{"id":125706,"date":"2026-01-21T01:35:19","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T01:35:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125706\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T01:35:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T01:35:19","slug":"miami-stars-punch-details-emerge-after-national-title-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125706\/","title":{"rendered":"Miami star&#8217;s punch details emerge after national title loss"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!\n  <\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">An <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/sports\/ncaa\/indiana-hoosiers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Indiana Hoosiers<\/a> defensive lineman was accused of making a remark about Miami Hurricanes star Mark Fletcher Jr.\u2019s deceased father after the national championship game on Monday night, nearly sparking a brawl between the two players at Hard Rock Stadium.<\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">Fletcher was caught on the ESPN broadcast taking a swing at Hoosiers defensive lineman Tyrique Tucker. Players and personnel from both schools had to come between the competitors before the issue escalated further.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM<\/a><\/p>\n<p> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/miami-mark-fletcher-jr-012026-3.jpg\" alt=\"Mark Fletcher Jr stiff arms a defender\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\"\/> <\/p>\n<p>Mark Fletcher Jr. #4 of the Miami Hurricanes stiff arms Aiden Fisher #4 of the Indiana Hoosiers during the third quarter in the 2026 College Football Playoff National Championship at Hard Rock Stadium on Jan. 19, 2026, in Miami Gardens, Florida. (Patrick Smith\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<p>Mike Rumph, Miami\u2019s director of recruiting, alleged in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/tech\/companies\/instagram\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">comment on Instagram<\/a> that Tucker made the comment.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Dude was talking about Mark\u2019s dad who passed away last year. Mark is and always will be one of the most classy people you will meet. RIP Mr. Fletcher,&#8221; Rumph wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Tucker had a different take, saying that Fletcher was trying to sucker punch him.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\/fernando-mendozas-brother-enters-transfer-portal-after-indiana-wins-national-title\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">FERNANDO MENDOZA&#8217;S BROTHER ENTERS TRANSFER PORTAL AFTER INDIANA WINS NATIONAL TITLE<\/a><\/p>\n<p> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768959319_629_tyrique-tucker-cfp-final.jpg\" alt=\"Tyrique Tucker celebrates national title win\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\"\/> <\/p>\n<p>Tyrique Tucker #95 of the Indiana Hoosiers celebrates after defeating the Miami Hurricanes 27-21 in the 2026 College Football Playoff National Championship at Hard Rock Stadium on Jan. 19, 2026, in Miami Gardens, Florida.\u00a0 (Megan Briggs\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was just trying to congratulate him on the game,&#8221; he told The Herald-Times. &#8220;He tried to sneak me, everybody kind of held me back. That was a cheap punch. Luckily, we got the win, I&#8217;m not really too worried about it. He&#8217;s salty, he going home with the L.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Tucker apparently wanted to congratulate Fletcher on his two touchdown performance before things went awry, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heraldtimesonline.com\/story\/sports\/college\/iu\/2026\/01\/20\/miamis-mark-fletcher-jr-sucker-punch-indiana-football-tyrique-tucker\/88138149007\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">The Herald-Times<\/a>. He said he didn\u2019t say anything to him.<\/p>\n<p>Fletcher hasn\u2019t said anything about the incident.<\/p>\n<p> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/miami-mark-fletcher-jr-012026-4.jpg\" alt=\"Mark Fletcher Jr runs the ball\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\"\/> <\/p>\n<p>Miami Hurricanes running back Mark Fletcher Jr. (4) rushes for a touchdown against the Indiana Hoosiers in the second half during the College Football Playoff National Championship game at Hard Rock Stadium on Jan. 19, 2026. (Nathan Ray Seebeck\/Imagn Images)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/foxnews.onelink.me\/xLDS?pid=AppArticleLink&amp;af_dp=foxnewsaf%3A%2F%2F&amp;af_web_dp=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fapps-products\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The star running back nearly carried the Hurricanes to a national championship. But a few miscues ultimately sunk them in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\/indiana-wins-college-football-playoff-national-championship-thriller-over-miami\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">27-21 loss<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Follow Fox News Digital\u2019s<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FoxNewsSports_\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">\u00a0sports coverage on X<\/a> and subscribe to<a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/newsletters\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"> the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Ryan Gaydos is a senior editor for Fox News Digital.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! An Indiana Hoosiers defensive lineman was accused of making a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125707,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[6795,123,125,5079,124,142,10622],"class_list":{"0":"post-125706","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-indiana-hoosiers","9":"tag-miami","10":"tag-miami-headlines","11":"tag-miami-hurricanes","12":"tag-miami-news","13":"tag-ncaa","14":"tag-ncaa-fb"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125706\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}