad Riley and the Fighting Irish coaching staff and simultaneously applied for admission to Our Lady’s University.
“I was never actually recruited by Notre Dame; I was actually a walk-on,” said Burns, a junior defender for a Notre Dame program seeking a second-straight College Cup berth and to defend its 2021 ACC crown. “I got in based on my academics, which was a really proud moment for me.
“I e-mailed the coaches and said, ‘Listen, I’d absolutely love to play on your soccer team.’ They took a chance on me and told me I could try to play on the team and since that moment I’ve tried every day to repay the opportunities given to me.”
The journey required all the patience Burns could muster from the very outset. As the world worked to persevere through the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the 2020 calendar year, Burns found his visa process delayed as a result.
He missed the opening days of the Fighting Irish’s soccer workouts.
He was undeterred.
“Probably the best decision I’ve ever made is coming here, I’m just so happy, and that was my first time on campus,” Burns said of his August 2020 arrival. “I was delayed and missed the first few days of preseason because of Covid’s impact on the visa application, and I actually arrived the night before classes on Aug. 9, 2020.
“I didn’t know anybody. I didn’t have any supplies, no way to take notes. I was taking notes on my phone.”
After that initial class, now-senior midfielder PJ Bujouves introduced himself to Burns and, though himself a Toronto, Ontario, native, Bujouves became a steadfast mentor to Burns.
Still, the transition to life at an American university maintained its challenges. Through his first two years, as the world gradually climbed from the depths of the Covid pandemic, Burns never got to experience a stateside visit from his family.
Typically, he spent a couple weeks on Christmas break and a couple more in the summer back home in Ireland.
With their two youngest sons now on Notre Dame’s picturesque campus, including freshman Malachi, and their oldest son, Bobby, back home playing…