David Shanahan’s unconventional journey from Ireland to Atlanta and back

Week 0 bout Georgia Tech And Florida State The match, to be held at Aviva Stadium in Dublin, Ireland, will be played at a neutral venue for all players from both teams — except for the Yellow Jackets’ punter. David Shanahan,

Shanahan is from Castleisland, County Kerry, Ireland and is believed to be the first Irish native to be awarded a full scholarship to play American college soccer. On August 24, he will have the opportunity to play for his home country.

“I’m excited that the kid has a chance to go home,” Georgia Tech head coach Brent Key said. “It’s exciting any time a kid goes back home, especially when it’s so far away from here.”

When he arrived at Georgia Tech, Shanahan — now a senior — thought there was a remote chance he would be able to play a game in Ireland, but figured the odds would be slim since Georgia Tech had already played in Ireland in 2016. But during spring ball in 2022, Shanahan recalled Key called him up during practice and asked him “cryptic” questions about Ireland.

“Usually he’s yelling somewhere on the O-line. He doesn’t really interact during practice,” he said. “I figured it out after a while because I knew the game was coming up and I knew they hadn’t announced any fixtures for 2024. But eventually he told me, and I was like, ‘Oh, that’s so weird.'”

Shanahan took a circuitous route to American college football. Growing up, rugby and Gaelic football were his main sports. He compared the passion people in Ireland have for Gaelic football to the passion people in the US have for American football.

“When you’re 15, you train really hard, you work really hard in the gym,” he said. “I’m from Kerry, so every town in Kerry would have their own club, and then the best players from their club would play for their county. So I was playing for the county underage squad.”

Shanahan was a member of the Kerry U17 Gaelic football “panel” that won the 2017 Munster Championship (the national title of Gaelic football) at U17 level. But as he approached adulthood, Shanahan’s passion for the game waned and he began looking for a new challenge.

“I felt there wasn’t much excitement there. Because I think, ‘Well, the best case scenario would be that I grow up and play for Kerry and never leave my hometown’ or something. It’s something that doesn’t really excite me that much.”

Instead, he got involved in American football. The mechanics he had learned were quite useful for the American game, so Shanahan felt he could make the jump. “Obviously the skill set worked,” he said. “I tried kicking for a while, but it didn’t really come as naturally as punting. But despite saying that punting was really hard, it took me a while to get really good at it, to get consistent at it.”

Shanahan realized he needed to take certain steps to reach his full potential. He gives a lot of credit to his parents, Jack and Eliza, who believed in him and encouraged him to move forward.

“I was 18, and I thought, ‘Guys, I want to go to Australia, to the other side of the world, to the suburbs of Melbourne, and play football for a year to try and get a scholarship to the US.'”

Over the past decade, Australia has emerged as the unexpected home to many of football’s best punters. The main reason for this is Prokick Australia in Melbourne, an academy founded in 2007 by Nathan Chapman, an Australian rules footballer who played three preseason games for the Green Bay Packers in 2004. Prokick has produced six of the last seven Ray Guy Award winners and four current NFL punters. Shanahan felt that if he wanted to make it in high-level American football, he would first have to go in a different direction across the world.

“I worked, saved money and did other things. But (my parents) agreeing to this and fully supporting me is probably something that’s a little bit overlooked, how much of a commitment it was on their part – just like mine – that their youngest son was going halfway around the world to a country they’ve never been to before, and he’s doing a job they know nothing about.”

Shanahan worked on his family farm, in his father’s pharmacy, took the money he had saved from past birthdays, his First Sacrament and his Confirmation and used it to move to Melbourne in late August of 2019. But he was ultimately forced to fly back to Ireland to quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Shanahan, his brother Rob and their parents were together at their home for the quarantine. They converted their shed into a gym where the brothers would work out. After finishing work in the shed, David and Rob would walk 20 minutes to their farm behind their house, kick back for 2.5 hours and head back home.

“Honestly, I had a great time during COVID,” he said.

While he was honing his skills on the farm, Prokic’s team was trying to find a landing spot for Shanahan. He compared the process to ordering a pizza.

“The coach calls them up, tells them, ‘We want a guy who can do this, this and this.’ And then they look at their group of guys and see which guy would fit here. So they come to you and say, ‘Hey, this school is interested in finding somebody. Would you be interested in going here if they gave you a scholarship?’ And if you say yes, and they give you a scholarship, that’s where you’re going to go. There’s no going back.”

Shanahan said he was talking to some ACC schools, and then one Tuesday morning, he woke up to a message from Prokick coach John Smith.

“He said, ‘Hey, we’re going to be talking on Zoom with Georgia Tech tomorrow. I bet you’d be interested in moving here?’ I said, ‘Yeah, absolutely.’

“Then they sent them all of my film, and then probably three or four days later I got a text saying, ‘You’re committed to Georgia Tech.’ It happened pretty quickly.”

Shanahan announced his commitment to Tech on May 15, 2020. He was scheduled to arrive in Atlanta in January of 2021, but due to the extra COVID year, he was told there would be no scholarships available until May.

He wanted to continue working on his skills in the meantime, but couldn’t return to Australia due to COVID restrictions. Shanahan’s coaches at Prokick advised him to meet with Tom Hackett – a two-time Ray Guy Award winner and Prokick alumnus – to get a chance to move forward. Shanahan traveled to Utah, worked on his game and eventually ended up in Atlanta. He played his first American football game for the Yellow Jackets against Northern Illinois on September 4, 2021.

Just getting on the field was an accomplishment, but Shanahan still had growing to do, especially when it came to understanding the game and situational punting.

“It was definitely an adjustment,” he said. “I can always sit back and boot the football, but it’s probably more of a situational thing, like when the rush is coming, when you have to unload it, when you have to cut your stride short when you’re behind in the end zone, and the dog punts.

“Obviously, a lot of the situational stuff, I definitely wasn’t good at it as a freshman, and I would just go out there and swing my leg and hope for the best. But that’s something that has come from experience, and the coaches have been really good at helping me with all of that. But I feel like I’ve pretty much learned everything now. I’ve been doing it for a long time.”

The adjustments on the field are important, and Key emphasized that this is not something that can be overlooked in Shanahan’s journey. But Key also praised Shanahan for making adjustments to everything off the field.

“The transition to living here, the transition to academics, he’s never looked back, and it’s never been something that’s been a struggle for him,” Key said. “Other than his accent, he gets along with everybody.”

The Aer Lingus College Football Classic will mark the first time Shanahan’s family will play together. Each player was given two tickets for family and friends, but Shanahan was able to get some tickets from his teammates and his father bought 20 additional tickets, giving the family at least 40 total seats by Shanahan’s estimate.

Besides being excited to have his family in attendance, Shanahan is looking forward to introducing his teammates to the local breakfast.

“It’s blood pudding,” he said. “You might think it’s sausage, but it’s not really sausage. Coach Key didn’t like it at all. I asked our nutritionist yesterday, ‘We’re having pudding, right?’ And she says, ‘Coach Key said he doesn’t want to see it at all.’ I thought, ‘What are we doing here?’ But I’m going to sneak in some blood pudding.”

“He can offer them whatever he wants,” Key said. “I’ll stay away from it. I’ll have my eggs and grits.”

That’s OK. Shanahan has some less offensive things he’d like to show his teammates and coaches: “There are a couple of bars in Dublin I’d love to take them to if we win.”