As the 2007 season has unfolded for the Notre Dame football squad, it becomes apparent just how reliant the team was upon its players who graduated after last season. The headliner from this group was, of course, Brady Quinn, who left Notre Dame in possession of most school records for the QB position. With discussions about scheduling, recruiting and depth issues set aside, something else the team has lacked this year is a consistent presence to guide the offense, such as Quinn was during the 2005 and 2006 seasons.
No game demonstrated Quinn's resilience better than the 2006 contest against UCLA. Similar to this year, the Irish came into that game after a rough stretch of games. A defensive battle ensued, as UCLA successfully contained Notre Dame's offense for most of the game. Still, Quinn fought through the defensive pressure, completing 27 passes for over 300 yards. That game always will be remembered for the late-game heroics engineering by Quinn and WR Jeff Samardzija. Trailing 17-13, the Irish had gone three-and-out with 2:25 remaining in the game. The situation looked bleak for Notre Dame, but still, the Irish defense responded by holding UCLA to three-and-out, giving the Irish offense one last chance.
With 1:02 remaining and the ball on the Irish 20, Quinn moved quickly, getting the ball to Samardzija for 21 yards and WR David Grimes for another 14 yards out to the UCLA 45. Then, Quinn hit Samardzija on one of the most famous plays in recent Notre Dame history. Samardzija streaked down the right side of the field, evading UCLA defenders along the way, reaching the endzone. Quinn and the offense had given the Irish program its first game-winning touchdown in the final minute of a game since Penn State in 1992. In winning 20-17, the Irish moved to 7-1, edging closer to a berth in the BCS.
Despite the schools' proud football traditions, Notre Dame and UCLA have met a surprisingly infrequent number of times on the gridiron. The series dates back to 1963, when the Bruins traveled to South Bend during a disastrous 2-7 Notre Dame campaign. For Notre Dame, UCLA was one of two teams they were able to beat that year, Southern Cal being the other. In the following season, UCLA returned to South Bend again. Once again, the Irish, now led by coaching immortal Ara Parseghian, defeated the Bruins, 24-0. After that game, these schools would not meet again until last season. The 42-year break between games was one of the longest in the history of the Notre Dame program. Overall, the Irish hold a 3-0-0 record in this series.
On an interesting side note, Saturday will mark the first time that Notre Dame returns to the Rose Bowl since January 1, 1925. That day, the undefeated Notre Damers traveled to Pasadena to play the Stanford Indians. In a game that featured Notre Dame’s famed "Four Horseman" backfield and Stanford's legendary Ernie Nevers, as well as coaching luminaries Knute Rockne and Glenn "Pop" Warner, Notre Dame rolled to a 27-10 victory. It was the program's sole bowl appearance until the Cotton Bowl following the 1969 season.
/ / / / / / / / / / /
Other notes:
-The Irish have never started a season 0-6. A loss this week would tie the school record for consecutive losses (8), which was set in 1960.
-The Irish are 19-11 (.633) under Charlie Weis, and 8-4 (.667) on the road during the Weis Era.
-Notre Dame last lost five consecutive road games between 1998 and 2000 (losses at Southern Cal, Michigan, Purdue, Tennessee, Pittsburgh, Stanford, and Michigan State). That streak reached seven straight road losses before the Irish finally prevailed at West Virginia in October 2000, 42-28.
-UCLA (1954) is the fifth opponent the Irish will play this season that has won at least one national championship. Among Notre Dame's first eight opponents, the only ones without at least one national title are Purdue and Boston College.
-Notre Dame is 29-24-5 (.543) against Pac-10 teams on the road. They have never played a road game against UCLA.
-These schools are not scheduled to meet again.
-An update on Notre Dame-Michigan: I will continue (tentatively) to include updates on the competition for all-time best winning percentage, but Michigan is definitely pulling away. Depending on how bad things get this year, I may suspend updates on this until a future time when it's actually a competition again. For now, here's where things stand:
Michigan squeaked by at unranked Northwestern, 28-16, moving their record to 863-284-36 for a winning percentage of .7447. This week, Michigan hosts the fearsome Eastern Michigan Eagles.
Notre Dame lost its seventh consecutive game, this time at Purdue, 33-19, dropping their record to 821-274-42 for an all-time winning percentage of .7406. This represents Notre Dame's lowest winning percentage since the week following the program's landmark win over Michigan in November 1909. This week, Notre Dame travels to UCLA.
Michigan's lead has expanded to five games.
This week's game kicks off on ABC at 5:00 P.D.T.
Go Irish! Beat Bruins!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Notre Dame vs. Purdue
In trying times such as the 2007 season for the Fighting Irish, it is sometimes educational to look back at how far the program has come since its humble beginnings in the fall of 1887. A look back at the 1896 season, for example, shows a schedule with opponents' names that are simply comical to the modern eye. Among that season’s adversaries were such luminaries as Chicago Physicians & Surgeons (a surprisingly worthy foe that actually defeated Notre Dame that year, 4-0), the University of Chicago (in those days a burgeoning power under Amos Alonzo Stagg), South Bend Athletic Club, Albion, Highland Views, and Beloit College. Aside from the game against Chicago, itself a newcomer to college football since that school's founding in 1892, the only other foe that is recognizable to modern-day Notre Dame fans is Purdue.
Then as now, Purdue was a regular on Notre Dame schedules. Among current members of the NCAA's Division I-A, the only schools to have older histories with Notre Dame are Michigan and Northwestern. Unlike those schools, however, Purdue has remained a staple for Notre Dame football through the decades. It is interesting to note that among all of Notre Dame's traditional opponents, Purdue is the only one the Irish have played at least once in each decade since the 1890s. While other members of the Big Ten Conference boycotted Notre Dame from their schedules throughout the first half of the twentieth century, Purdue continued to schedule Notre Dame. Since the end of World War II, Notre Dame and Purdue have played one another every year. This year, they will renew the series for the 62nd consecutive season.
