Who Notre Dame DT Gabriel Rubio thanks for becoming the 'barbarian'

In the midst of a big game during his junior season at St. Louis Lutheran St. Charles High School, current Notre Dame sophomore defensive tackle Gabriel Rubio found himself in one of the last places he wanted to be. 

On his back, face up, staring at the bright lights. 

They were supposed to be shining on him between the white lines, not beaming down while he was being attended to by team trainers with gobs of blood dripping down his face. 

Rubio had an issue with the forehead padding of his helmet slamming into the bridge of his nose that night. The referees continuously sent him off the field any time they saw blood. 

The last time it occurred, the trainers took matters into their own hands and applied a butterfly bandage. Rubio’s father, Angel, snapped a photo of his son with his eyes closed, wound still open, displaying a slight smirk. 

Don’t be fooled by the sly smile. It was still one of the last places he wanted to be. 

“He was pissed,” Lutheran St. Charles head coach Arlen Harris told BlueandGold.com. “Every time he came off, he felt like he was letting his team down.” 

Angel Rubio, Lutheran St. Charles’ defensive line coach, remembers his son only missing part of a series during the cleanup procedure. Rubio finished the drive, and the game, to help his team to victory. He received 12 stitches afterward. 

Perhaps it was the beginning of Rubio embodying a persona Notre Dame defensive line coach Al Washington defines as the “barbarian.” That’s Washington’s calling card for the 6-5 ¼, 295-pound, eye-black-wearing behemoth. 

“He got the nickname based of my middle-bar facemask,” Rubio said. “He was like, ‘Man, you must be a rough and tough dude if you’re rocking that thing. Not many people rock that anymore.’ He was just ecstatic that someone was keeping that old culture alive.” 

One epithet isn’t enough to describe Rubio. 

“He’s a warrior,” Harris said. “It was ironic that the imagery fit perfectly. He looked exactly like he was out there in the field of battle.” 

That’s one of the first places he wants to be. 

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‘Don’t Quit’

Rubio rocks the middle-bar because his dad did. 

So did Notre Dame’s Bryant Young and Tennessee’s Reggie White, two Pro Football Hall of Fame inductees. Rubio molds his game from a cut of “old culture” cloth. Those are his idols. Given his last name, it was written in the stars – the same ones he peered up at with a bloody mug three years ago — for Rubio to latch onto the old guard. 

Angel Rubio was a seventh-round NFL Draft pick of the Pittsburgh Steelers out of Southeast Missouri State, where he set school records for sacks (21.5) and tackles for loss (44.0). A California kid with a scholarship offer to play for the Cal Bears, Angel’s family moved to the Midwest to start a church close to the time he had to choose a college. 

He went with his family, enrolled at SEMO and carved out a professional career that spanned nearly a decade with stops in the NFL, XFL and AFL. Not bad for a walk-on who spurned a Power Five scholarship to be close to his new home while playing for a Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) program. 

There are rewards in taking the tougher route. 

“I’m very big on teaching all my kids, my daughter included, what being a Rubio means,” Angel said. “We don’t quit on anything. Everything we put our hand to we do with the most effort we possibly can. We see things through. Our word is our bond. Our yes is yes. Our no is no. We don’t lie. If we say we’re going to help somebody or do something, we do it.” 

“Perseverance is definitely a value for me,” Rubio added. “It’s been embodied into me because where we’re from, we don’t like quitting. Quitting is like a cardinal sin in our house. 

“You always have to persevere, no matter what. Whether you want to quit or you don’t feel like doing it, you have to do it to see the outcome of your labor.” 

‘A Different Creed’

Angel is a firefighter, the same occupation his father held, in addition to coaching the defensive line at Lutheran St. Charles. Gabriel wants to be one when his playing days are over. Angel hopes that isn’t any time soon. The two put in too much work for that to be the case. 

Rubio’s infatuation with football began when Angel sat him through film study at 9 years old. He might have been the only kid at his elementary school who knew the difference between a base block and a reach block and what to do as a defensive lineman to combat both. 

Angel spent half an hour here and there going through the motions of different defensive lineman attacking mechanisms with Gabriel in the backyard throughout his upbringing. 

“As I’ve grown as a player and as a person, I can see the drills he was doing with me were similar to the drills we’re doing right now,” Rubio said. “Very little has changed in that regard. Technique has always been a big emphasis whenever I’m learning.” 

Stuck behind a slew of elder defensive tackles on the Notre Dame roster, Rubio was not a focal point for Washington’s unit early in the 2022 season. But when Jacob Lacey entered the transfer portal in early October, Rubio was one of the next men up. He played a career-high 44 defensive snaps vs. Stanford on Oct. 15. In 24 snaps vs. Boston College on Nov. 19, he logged 2 quarterback pressures and a career-high 3 tackles. 

Notre Dame DTs Jayson Ademilola and Chris Smith are on the way out at the end of the year. A natural progression is leading Rubio up the depth chart. But so is what Harris described as a “blue-collar work ethic.” 

“He follows a different creed,” Harris said. “He puts in the work and doesn’t expect anything handed to him.” 

That’s a byproduct of getting groomed by an NFL Draft pick in his father. And it’s also a result of learning from a head coach in Harris, who went undrafted as a running back out of Hofstra but overcame not playing his junior and senior seasons because of a knee injury and an eligibility issue, respectively, to sign with the St. Louis Rams and start 6 NFL games with them and the Detroit Lions over four seasons. He played in 56 career games and rushed for 497 yards and 6 touchdowns. 

Rubio started on the offensive and defensive lines for Harris. He was the team’s left tackle. In a game toward the end of Rubio’s senior season, Harris could tell the wear and tear of a long grind had taken its toll on Rubio. He had a sideline conversation with assistants that maybe it wasn’t wise to run behind him as a lead-blocker as the offense had done time and again all year. 

Rubio overhead his coaches. 

“Let me go,” Harris said Rubio told him. 

“We released him and he put two huge blocks out there for us to score a touchdown,” Harris said. 

That’s the player Notre Dame has in Rubio. He’s not going to throw any blocks to set running backs Audric Estimé and Logan Diggs loose for scores, but he is going to do everything he can to shed them so opposing tailbacks are stopped in their tracks. 

Everything he’s done since he was 9 has prepared him for that. 

“He’s a tough individual,” Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said. “He is a tough guy. He is high motor, high energy. He’s exceeded my expectations from last year. 

“Did I think Gabe was going to be a good player? Absolutely. I didn’t know how soon it was going to be. And he’s exceeded my expectations. He’s been a great addition for this team.”