SOUTH BEND — The caveat was clear.
If there came a time when being a member of the Notre Dame basketball team interfered with his focus on being a member of the Notre Dame football team, freshman cornerback turned point guard Mark Zackery IV would have no choice.
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He would go back to football.
Zackery spent six weeks as a backup point guard for an Irish basketball team that, at the time he joined up with coach Micah Shrewsberry’s program, needed backcourt depth. In stepped Zackery, who hadn’t played basketball since his junior year in high school. Zackery practiced a lot with the Irish but played a little — 20 minutes over four games. He dressed in uniform for seven.
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On January 21, in a loss at North Carolina, Zackery logged a career high seven minutes. Three days later, the program announced prior to the January 24 home win at Boston College that Zackery no longer was on the roster.
“Going into it, I was always like, ‘I don’t want to mess up anything for you across the street,’” Shrewsberry said of Zackery playing basketball. “At the end of the day, we knew that once they got going with their winter conditioning, their winter meetings, he’d be shuffling back over.”
The decision, and the announcement, coincided with the recent start of offseason conditioning for a Notre Dame football program that many believe can seriously chase its first national championship since 1988. Zackery, a backup cornerback, will be a key piece to that 2026 football puzzle.
Zackery enters spring practice a backup to veteran Christian Gray at field cornerback. He’ll also be working under a new position coach after defensive backs Mike Mickens left recently for the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens.
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Shrewsberry admitted that the basketball team could still use him, but the football team needs him.
“I didn’t want to be selfish in any of that,” Shrewsberry said. “I want him to have as great an impact on the field as possible next year. Without him playing a lot, it was the best move for him to be able to focus on everything he needed to focus on to be ready to make an impact next year for them.”
That Zackery gave basketball a second chance was by pure luck. Had Notre Dame been invited to participate in the 12-team College Football Playoff, he would have spent much of December in football mode. When the Irish were not invited, then declined any bowl game, Zackery’s schedule lightened for most of December and January.
Zackery joined the basketball team the day after starting point guard Markus Burton underwent surgery for a broken left ankle. He had last played a full season of basketball during his junior year at Indianapolis Ben Davis High School when he averaged 11.0 points, 4.3 assists and 1.4 steals. A left thumb injury suffered during the 2024 football season cut short Zackery’s senior season in basketball.
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“We were in a time of need where we needed a lot of help early, especially in practice,” Shrewsberry said. “We just have so many older guys playing and guys we need to count on for the future that it was hard to give him a lot of minutes to take away from some of those guys.”
Zackery, who made 10 tackles with two passes defended and two pass breakups in 11 games in 2025 (he missed only the USC game), made his basketball debut on the same campus — Stanford — where his freshman football season ended.
He played five scoreless minutes in the December 30 win at Stanford, then scored his only basket on a reverse layup three nights later at Cal. He became the first Irish football player to play basketball at Notre Dame since former tight end John Carlson, who was a backup power forward for the Irish in 2003-04.
Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at tnoie@sbtinfo.com
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Notre Dame basketball loses a backup point guard to football focus