Overall, the Irish hold a 51-25-2 record against Purdue. Saturday's game will be the 79th between Notre Dame and Purdue. Aside from Navy, the Irish have played and beaten no opponent more frequently than the Boilermakers. Aside from Southern Cal and Michigan State, no school has beaten the Irish more frequently than Purdue.
The series probably enjoyed its greatest glory during the late 1960s when Notre Dame and Purdue had teams perennially ranked in the top ten. In 1968 #1 Purdue handed #2 Notre Dame its only home loss ever in a #1 vs. #2 game, winning, 37-22. In more recent times the Irish came to dominate the series, winning, for example, 18 out of 22 games between 1975 and 1996. With the advent of Bob Davie's tenure at Notre Dame, however, parity came to the series once again. Since 1997, Notre Dame holds only a 6-4 record against their regular in-state foes. Notre Dame has won the last two series games.
In the last series game played in West Lafayette, the Irish throttled the Boilermakers in a night game, winning 49-28; the game wasn’t even that close. Last season, the Irish endured the rain that so often seems to accompany the Purdue game, winning at home, 35-21.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
-This will be the second game in this series in the past 20 seasons in which neither team is ranked. The other came in 2001.
-Notre Dame holds a 25-13-2 (.600) record in games played between the schools at Purdue.
-Notre Dame is 8-3 (.727) in road games under Charlie Weis.
-The Irish have never started a season 0-5. Their last seven game losing streak came in 1960.
-The winner of the Notre Dame-Purdue series receives the Shillelagh Trophy, a tradition that dates back to 1957. The trophy was donated by the late Joe McLaughlin, a merchant seaman and Notre Dame fan who brought the club from Ireland.
-These teams are scheduled to continue meeting yearly, as they have since 1946.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for the all-time best winning percentage in college football, here is where things stand after last weekend
Unranked Michigan defeated #10 Penn State at home, 14-9, moving their winning percentage to .7445. This week, unranked Michigan take to the road for the first time this season to play at unranked Northwestern.
Unranked Notre Dame lost its sixth consecutive game, falling for the sixth straight time at home to unranked Michigan State, 31-14. This drops Notre Dame's winning percentage to .7412, its lowest level since November 1910. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to unranked Purdue.
Michigan's lead expands to 33/10,000ths of a point.
Texas defeated Rice, 58-14, to move within six wins of Notre Dame on the all-time wins list.
This week's game kicks off on ESPN at noon EDT.
Go Irish! Beat Boilers!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Then as now, Purdue was a regular on Notre Dame schedules. Among current members of the NCAA's Division I-A, the only schools to have older histories with Notre Dame are Michigan and Northwestern. Unlike those schools, however, Purdue has remained a staple for Notre Dame football through the decades. It is interesting to note that among all of Notre Dame's traditional opponents, Purdue is the only one the Irish have played at least once in each decade since the 1890s. While other members of the Big Ten Conference boycotted Notre Dame from their schedules throughout the first half of the twentieth century, Purdue continued to schedule Notre Dame. Since the end of World War II, Notre Dame and Purdue have played one another every year. This year, they will renew the series for the 62nd consecutive season.
Overall, the Irish hold a 51-25-2 record against Purdue. Saturday's game will be the 79th between Notre Dame and Purdue. Aside from Navy, the Irish have played and beaten no opponent more frequently than the Boilermakers. Aside from Southern Cal and Michigan State, no school has beaten the Irish more frequently than Purdue.
The series probably enjoyed its greatest glory during the late 1960s when Notre Dame and Purdue had teams perennially ranked in the top ten. In 1968 #1 Purdue handed #2 Notre Dame its only home loss ever in a #1 vs. #2 game, winning, 37-22. In more recent times the Irish came to dominate the series, winning, for example, 18 out of 22 games between 1975 and 1996. With the advent of Bob Davie's tenure at Notre Dame, however, parity came to the series once again. Since 1997, Notre Dame holds only a 6-4 record against their regular in-state foes. Notre Dame has won the last two series games.
In the last series game played in West Lafayette, the Irish throttled the Boilermakers in a night game, winning 49-28; the game wasn’t even that close. Last season, the Irish endured the rain that so often seems to accompany the Purdue game, winning at home, 35-21.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
-This will be the second game in this series in the past 20 seasons in which neither team is ranked. The other came in 2001.
-Notre Dame holds a 25-13-2 (.600) record in games played between the schools at Purdue.
-Notre Dame is 8-3 (.727) in road games under Charlie Weis.
-The Irish have never started a season 0-5. Their last seven game losing streak came in 1960.
-The winner of the Notre Dame-Purdue series receives the Shillelagh Trophy, a tradition that dates back to 1957. The trophy was donated by the late Joe McLaughlin, a merchant seaman and Notre Dame fan who brought the club from Ireland.
-These teams are scheduled to continue meeting yearly, as they have since 1946.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for the all-time best winning percentage in college football, here is where things stand after last weekend
Unranked Michigan defeated #10 Penn State at home, 14-9, moving their winning percentage to .7445. This week, unranked Michigan take to the road for the first time this season to play at unranked Northwestern.
Unranked Notre Dame lost its sixth consecutive game, falling for the sixth straight time at home to unranked Michigan State, 31-14. This drops Notre Dame's winning percentage to .7412, its lowest level since November 1910. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to unranked Purdue.
Michigan's lead expands to 33/10,000ths of a point.
Texas defeated Rice, 58-14, to move within six wins of Notre Dame on the all-time wins list.
This week's game kicks off on ESPN at noon EDT.
Go Irish! Beat Boilers!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Notre Dame vs. Michigan State
In 1993 Notre Dame stood at 2-0 and was entering the third week of the
season, preparing for its annual game against Michigan State. The
Irish that year were a rag-tag group, a team that few people expected
to compete seriously on the national stage. The Irish had lost the
nucleus of the 1992 team that had finished with a 10-1-1 record, a
nucleus that included QB Rick Mirer, as well as RBs Reggie Brooks and
Jerome Bettis.
