97 days until Notre Dame football: Why Gabriel Rubio could break out in 2023

BlueandGold.com will release a countdown article highlighting a significant Fighting Irish football statistic every day until the 2023 Notre Dame season opener against Navy in Dublin, Ireland, on Aug. 26. Today, there are 97 days until the Fighting Irish and Midshipmen kick off at Aviva Stadium.

If you’re looking for a guy who wasn’t Notre Dame’s best player at his position in 2022 but could catapult into that conversation in 2023, you don’t have to look very hard to find a candidate. There is one who stands out with a middle bar face mask, plenty of eyeblack and a big 97 on his jersey.

It’s Gabriel Rubio.

Rubio’s rise wasn’t immediate. He didn’t play during his freshman season until the Fiesta Bowl vs. Oklahoma State. He didn’t appear at all in last year’s season opener vs. Ohio State. He played 10 or fewer snaps in six games thereafter.

But in what felt like a low point in the year for the Irish as a whole, Rubio found himself personally. He played a career-high 44 snaps in Notre Dame’s home loss to Stanford. He received a Pro Football Focus grade of 74.9, which was his third-highest mark of the season. He played a combined 12 snaps in his top two graded games.

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Jayson Ademilola had a heart and soul quality about him on and off the field. He will be missed in the middle of the Notre Dame defensive line. But Rubio has some fire to him, too. He’s the son of a former NFL player. Competition has always been widespread in the Rubio household. You can’t pull off a middle bar and enough eyeblack to cover a small child’s entire body without it.

And like Rubio’s father, who endured a gruesome leg injury but still managed to play professionally for 10 organizations in the NFL and Arena Football League for nearly decade, Rubio is having to work for everything in his career. Nothing has been handed to him. He sat behind older players on the depth chart for the better part of two seasons. Even at the end of 2022, he was not yet a focal point of the Notre Dame defensive line rotation. He was a part of it, but he wasn’t on Ademilola’s level.

That might change this fall.

Not every player is going to be a star right away. Most never make it to stardom. But for many players, junior year is one that shows what the next two years could look like. Rubio is on the cusp of being a big-time contributor.

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