​SOUTH BEND — One Notre Dame basketball player with plenty of eligibility (and seemingly options) remaining decided last spring to do something too few teammates with plenty of eligibility (and options) remaining did. He stayed. No sprint to the transfer portal, like more than 2,000 college players did. No hard reset on a college career that didn’t start how he wanted it to start. No second thoughts about flushing everything from a frustrating season and starting over somewhere else. None of that for sophomore power forward Tommy Ahneman, who missed his entire freshman season after left knee surgery in October 2025. Ahneman watched a 13-18 Irish season unfold from the sideline last winter. Then he watched six teammates, all core rotation guys, flee last spring. Ahneman never wavered or wondered. “There was no hesitation,” Ahneman told the Tribune in July. “I didn’t have a reason to leave.” Noie: Why this year already is different for one Notre Dame basketball playerNoie: Sights and sounds from a Notre Dame basketball summer practiceThat didn’t stop programs from trying to contact Ahneman and convince him otherwise. Ahneman thought he had left recruiting behind when he committed to Notre Dame coming clear of his high school junior year where he earned Gatorade Player of the year in North Dakota after averaging 20.3 points, 13.3 rebounds, 1.9 assists and 2.2 blocks for a Sheyenne High team that won a state championship. Ahneman never thought that recruiting door would spin again in the spring. Spin, he reiterated, not by his choice, but by others trying to convince him to spin it. To go here or go there. Go somewhere other than the place he believed he wanted to be — Notre Dame. Ahneman had no idea about the transfer portal, but it didn’t take him long to learn that it’s a whole different world. A world not for the meek. A world maybe not for the better. “As soon as the portal opened, it’s like the (recruiting) floodgates opened,” he said. “Like high school recruiting all over again. It’s a weird time for college basketball.” Ahnman insisted that he didn’t answer any calls. His agent had already put it out that the 6-foot-11, 250-pound Ahneman wasn’t interested. He wasn’t going anywhere. He was staying. The calls still came for someone whose next college basketball game will be his first college basketball game. “Even if you didn’t play, someone’s looking for you,” Ahneman said. “Teams started calling me and saying we’ve got this for you and we’ve got this and this and that and the other. It was weird.” Seeing main guys like Markus Burton and Cole Certa and Jalen Haralson leave was hard, but hearing words from former associate head coach Kyle Getter, who recruited Ahneman to Notre Dame, reinforced his belief in head coach Micah Shrewsberry. In the coaching staff. In the program. In the place. “KG was like, ‘Tommy, you need to stay. This is where you should be,’” Ahneman sa