Still, the squad, led by senior QB Kevin McDougal, starting for the
first time in his career at N.D., opened with a 2-0 record after wins
against Northwestern and at #3 Michigan. The win at Michigan had
grabbed everyone's attention, and served as notice that the Irish would
be a formidable team that year. Into town came the unranked 1-0
Michigan State Spartans. Then as now, the Spartans were an erratic
team, dangerous against the Irish, but frequently inept against lesser
competition. Coming off a disappointing 5-6 finish in 1992, they were
looking to gain respectability by upending an Irish squad that was
flying high after their big win at Michigan. That was not to be the
case, however, as a formidable Irish offense and smothering defense led
Notre Dame to its sixth straight win over Michigan State.
By winning a convincing 36-14 victory over Michigan State, the Irish
continued their march toward a late-season match-up against #1 Florida
State, a game that second-ranked Notre Dame would win. Unbelievably,
that 1993 victory by Notre Dame over Michigan State marked the most
recent time the Irish won at home against Michigan State, a streak of
five straight home losses to the Spartans. No school has ever won six
straight games at Notre Dame.
In many ways, the Notre Dame-Michigan State series provides a barometer
on the Notre Dame football program in general. When things are going
well for the Irish, they tend to fare well against the Spartans. When
the Irish are down, however, they struggle against MSU. An example:
from 1954-63, Notre Dame experienced one of its lowest periods ever,
going 51-48 (.515). During that period, the Spartans dominated the
Irish, compiling a record of 8-1 in the series. On the other side of
the coin, from 1987 to 1993, when the Irish compiled a 72-12-1 (.853)
record, they were 6-0 against the Spartans. Since those days, the
Irish program again has stumbled into more trying times, and the
Michigan State series bears that out. Since the series was renewed in
1997 after a two-year break, the Spartans are 7-3 against the Irish,
including 5-0 in games played at Notre Dame during that period.
This series dates back to 1897, when the Michigan Aggies, as the
Spartans were called back then, fell to Notre Dame, 34-6, in a
rain-soaked game in South Bend. Since those days, the schools have
been frequent opponents, playing each other every season since 1959,
for example, with the exception of a two-year break in 1995-96.
During the 1940s, Michigan State was struggling as a football
independent. Still several years away from admittance into the Big Ten
Conference, Michigan State sought help from Notre Dame athletic
director Edward "Moose" Krause. By agreeing to a long-running series
against the Spartans, Krause helped steady the struggling program
during its difficult years. After joining the Big Ten in 1950,
Michigan State refused to go along with Michigan coach Fritz Crisler's
calls to other Big Ten schools to boycott the Irish.
No discussion of the Notre Dame-Michigan State series would be complete
without mention of the titanic battle between the schools in 1966.
That year, undefeated and untied Notre Dame, ranked #1, traveled to
East Lansing to play undefeated and untied Michigan State, ranked #2.
In a game that featured numerous Hall of Fame players, as well as two
coaching luminaries, the Irish and Spartans dueled to a 10-10 tie in
one of the most famous games in college football history. The game
continues to stand the test of time as one of the most memorable ever
played.
This weekend's game will be the 71st between the schools. Overall, the
Irish hold a 44-25-1 record against the Spartans, but, as previously
mentioned, the Spartans have won seven of the last 10 played in the
series. Michigan State is among the most frequent opponents to appear
on Notre Dame's schedules through the years. The only teams to play
the Irish more frequently are Navy (80), Purdue (78), and Southern Cal
(78).
In recent years, the schools have played some memorable games not
decided until the fourth quarter. Between 1999 and 2003, the schools
played six consecutive games determined in the closing minutes. The
2002 game, played at Spartan Stadium, featured a game-winning 60-yard
TD scamper by Irish WR Arnaz Battle in the last minute, Notre Dame's
first win over MSU since 1993. Since then, the schools have traded
wins on each other's home field. In 2005, the Spartans won a memorable
and heartbreaking victory over the Irish in overtime, 44-41. The sting
of defeat was accentuated for Irish fans by the sight of Spartans
players planting a Michigan State flag at the fifty yard-line of Notre
Dame Stadium. Last year, the Irish exacted a measure of revenge, as
Terrail Lambert returned an interception in the closing minute to
complete an improbable comeback from 16 points down to win at rainy
Spartan Stadium, 40-37.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-Two of Notre Dame's greatest coaches served as assistants at Michigan
State. Frank Leahy (1941-43, 1946-53) was an assistant in the 1930s
for Jim Crowley, a Notre Dame graduate and member of the famed "Four
Horsemen" backfield. Dan Devine (1975-80) served on MSU's staff in the
1950s.
-Navy (70), Purdue (51), and Pittsburgh (44) are the only opponents
that N.D. has beaten more frequently than MSU. Only Southern Cal (31)
has beaten N.D. more frequently than MSU.
-Notre Dame is 15-11 versus Michigan State at Notre Dame Stadium.
-The Irish are 10-4 (.714) at home under Charlie Weis.
-The Irish have never started a season 0-4.
-Notre Dame has only lost six straight games once. That streak came
during a string of eight straight losses in 1960.
-Since 1949, the winner of the Notre Dame-Michigan State game has
received the Megaphone Trophy, sponsored by the Notre Dame and Michigan
State clubs of Detroit.
-These schools are scheduled to continue meeting through the 2011
season. At that point, they are expected to take a two-year hiatus to
make room on Notre Dame's schedule for a home-and-home series against
either Arizona State or Oklahoma. The schools are expected to resume
the series in 2014.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college
football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand
after last week:
Unranked Michigan walloped the hapless Irish, 38-0, moving their record
to 861-284-36 for a winning percentage of .7443. This week, the
unranked Wolverines host #10 Penn State.
