For the most part, Notre Dame football fans know who the starters are going to be when head coach Marcus Freeman and the Fighting Irish open the 2026 season at Lambeau Field against Luke Fickell and the Wisconsin Badgers. 

The starting quarterback is known. The running backs are set. The wide receiver rotation is mostly figured out. Left tackle, right tackle, left guard, and the majority of the defense are all accounted for. Even some position battles, like defensive tackle, feature a projected five- to six-man rotation where it doesn’t matter much who gets the first snap.

But at right guard, it does matter. And the position battle that has unfolded throughout fall camp has been one of the strangest to watch heading into the season.

Charles Jagusah’s absence started the chain reaction

If Notre Dame offensive guard Charles Jagusah is healthy, he is the starting right guard for this team, and I don’t even think it’s debatable. He is that talented of a football player. 

With Jagusah still dealing with a humerus injury that led to an infection and subsequent nerve issues, there is no firm timetable for his return, and it remains unclear when or if he will suit up again for Notre Dame.

Once Jagusah went down, the natural assumption was that redshirt junior Sullivan Absher would step in. Absher is a known commodity. He filled in and started a lot of games last season, and I thought he was a very solid right guard for the Irish. 

But the player I continuously heard about behind the scenes, even when there was availability to talk to offensive line coach Joe Rudolph and some of the other coaches, was redshirt freshman Matty Augustine.

Augustine is a player I was extremely excited about going into the fall. At 6-8, 310 pounds, the young lineman had been generating buzz throughout the offseason. 

The vibes I’ve always gotten about this staff, based on conversations and actions rather than anything told to me directly, suggest that Notre Dame likes Absher but may not love him as a full-time starter on the offensive line. They seem to prefer him as a high-quality depth piece and swing player who can man both guard spots and slide to tackle in a pinch. That dependable, solid nature is what Absher brings to the table, and I think that’s where the staff ultimately wants him.

Augustine, however, suffered a broken foot (fifth metatarsal) during camp and is expected back early in the 2026 season. Missing the majority of fall camp obviously hurt his opportunity to win the starting job for the opener against Wisconsin. There is a firm possibility that Augustine starts at right guard at some point this season, but the position battle was effectively put on hold the moment he went down.

The Ashton Craig wrinkle

My initial assumption was simple: one of the two candidates got hurt, so the other one starts. Sullivan Absher, starting right guard, case closed. 

Then reports surfaced that the staff was cross-training Ashton Craig at right guard, floating the idea that Joe Otting and Craig might be two of the five best offensive linemen on the roster. If that’s the case, you play Otting at center, shift Craig to right guard, and Absher again becomes the depth piece.

That possibility made sense on paper. But it also introduced some concerns. 

Craig has been the starting center for Notre Dame over the last few years. Moving him to guard in his final season carries risk. There can be real clunkiness in those transitions. Think about what happened with Jarrett Patterson when he moved around a couple of times. 

Sometimes a player is simply best in one spot, and shuffling him disrupts the flow and cohesiveness of an entire offensive line.

Why the Styles Prescod development raises red flags

Then came the latest curveball. Styles Prescod, a redshirt sophomore listed as the backup left tackle, began taking first-team reps at right guard this week. According to the local beat reporters who spoke with Rudolph, Prescod is very much in play to be the starter at right guard.

That revelation tells a story. Notre Dame is unsettled and not solidified with the right guard options already on the table. Cross-training Prescod to build depth at multiple spots is one thing. If he is genuinely in contention to start, though, that signals a few things worth noting. 

It means the staff still isn’t fully comfortable with Absher as the starter. It could mean they’ve had second thoughts about the Craig-to-guard transition. And it introduces a profile question that gives me pause.

What I’ve always heard about Prescod is that Notre Dame really likes his athleticism. He was a player that former offensive line coach Harry Hiestand originally liked because of his long arms, athletic ability, and local ties. There were tools to work with. 

But the consistent knock on Prescod throughout his development has been adding power to his profile. He has never been an overly powerful football player. He has had to add weight to his frame and get stronger generally.

I worry about that profile fitting inside at guard. Playing guard requires consistent work at the point of attack, violence on contact, and displacement power. Whether Notre Dame runs inside zone, outside zone, or gap power concepts, the right guard needs torque and the ability to move defenders. 

Prescod is not who I would think of as a clean fit at offensive guard. He feels like a natural tackle, not a power plug inside.

If I’m wrong and Prescod wins the job and plays well, I will be the first to give him credit. But at no point during his recruitment or his early career at Notre Dame has he struck me as a potential fit inside. It feels clunky relative to his skill set.

The bottom line

This right guard situation deserves attention. The timeline of this position battle — from Jagusah’s absence to Augustine’s injury to the Craig experiment to Prescod’s emergence — has been unpredictable. Notre Dame’s offensive line has the pieces to be strong in 2026, but the right guard spot remains the one area where the staff clearly hasn’t found its answer heading into the opener. 

I’m getting a little worried, and I think Fighting Irish fans should keep a close eye on how this shakes out over the final days of camp.