{"id":134792,"date":"2026-01-28T11:21:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/134792\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T11:21:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:21:07","slug":"qb-darian-mensah-joins-miami-hurricanes-after-legal-battle-with-duke-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/134792\/","title":{"rendered":"QB Darian Mensah joins Miami Hurricanes after legal battle with Duke"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \">CORAL GABLES, Fla. &#8212; Darian Mensah has enrolled at Miami, giving the Hurricanes another standout transfer at quarterback as they come off a season where they went to the national championship game and got into the College Football Playoff for the first time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Mensah transferred to Miami from Atlantic Coast Conference rival Duke on Tuesday night. Duke had <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/duke-mensah-lawsuit-faeced1f035313ae80a56cface72109a?utm_source=copy&amp;utm_medium=share\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">agreed earlier Tuesday to end a legal battle<\/a> with its now-former quarterback over whether he should be allowed to sign elsewhere.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Duke and Mensah announced they came to that agreement, a few hours before Mensah and his top target with the Blue Devils this past season \u2014 wide receiver Cooper Barkate \u2014 toured the Miami campus in Coral Gables, Florida.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">About 12 hours later, Mensah&#8217;s deal with Miami was official. Barkate committed Tuesday night as well, after the former Duke duo dined at a steakhouse in Miami Beach alongside some current and former Miami players.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Mensah is joining his third team in as many years. He threw for 2,723 yards and 22 touchdowns for Tulane in 2024, then had 3,973 passing yards and 34 touchdowns \u2014 both best in the ACC \u2014 for Duke while leading the Blue Devils to a surprise conference title this past season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">And the Hurricanes are hoping he can keep their run of portal-quarterback success going.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Miami has hit home runs in the past two seasons by going the transfer route, first with Cam Ward \u2014 who played his way into becoming the No. 1 pick in last year&#8217;s NFL draft \u2014 leading the Hurricanes to a 10-win season in 2024, then this past season with Carson Beck guiding the team to its first national championship game in nearly a quarter-century.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The Hurricanes return a slew of offensive firepower from the national runner-up team, including star wide receiver Malachi Toney \u2014 the nation&#8217;s top freshman this past season \u2014 along with running backs Mark Fletcher Jr., Marty Brown and Girard Pringle, and tight end Elija Lofton.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Barkate, who is also set to join his third different team in a three-season span, would seem to add even more to that already-loaded mix. He has 185 catches for 2,848 yards and 21 touchdowns in his college career, which includes three years at Harvard \u2014 he has an economics degree from there \u2014 and then this past season at Duke.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Duke plays at Miami this coming season, visiting on Nov. 14. The Blue Devils are coached by Manny Diaz, who coached Miami from 2019 through 2021. He was replaced in Coral Gables by Miami alum Mario Cristobal, who led the team to a school-record 13 wins this past season and its first instance of back-to-back 10-win seasons since a four-year run of those from 2000 through 2003.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Miami opens the 2026 season at Stanford on Sept. 4.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">___<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC eTIW sUzSN \">Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/www.apnews.com\/newsletters\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>. AP college football: <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-football-poll\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-football-poll<\/a> and <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-football\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-football<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CORAL GABLES, Fla. &#8212; Darian Mensah has enrolled at Miami, giving the Hurricanes another standout transfer at quarterback&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":134793,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[66063,1111,111,143,57,123,125,124,110],"class_list":{"0":"post-134792","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-66063","9":"tag-article","10":"tag-college-sports","11":"tag-college-football","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-miami","14":"tag-miami-headlines","15":"tag-miami-news","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134792","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=134792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134792\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}