Unranked Notre Dame was woefully bad in losing at unranked Michigan,
38-0. Their record drops to 821-272-42 for a winning percentage of
.7419. This stands as the program's lowest winning percentage since
November 1910. This week, the unranked Irish host unranked Michigan
State.
Michigan's lead expands to 24/10,000ths of a point, its largest lead
over Notre Dame since 1920.
Another sobering note as the Irish continue to freefall: Texas is
creeping up behind Notre Dame on the all-time wins list, and at this
point are just seven wins behind the Irish with 814. The #7 Longhorns
host Rice this week.
Notre Dame's game kicks off at 3:30 EDT on NBC.
Go Irish! Beat Spartans!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
season, preparing for its annual game against Michigan State. The
Irish that year were a rag-tag group, a team that few people expected
to compete seriously on the national stage. The Irish had lost the
nucleus of the 1992 team that had finished with a 10-1-1 record, a
nucleus that included QB Rick Mirer, as well as RBs Reggie Brooks and
Jerome Bettis.
Still, the squad, led by senior QB Kevin McDougal, starting for the
first time in his career at N.D., opened with a 2-0 record after wins
against Northwestern and at #3 Michigan. The win at Michigan had
grabbed everyone's attention, and served as notice that the Irish would
be a formidable team that year. Into town came the unranked 1-0
Michigan State Spartans. Then as now, the Spartans were an erratic
team, dangerous against the Irish, but frequently inept against lesser
competition. Coming off a disappointing 5-6 finish in 1992, they were
looking to gain respectability by upending an Irish squad that was
flying high after their big win at Michigan. That was not to be the
case, however, as a formidable Irish offense and smothering defense led
Notre Dame to its sixth straight win over Michigan State.
By winning a convincing 36-14 victory over Michigan State, the Irish
continued their march toward a late-season match-up against #1 Florida
State, a game that second-ranked Notre Dame would win. Unbelievably,
that 1993 victory by Notre Dame over Michigan State marked the most
recent time the Irish won at home against Michigan State, a streak of
five straight home losses to the Spartans. No school has ever won six
straight games at Notre Dame.
In many ways, the Notre Dame-Michigan State series provides a barometer
on the Notre Dame football program in general. When things are going
well for the Irish, they tend to fare well against the Spartans. When
the Irish are down, however, they struggle against MSU. An example:
from 1954-63, Notre Dame experienced one of its lowest periods ever,
going 51-48 (.515). During that period, the Spartans dominated the
Irish, compiling a record of 8-1 in the series. On the other side of
the coin, from 1987 to 1993, when the Irish compiled a 72-12-1 (.853)
record, they were 6-0 against the Spartans. Since those days, the
Irish program again has stumbled into more trying times, and the
Michigan State series bears that out. Since the series was renewed in
1997 after a two-year break, the Spartans are 7-3 against the Irish,
including 5-0 in games played at Notre Dame during that period.
This series dates back to 1897, when the Michigan Aggies, as the
Spartans were called back then, fell to Notre Dame, 34-6, in a
rain-soaked game in South Bend. Since those days, the schools have
been frequent opponents, playing each other every season since 1959,
for example, with the exception of a two-year break in 1995-96.
During the 1940s, Michigan State was struggling as a football
independent. Still several years away from admittance into the Big Ten
Conference, Michigan State sought help from Notre Dame athletic
director Edward "Moose" Krause. By agreeing to a long-running series
against the Spartans, Krause helped steady the struggling program
during its difficult years. After joining the Big Ten in 1950,
Michigan State refused to go along with Michigan coach Fritz Crisler's
calls to other Big Ten schools to boycott the Irish.
No discussion of the Notre Dame-Michigan State series would be complete
without mention of the titanic battle between the schools in 1966.
That year, undefeated and untied Notre Dame, ranked #1, traveled to
East Lansing to play undefeated and untied Michigan State, ranked #2.
In a game that featured numerous Hall of Fame players, as well as two
coaching luminaries, the Irish and Spartans dueled to a 10-10 tie in
one of the most famous games in college football history. The game
continues to stand the test of time as one of the most memorable ever
played.
This weekend's game will be the 71st between the schools. Overall, the
Irish hold a 44-25-1 record against the Spartans, but, as previously
mentioned, the Spartans have won seven of the last 10 played in the
series. Michigan State is among the most frequent opponents to appear
on Notre Dame's schedules through the years. The only teams to play
the Irish more frequently are Navy (80), Purdue (78), and Southern Cal
(78).
In recent years, the schools have played some memorable games not
decided until the fourth quarter. Between 1999 and 2003, the schools
played six consecutive games determined in the closing minutes. The
2002 game, played at Spartan Stadium, featured a game-winning 60-yard
TD scamper by Irish WR Arnaz Battle in the last minute, Notre Dame's
first win over MSU since 1993. Since then, the schools have traded
wins on each other's home field. In 2005, the Spartans won a memorable
and heartbreaking victory over the Irish in overtime, 44-41. The sting
of defeat was accentuated for Irish fans by the sight of Spartans
players planting a Michigan State flag at the fifty yard-line of Notre
Dame Stadium. Last year, the Irish exacted a measure of revenge, as
Terrail Lambert returned an interception in the closing minute to
complete an improbable comeback from 16 points down to win at rainy
Spartan Stadium, 40-37.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-Two of Notre Dame's greatest coaches served as assistants at Michigan
State. Frank Leahy (1941-43, 1946-53) was an assistant in the 1930s
for Jim Crowley, a Notre Dame graduate and member of the famed "Four
Horsemen" backfield. Dan Devine (1975-80) served on MSU's staff in the
1950s.
-Navy (70), Purdue (51), and Pittsburgh (44) are the only opponents
that N.D. has beaten more frequently than MSU. Only Southern Cal (31)
has beaten N.D. more frequently than MSU.
-Notre Dame is 15-11 versus Michigan State at Notre Dame Stadium.
