How much trouble is Notre Dame in without Charles Jagusah?

Notre Dame announced on Monday that redshirt freshman offensive tackle Charles Jagusah would miss the 2024 season due to a pectoral injury.

That news is devastating for both Jagusah and Notre Dame. The 2024 campaign would have been his first as Notre Dame’s starter. Jagusah was slated to replace Joe Alt at left tackle, who was drafted No. 5 overall in the 2024 NFL Draft.

Jagusah made his first-career start in Notre Dame’s Sun Bowl victory at the end of last season. In the run-up to that bowl game, head coach Marcus Freeman gushed about Jagusah’s future.

“He’s got natural ability,” Freeman said. “We noticed that in recruiting, we noticed that when he got here. There was just not a need at that moment for him to play for us. We had a pretty good left tackle that started for us all year.

“But he’s shown on scout team, he’s shown in the bye weeks and in the individual drills that he’s going to be a future great offensive lineman for us.”

Gino Guidugli, Notre Dame’s quarterbacks coach who served as interim OC for the Sun Bowl, said Jagusah was going to be “special” in the lead-up to the bowl game.

Although Jagusah is inexperienced, he impressed the Notre Dame coaching staff last season to such a degree that the program chose not to pursue any left tackle options in the transfer portal. Notre Dame also didn’t hold a competition for the vacant left tackle position this offseason.

The job simply belonged to Jagusah prior to this injury. That’s how highly-thought of Jagusah was after just a year-plus on campus.

To replace Jagusah, Notre Dame has a couple of obvious options. Tosh Baker and Aamil Wagner were competing for the right tackle job this offseason, so it’s logical that one of them will slide over to the left and protect Riley Leonard’s blindside.

Baker is a former top-100 overall recruit from the class of 2020, but he has not played much football in his first 4 years at Notre Dame. He started 2 games in 2023, with 1 of them coming at right tackle in the Sun Bowl.

Wagner was also a highly-touted recruit, earning consensus 4-star status in the class of 2022. However, like Baker, he has very little experience. He’s played in just 7 games so far in college and hasn’t recorded any starts.

Notre Dame’s interior offensive line was inconsistent at times last season, but that part of the unit will be called upon to do a lot of the heavy lifting with so much uncertainty at tackle. The Fighting Irish do bring back an experienced group at guard and center, at least. Ashton Craig locked down the starting center job at the end of last season, as did Billy Schrauth at right guard. Rocco Spindler and Pat Coogan are expected to compete for the left guard role.

Notre Dame’s uneasiness at tackle would be troubling on the eve of any season, but it’s especially true in 2024. Notre Dame will travel to face a hungry Texas A&M team in Week 1 later this month as the Aggies kick off the Mike Elko era in front of more than 100,000 fans.

To make matters worse: Texas A&M possesses what may be the toughest defensive front that Notre Dame will see all season. It’s headlined by former Purdue pass rusher Nic Scourton, who ran roughshod over the Big Ten last season to the tune of 15 tackles for loss and 10 sacks. He was one of the most highly-coveted transfers in the country this offseason.

A&M’s pass rush doesn’t stop there, though. Bowling Green transfer Cashius Howell, former 5-star Shemar Turner and former 5-star Shemar Stewart are just a few members of Texas A&M’s defensive front who are capable of causing major problems for Notre Dame’s inexperienced tackles.

Despite the significant concern with how Notre Dame will matchup with that pass rush, the betting markets are still projecting the game to be a virtual coin flip. Texas A&M is currently a 1-point favorite over the Fighting Irish, per the latest lines at DraftKings.

The expansion of the College Football Playoff to 12 teams this fall will certainly add to Notre Dame’s margin-for-error early in the year as it sorts out its tackle situation. The Irish could likely afford a loss or 2 — especially in a spot like at Texas A&M — and still qualify for the CFP in December.

Will Notre Dame be able to stabilize its line even if things go poorly in College Station? That’s going to be the million dollar question for Freeman and offensive line coach Joe Rudolph. The good news is that Notre Dame’s schedule lightens up considerably after its Week 1 trek to SEC country.

Notre Dame’s remaining games away from South Bend are against Purdue, Georgia Tech, Navy, Army and USC. Notre Dame has a clear talent advantage over all of those programs — save for maybe USC — and none figure to have the type of pass rush that would cause Notre Dame’s offensive staff to lose sleep. It’s also perhaps a blessing that Notre Dame will not have to face the rival Trojans until Week 14 — by that point, the Irish will certainly hope to have figured out a solid solution at left tackle.

Even with the uncertainty on the offensive line, Notre Dame is still well-thought of in the betting markets. The Fighting Irish are -165 to make the College Football Playoff, per the latest lines from FanDuel. Notre Dame is also +1800 to win the national championship this season — tied with LSU for the 6th-best odds.

But there’s a long way to go — and a lot to figure out — before Notre Dame can start checking off its offseason goals. Notre Dame will travel to Kyle Field in just 25 days.