Notre Dame football enters 2026 fall camp with one of the deepest defensive lines the program has had in a long time.

The Fighting Irish pass rush, led by defensive end Boubacar Traore, has the potential to be an elite unit. But the secondary pass rushers behind Traore remain the biggest question mark for head coach Marcus Freeman’s defense heading into the season.

That question is the one worth exploring in detail right now, because it carries massive implications for how far Notre Dame can go this year.

The rest of this defense looks locked in.

Notre Dame returns an elite secondary, a great linebacker room, and defensive coordinator Chris Ash showed over the final nine and a half games of last season just how dominant this scheme can be when everyone is clicking. Freeman’s defensive mind gives this group a high ceiling.

The pass rush is the variable that determines whether the ceiling becomes reality.

Boubacar Traore is the clear No. 1

Everybody knows Traore is one of the more talented pass rushers in college football. He recorded 6.5 sacks last year along with a high volume of pressures and quarterback hits, finishing as Notre Dame’s best pass rusher by a steep margin.

The question is who steps up behind him.

To get an impartial look, I ran Notre Dame’s projected top 5 sack leaders through Grok, Twitter’s AI model, to see what the numbers would look like. Grok projected Notre Dame to finish with 40-plus sacks in the 12-game regular season, which would make them one of the most improved pass-rushing units in the country.

Grok’s projected leader was no surprise: Traore at 10 sacks and 45 pressures. That would be a tremendous season. Right now, Traore carries roughly a third- to fourth-round grade around the league for the 2027 NFL Draft. If he posts 10 sacks and 45 pressures, you would think he becomes a substantial riser in next year’s class.

Bryce Young’s breakout potential

The second name Grok projected was Bryce Young at 8 sacks and 40 pressures. I don’t think 40 pressures is realistic, but I’m buying more into a Young breakout as we get deeper into the offseason. If Young is that close in pass rush productivity to Traore, this defensive unit has a chance to be special.

Young is a freaky athlete.

At 6-6, 260 pounds, he’s down about 10 pounds this offseason. He looks more explosive, faster, trimmer. Now he’s working with defensive line coach Charlie Partridge, and there’s every reason to feel great about his ascension as a true junior. Traore is a better player right now, and Traore is very talented in his own right. But Young’s movement skills are on another level. We know his track times coming out of high school. We’ve seen him move on the football field even when he was probably carrying more weight than he should have been.

I’m hopeful, because I have heard a lot of great things about Young this offseason. If this is the year, this defense is going to be special. And if he puts up those kinds of numbers, there’s going to be a serious conversation about him declaring early for the 2027 NFL Draft.

Keon Keely and Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa round out the group

Grok had Keon Keeley third at 6 sacks and 25 pressures. For context, Keely had 3 sacks and 9 pressures with Alabama last year, but he did that in only 167 snaps. That’s a very productive rate on a snap-to-snap basis. With a higher volume of reps at Notre Dame, those numbers should climb significantly.

If he delivers 6 sacks and 25 pressures as the third pass rusher, that represents a substantial improvement in depth compared to 2025, when the No. 2 sack producer, Drayk Bowen, had just 3.5 sacks.

Fourth was Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa at 5 sacks and 22 pressures. Viliamu-Asa is an incredibly versatile linebacker who should be used to rush the quarterback frequently. If he’s fully healthy, and it appears he’s getting very close, 5 sacks and 22 pressures would not shock anybody.

The Drayk Bowen question

The one projection I had some pushback on was Grok’s fifth slot: Drayk Bowen at 4.5 sacks and 18 pressures.

If the defensive ends ahead of him are producing at the levels projected, I just don’t think Notre Dame has to send Bowen as a blitzer at the same rate they did last season. This is not a Bowen criticism. It’s a pass rush usage question. If you have guys posting 10, 8, 6, and 5 sacks, the action-reaction of the game flow probably means Bowen rushes less while other players rush at a higher and more effective rate.

I would have projected Bowen closer to 3 or 3.5 sacks, matching his 2025 production. And I would have loved to see Grok slot Rodney Dunham in with 4.5 sacks instead. That would have been a great freshman year projection for a player with real upside.

If this pass rush performs anywhere close to these projections, this Notre Dame defense has a chance to be one of the best units in the country. The talent is there, the depth is there, and now it comes down to the secondary rushers proving they can produce alongside Traore when the biggest games arrive.