-The Irish are 10-4 (.714) at home under Charlie Weis.
-The Irish have never started a season 0-4.
-Notre Dame has only lost six straight games once. That streak came
during a string of eight straight losses in 1960.
-Since 1949, the winner of the Notre Dame-Michigan State game has
received the Megaphone Trophy, sponsored by the Notre Dame and Michigan
State clubs of Detroit.
-These schools are scheduled to continue meeting through the 2011
season. At that point, they are expected to take a two-year hiatus to
make room on Notre Dame's schedule for a home-and-home series against
either Arizona State or Oklahoma. The schools are expected to resume
the series in 2014.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college
football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand
after last week:
Unranked Michigan walloped the hapless Irish, 38-0, moving their record
to 861-284-36 for a winning percentage of .7443. This week, the
unranked Wolverines host #10 Penn State.
Unranked Notre Dame was woefully bad in losing at unranked Michigan,
38-0. Their record drops to 821-272-42 for a winning percentage of
.7419. This stands as the program's lowest winning percentage since
November 1910. This week, the unranked Irish host unranked Michigan
State.
Michigan's lead expands to 24/10,000ths of a point, its largest lead
over Notre Dame since 1920.
Another sobering note as the Irish continue to freefall: Texas is
creeping up behind Notre Dame on the all-time wins list, and at this
point are just seven wins behind the Irish with 814. The #7 Longhorns
host Rice this week.
Notre Dame's game kicks off at 3:30 EDT on NBC.
Go Irish! Beat Spartans!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Notre Dame vs. Michigan
It was one of the most exciting and memorable endings to a football game that anyone at Notre Dame could remember. It was 1980 and that year Notre Dame and Michigan played what was arguably the greatest game in the long-running series between the schools. For the third consecutive year, Notre Dame and Michigan had met on the gridiron, the first time since 1898-1900 that the ancient rivals had played that many years in a row. As usual, it was a ferocious, hard-fought game, the type of contest that this series had been known for, and it will always be remembered for the heroics of Harry Oliver, who sadly passed away earlier this year at the age of 47 from cancer.
The 1980 game featured two ranked teams with #8 Notre Dame hosting #14 Michigan. On a perfect fall afternoon, the two schools played a tense back-and-forth game, serving as a prelude for many future games in this series. Michigan took the lead late in the game, 27-26, though they failed to convert a key two-point conversion. Starting on its own 23-yard line with 41 seconds to play, the Irish quickly moved down the field as QB Blair Kiel completed a number of clutch passes. With 0:03 showing on the clock, the Irish had gotten to the Michigan 34-yard line. There, Oliver, the skinny kicker from Cincinnati walked out onto the field. Oliver was seeking redemption, having missed a key extra point earlier in the game. Although the wind had been blowing into the faces of the Irish before Oliver stepped onto the field to attempt a 51-yard field goal, bizarrely, it stopped just before Oliver kicked. The ball was snapped, the hold was good and Oliver made solid contact. The ball carried through the air true and cleared the crossbar by mere inches as time expired. The Irish had won the game 29-27, one of the great victories in the program's history. Oliver was mobbed by his green-clad teammates and countless Irish fans who had stormed the field. Irish defensive tackle Pat Kramer later said, "This could only happen here."
This year, the stakes are not quite as high as they were in 1980, but still the emotion of this series runs high. Given, with the way things are for both Notre Dame and Michigan this year, Knute Rockne and Fielding Yost must be turning over in their graves. Since the 1880s Notre Dame and Michigan have been playing college football, and in all those years, the schools had never started the same season 0-2 before now. What makes this statistical aberration all the more interesting is that the ancient rivals now will square off with identical 0-2 records. Aside from the six times that the schools faced off in season-opening games, Notre Dame and Michigan have never met as winless teams.
Nevertheless, it is Notre Dame-Michigan week. This dysfunctional and emotionally-charged series has been played, off and on, since 1887. On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving in 1887, Michigan’s football team was on the way to Chicago for a game against the Harvard Club of Chicago the following day. Making a pre-arranged stop in Niles, Michigan, they took horse-drawn carriages down to Notre Dame’s campus. There, they taught some of the students there the game of football before taking a tour of the campus and eating a meal before continuing on to Chicago. That day’s “game” was more of a scrimmage than anything, but Notre Dame gave Michigan a tough match-up before falling, 8-0.
Michigan was integral to Notre Dame’s early football history, perhaps evidenced in no better way than the fact that not only was Michigan Notre Dame’s opponent in the school’s first game, but also in N.D.’s second and third games, played on consecutive days in April of 1888. In those early days Notre Dame measured itself against Michigan, seeking validation from playing (and hopefully defeating) the power team in the Midwest in those days. Understandably, Michigan did not reciprocate, choosing to focus its energies on playing other large state schools in the Midwest, as well as the great teams from the Ivy League.
Still, Notre Dame and Michigan would play off and on throughout the 1890s and 1900s, nine times in all from 1887 through 1909. Michigan prevailed in each of the first eight games, effectively keeping their thumb on the small Catholic school and its upstart football program. In 1909, however, the tides turned in Notre Dame’s favor. In prevailing over Michigan, 11-3, Notre Dame put its program on the map, and vanquished 22 years of football frustration. Michigan’s great coach, Yost, was a proud man and took the loss badly. After losing that game, Michigan would not schedule Notre Dame for another 32 years. Yost even took to using his clout within the Big Ten to prevent other conference members from scheduling Notre Dame. Ironically, by trying to stifle Notre Dame’s football program, Yost forced N.D. to branch out and play games outside of the Midwest, helping to lay the groundwork for its future popularity throughout the country.
