Key Players Stepped Up In Crucial Moments For Notre Dame Against Miami

We're heading into the home stretch of the 2026 regular season and the final 12-team College Football Playoffs will be here before you know it. As teams head into their final three to four games of the regular season, they're having to reach further and further into the depth chart due to injuries. This past weekend, we saw Notre Dame have to call upon, and rely on, some key depth pieces in their outstanding 31-24 win over the Miami Hurricanes. 

With key injuries on defense to players like safety Brauntae Johnson, middle linebacker and two-time captain Drayk Bowen, defensive tackles Jason Onye and Francis Brewu and cornerback DJ McKinney, the Irish had to rely on key players at every level of the defense. Two of those players were in the trenches in defensive tackles Armel Mukam and Tionne Gray. Gray and Mukam both played, arguably, their best game in Notre Dame uniforms and it showed on Saturday night. 

"Tionne really probably played his best game since he's been here, and we needed him," head coach Marcus Freeman shared. "He did a great job of really demanding double teams in a run game, holding point. Armel played extremely well, played aggressively. We needed them to step up just with the loss of Brewu and Jason. We needed them to play more, and we needed them to step up and play big and I feel like they did a really good job at doing that."

Notre Dame's defensive line did their job getting after the quarterback and limiting the Miami rushing attack. They were a dominant unit in the first half and played a major role in the Irish jumping out to a 24-3 lead in the 4th quarter. But Gray and Mukam weren't the only players who stepped up.

The Fighting Irish secondary was already banged up, and during the game, star cornerback Leonard Moore left with an injury but would later return. In his place, sophomore Mark Zackery answered the call. His performance was far from perfect, but his presence on the field truly showcased Notre Dame's depth on the back end.  

"Part of his issues from the game were technique," Freeman explained. "We got to play with better technique. This is no different than a quarterback, right? Not all the plays that were caught on him were actually his fault. We got to help him with our safety play at times, but also continue to mix up those calls. We should’ve identified probably a little bit earlier that they're trying to go after the guy that hasn't been playing. Let's give him a little bit of relief and be able to adjust, which we ended up doing."

Zackery has some things he'll have to improve on, but there's several teams across the country that wish they could insert a Mark Zackery-type of player into the game if their star player goes down with an injury. The Indianapolis native wasn't the only younger player who stepped up Saturday night either. Offensively, senior wide out Jaden Greathouse was dealing with a rib injury in the second half which meant Ohio State transfer Mylan Graham needed to step up in the biggest moment of the season.

Graham had yet to get going for the Fighting Irish offense this season, but when the No. 1 team in the country comes to town, everyone has to be at the top of their game and Graham's performance against the Hurricanes didn't disappoint. He ended the night with three catches for 32 yards and all were in crucial spots. 

"I thought Mylan did an excellent job of what he was asked to do," Freeman stated. "Mylan has had two of the toughest catches, like in terms of getting hit, that I've seen all season. He's a tough dude, and he was really consistent, played really, really well. It's a reflection of being prepared for an opportunity that sometimes you don't know is coming. I said this last week about Jerome Bettis. It's one thing to be ready for an opportunity you know that's coming. It's another thing to be ready for an opportunity that you don't know when it's coming, but you believe it's coming and that's what Mylan was able to do."

When you take down the No. 1 ranked team in the country, you need everybody. Your 'dudes have to be dudes' but you also need players like Graham, Zackery, Gray, Mukam and several others to step up across the board and they did. This was a team win and one that should propel this program to its second appearance in three seasons to the College Football Playoffs. 

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