A generation later, Notre Dame and Michigan would appear on each other’s schedules in 1942 and 1943. As two of the great programs in the 1940s, Michigan and Notre Dame, appropriately enough, split the two games. The 1943 game, played at Michigan Stadium, was the first to feature the teams ranked #1 and #2 in the Associated Press poll, a game the Irish won, 35-12. As the story goes, #1 Notre Dame defeated #2 Michigan so badly that Michigan coach Fritz Crisler refused to schedule Notre Dame again. His claim was that the Irish won by playing dirty. Notre Dame coaches and players responded with claims that Crisler was upset at losing so badly on his home field. Regardless of the reasons, once again the Notre Dame-Michigan series went on a long hiatus.
Only after Crisler’s death did Michigan place Notre Dame on its schedule again. The series resumed again in 1978. Since that time, the teams have been fixtures on each other’s schedules. Each September the schools separated by only 175 miles meet on the gridiron to renew one of the oldest rivalries in college football. Until modern times, this series was more defined by the long gaps between games than for action on the gridiron. Since 1978, however, the teams have played virtually every year with only periodic two-year breaks interrupting the series. In the past 29 years, the teams have played some truly spectacular games.
Michigan holds the lead in this series, 19-14-1, but Notre Dame holds the advantage in games since the series resumed in 1978, 12-10-1. Between 1987 and 1990 Notre Dame registered its longest-ever winning streak against Michigan, winning four straight games. The 1989 game was a #1 vs. #2 match-up and is remembered best for Irish flanker Raghib Ismail’s two kick returns for touchdowns at Michigan. In more recent years Notre Dame and Michigan both have had memorable wins. In 2003, for example, Michigan rolled up a series record 38-0 win over the hapless Irish, while in 2004 and 2005, underdog Notre Dame teams pulled out improbable wins over highly favored Michigan squads. Last season, #11 Michigan throttled the #2 Irish at home, 47-21, as several Irish miscues and great QB play by Chad Henne led to Wolverine victory.
/ / / / / / / / / / /
Other notes:
-Since 1985, 14 of the 18 series games played have been decided by ten points or less.
-The Irish have won three out of the last five games in this series, dating back to 2002.
-Saturday will be the first game since the AP poll started in 1936 not to feature a ranked team.
-Notre Dame and Michigan have split the previous twelve series games played at Michigan Stadium, dating back to 1943.
-Michigan (19-14-1) is one of only seven current Division I-A schools with a winning record against Notre Dame. The others are: Nebraska (8-7-1); Florida State (4-2-0); Ohio State (3-2-0); Oregon State (2-0-0); Georgia (1-0-0); and North Carolina State (1-0-0).
-With Saturday’s loss at Penn State, Notre Dame started a season 0-2 for only the seventh time in school history (1888, 1896, 1963, 1978, 1986, 2001, 2007).
-Notre Dame’s only 0-3 start came in 2001.
-Also on Saturday, Notre Dame lost its fourth consecutive game dating back to last season. This is the tenth losing streak of four games or longer in school history.
-During this four-game losing streak, the Irish have been outscored 149-51, a margin of 98 points. This is the worst point-differential of any four-game losing streak in the annals of Notre Dame football.
-Notre Dame has not lost five consecutive games since 1985-86, when the Irish lost the last three games of the Faust years, and the first two games of the Holtz Era.
-The only full-time Notre Dame head coaches to lose five or more games in a row are Terry Brennan (1954-58), who lost five straight in 1956, and Joe Kuharich (1959-62), who lost an inconceivable eight straight in 1960. It should be noted that neither coach was still at N.D. three seasons past their five-game losing streak.
-Notre Dame and Michigan recently agreed to an unprecedented 20-year extension of this series. They now are scheduled to continue meeting annually through 2031.
-These schools rank #1 and #2 in all-time winning percentage and all-time wins.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand after last week:
Unranked Michigan lost to unranked Oregon, 39-7, dropping their record to 860-284-36 for a winning percentage of .7441. This week, unranked Michigan hosts unranked Notre Dame.
Unranked Notre Dame lost at #14 Penn State, 31-10, dropping their record to 821-271-42 for a winning percentage of .7425. This represents Notre Dame’s lowest winning percentage since November 1910. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to unranked Michigan.
Michigan’s lead stands at 16/10,000ths of a point.
The game kicks off at 3:30 EDT on ABC.
Go Irish! Beat Wolverines!
Big Mike
Just for fun, compare these two calls of the famous Harry Oliver kick at N.D. in 1980:
-N.D.’s Tony Roberts: http://youtube.com/watch?v=5qiAEeudOs8
-UM’s Bob Ufer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRlk0QB4pUY
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
The 1980 game featured two ranked teams with #8 Notre Dame hosting #14 Michigan. On a perfect fall afternoon, the two schools played a tense back-and-forth game, serving as a prelude for many future games in this series. Michigan took the lead late in the game, 27-26, though they failed to convert a key two-point conversion. Starting on its own 23-yard line with 41 seconds to play, the Irish quickly moved down the field as QB Blair Kiel completed a number of clutch passes. With 0:03 showing on the clock, the Irish had gotten to the Michigan 34-yard line. There, Oliver, the skinny kicker from Cincinnati walked out onto the field. Oliver was seeking redemption, having missed a key extra point earlier in the game. Although the wind had been blowing into the faces of the Irish before Oliver stepped onto the field to attempt a 51-yard field goal, bizarrely, it stopped just before Oliver kicked. The ball was snapped, the hold was good and Oliver made solid contact. The ball carried through the air true and cleared the crossbar by mere inches as time expired. The Irish had won the game 29-27, one of the great victories in the program's history. Oliver was mobbed by his green-clad teammates and countless Irish fans who had stormed the field. Irish defensive tackle Pat Kramer later said, "This could only happen here."
This year, the stakes are not quite as high as they were in 1980, but still the emotion of this series runs high. Given, with the way things are for both Notre Dame and Michigan this year, Knute Rockne and Fielding Yost must be turning over in their graves. Since the 1880s Notre Dame and Michigan have been playing college football, and in all those years, the schools had never started the same season 0-2 before now. What makes this statistical aberration all the more interesting is that the ancient rivals now will square off with identical 0-2 records. Aside from the six times that the schools faced off in season-opening games, Notre Dame and Michigan have never met as winless teams.
Nevertheless, it is Notre Dame-Michigan week. This dysfunctional and emotionally-charged series has been played, off and on, since 1887. On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving in 1887, Michigan’s football team was on the way to Chicago for a game against the Harvard Club of Chicago the following day. Making a pre-arranged stop in Niles, Michigan, they took horse-drawn carriages down to Notre Dame’s campus. There, they taught some of the students there the game of football before taking a tour of the campus and eating a meal before continuing on to Chicago. That day’s “game” was more of a scrimmage than anything, but Notre Dame gave Michigan a tough match-up before falling, 8-0.
Michigan was integral to Notre Dame’s early football history, perhaps evidenced in no better way than the fact that not only was Michigan Notre Dame’s opponent in the school’s first game, but also in N.D.’s second and third games, played on consecutive days in April of 1888. In those early days Notre Dame measured itself against Michigan, seeking validation from playing (and hopefully defeating) the power team in the Midwest in those days. Understandably, Michigan did not reciprocate, choosing to focus its energies on playing other large state schools in the Midwest, as well as the great teams from the Ivy League.
Still, Notre Dame and Michigan would play off and on throughout the 1890s and 1900s, nine times in all from 1887 through 1909. Michigan prevailed in each of the first eight games, effectively keeping their thumb on the small Catholic school and its upstart football program. In 1909, however, the tides turned in Notre Dame’s favor. In prevailing over Michigan, 11-3, Notre Dame put its program on the map, and vanquished 22 years of football frustration. Michigan’s great coach, Yost, was a proud man and took the loss badly. After losing that game, Michigan would not schedule Notre Dame for another 32 years. Yost even took to using his clout within the Big Ten to prevent other conference members from scheduling Notre Dame. Ironically, by trying to stifle Notre Dame’s football program, Yost forced N.D. to branch out and play games outside of the Midwest, helping to lay the groundwork for its future popularity throughout the country.
A generation later, Notre Dame and Michigan would appear on each other’s schedules in 1942 and 1943. As two of the great programs in the 1940s, Michigan and Notre Dame, appropriately enough, split the two games. The 1943 game, played at Michigan Stadium, was the first to feature the teams ranked #1 and #2 in the Associated Press poll, a game the Irish won, 35-12. As the story goes, #1 Notre Dame defeated #2 Michigan so badly that Michigan coach Fritz Crisler refused to schedule Notre Dame again. His claim was that the Irish won by playing dirty. Notre Dame coaches and players responded with claims that Crisler was upset at losing so badly on his home field. Regardless of the reasons, once again the Notre Dame-Michigan series went on a long hiatus.
Only after Crisler’s death did Michigan place Notre Dame on its schedule again. The series resumed again in 1978. Since that time, the teams have been fixtures on each other’s schedules. Each September the schools separated by only 175 miles meet on the gridiron to renew one of the oldest rivalries in college football. Until modern times, this series was more defined by the long gaps between games than for action on the gridiron. Since 1978, however, the teams have played virtually every year with only periodic two-year breaks interrupting the series. In the past 29 years, the teams have played some truly spectacular games.
Michigan holds the lead in this series, 19-14-1, but Notre Dame holds the advantage in games since the series resumed in 1978, 12-10-1. Between 1987 and 1990 Notre Dame registered its longest-ever winning streak against Michigan, winning four straight games. The 1989 game was a #1 vs. #2 match-up and is remembered best for Irish flanker Raghib Ismail’s two kick returns for touchdowns at Michigan. In more recent years Notre Dame and Michigan both have had memorable wins. In 2003, for example, Michigan rolled up a series record 38-0 win over the hapless Irish, while in 2004 and 2005, underdog Notre Dame teams pulled out improbable wins over highly favored Michigan squads. Last season, #11 Michigan throttled the #2 Irish at home, 47-21, as several Irish miscues and great QB play by Chad Henne led to Wolverine victory.
/ / / / / / / / / / /
Other notes:
-Since 1985, 14 of the 18 series games played have been decided by ten points or less.
-The Irish have won three out of the last five games in this series, dating back to 2002.
-Saturday will be the first game since the AP poll started in 1936 not to feature a ranked team.
-Notre Dame and Michigan have split the previous twelve series games played at Michigan Stadium, dating back to 1943.
-Michigan (19-14-1) is one of only seven current Division I-A schools with a winning record against Notre Dame. The others are: Nebraska (8-7-1); Florida State (4-2-0); Ohio State (3-2-0); Oregon State (2-0-0); Georgia (1-0-0); and North Carolina State (1-0-0).
-With Saturday’s loss at Penn State, Notre Dame started a season 0-2 for only the seventh time in school history (1888, 1896, 1963, 1978, 1986, 2001, 2007).
-Notre Dame’s only 0-3 start came in 2001.
-Also on Saturday, Notre Dame lost its fourth consecutive game dating back to last season. This is the tenth losing streak of four games or longer in school history.
-During this four-game losing streak, the Irish have been outscored 149-51, a margin of 98 points. This is the worst point-differential of any four-game losing streak in the annals of Notre Dame football.
-Notre Dame has not lost five consecutive games since 1985-86, when the Irish lost the last three games of the Faust years, and the first two games of the Holtz Era.
-The only full-time Notre Dame head coaches to lose five or more games in a row are Terry Brennan (1954-58), who lost five straight in 1956, and Joe Kuharich (1959-62), who lost an inconceivable eight straight in 1960. It should be noted that neither coach was still at N.D. three seasons past their five-game losing streak.
-Notre Dame and Michigan recently agreed to an unprecedented 20-year extension of this series. They now are scheduled to continue meeting annually through 2031.
-These schools rank #1 and #2 in all-time winning percentage and all-time wins.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand after last week:
Unranked Michigan lost to unranked Oregon, 39-7, dropping their record to 860-284-36 for a winning percentage of .7441. This week, unranked Michigan hosts unranked Notre Dame.
Unranked Notre Dame lost at #14 Penn State, 31-10, dropping their record to 821-271-42 for a winning percentage of .7425. This represents Notre Dame’s lowest winning percentage since November 1910. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to unranked Michigan.
Michigan’s lead stands at 16/10,000ths of a point.
The game kicks off at 3:30 EDT on ABC.
Go Irish! Beat Wolverines!
Big Mike
Just for fun, compare these two calls of the famous Harry Oliver kick at N.D. in 1980:
-N.D.’s Tony Roberts: http://youtube.com/watch?v=5qiAEeudOs8
-UM’s Bob Ufer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRlk0QB4pUY
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Notre Dame vs. Penn State
By the end of the 1973 college football season, Ara Parseghian had done it again. Seven seasons after leading his Notre Dame football squad to the 1966 national championship, Parseghian led his Irish to victory over #1 Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, securing his second national title, and the school's first perfect season since 1949.
While Parseghian enjoyed his second national title, Joe Paterno, Penn State's head coach since 1966, had completed his third perfect season in eight years as the Lions' head coach. And, for the third time, Paterno's Lions had failed to win the national title. Because of Penn State's notoriously soft schedules in those days, the Lions were left out in the cold when the final polls came out each year.
Paterno, who also served as Penn State's athletic director for a number of years, realized that the weakness of his schedules had to be addressed. Part of the solution came in the form of the very school that deprived Penn State of the national title in 1973. At the end of the 1976 season, Notre Dame met Penn State in the Gator Bowl. Although Notre Dame defeated Penn State, 20-9, the game rekindled a long-dormant series, sowing the seeds for a series renewal that would help define both programs in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Prior to the Gator Bowl, the schools had only played four times between 1913 and 1928, with Notre Dame chalking up a 3-0-1 record in those games. Despite a 48-year hiatus, however, the bowl game generated tremendous interest among the fan bases of both schools. As two proud football independents, a future series seemed like a match made in Heaven. Following the game, Paterno and the legendary Edward "Moose" Krause, Notre Dame's longtime athletic director, started discussions into scheduling a series between the schools. They agreed to an ambitious twelve-game series that would commence in 1981. . . .
Notre Dame and Penn State are two of college football's traditional powers, which makes the brief pre-1981 series history all the more surprising. The schools first played in 1913 at New Beaver Field in State College. Notre Dame won that first game, 14-7, and went 4-0-1 in the first five games in the series. The Lions would not register their first win in the series until 1981, when JoePa's boys defeated Gerry Faust's Irish, 24-21. Overall, the Irish hold a tenuous lead in the series with a 9-8-1 record overall.
The Lions dominated the series throughout most of the 1980s, winning six of the first seven games after the series was revived. Notre Dame finally got back on track by winning in back-to-back seasons against Penn State in 1988 and 1989. The Irish win in 1988 was the home finale of that season's national championship team, while the Irish win at State College in 1989 was the final victory in Notre Dame's school-record 23-game winning streak. Penn State rebounded in 1990 and 1991 with two more victories over the Irish.
In 1992, the curtain was falling on the series that had helped to define the two programs for the past 12 seasons. Penn State would join the Big Ten Conference the next year, but made one final trip to South Bend to play as a football independent against Notre Dame. Played in temperatures just below freezing with snow falling periodically throughout the game, the game was tense, as both teams struggled to score in the wintry conditions. Trailing 16-9 late in the game, Irish QB Rick Mirer led a late drive, culminating with a TD pass to RB Jerome Bettis. Still trailing 16-15, the Irish opted to go for the win. The resulting play, a scrambling pass from Mirer into the hands of a diving Reggie Brooks, instantly became one of the most famous plays in school history. The successful two-point conversion gave the Irish a 17-16 win before sending the series back into another dormant period.
The series resumed last year in South Bend. On a bright sunny day that was the complete opposite of the last time the teams had met, Brady Quinn and the #4 Irish pounded the #19 Nittany Lions, 41-17. It was the most convincing win in the series since the Lions registered a 30-point win over the Irish in 1985.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-Notre Dame has won four out of the last six games in this series, dating back to 1988.
-Saturday's game will be the first in the series since 1988 in which one of the teams is not ranked.
-Saturday will mark Notre Dame's first visit to Beaver Stadium since 1991. That year, the #12 Irish fell to the #8 Lions, 35-13, in one of the worst losses in the Holtz Era.
-State College has not been kind to the Irish, historically. Since Knute Rockne led them to victory there in 1926, the Irish have won there only once. In 1989, the #1 Irish won at Beaver Stadium, beating the #17 Lions, 34-23. Overall, Notre Dame's record at the current Beaver Stadium is 1-5.
-Among current Division I-A schools, Notre Dame and Penn State rank #2 and #10 in all-time winning percentage and #2 and #7 in all-time wins, respectively.
-Penn State's mascot, the "Nittany Lion," is a reference to the mountain lions that once roamed Mount Nittany near the campus of Penn State University.
-Last Saturday's 33-3 Irish loss at home to Georgia Tech ranks as the worst season-opening loss in the 119 seasons of Notre Dame football. The previous worst season-opening loss came in 1976, when the #11 Irish lost by 21 at home to #9 Pittsburgh.
-Saturday's 30-point defeat was also the sixth worst home loss in school history.
-A loss on Saturday would give the Irish four consecutive losses for the first time since 2001. That streak started with a Fiesta Bowl loss to Oregon State, and included losses at Nebraska, at home to Michigan State, and at Texas A&M.
-Jimmy Clausen is slated to become the first true freshman to start at QB for the Irish since Brady Quinn at Purdue in 2003.
-Charlie Weis is 8-1 (.889) in road games. His first loss on the road was last season's finale at Southern Cal.
-These teams are currently not scheduled to meet again.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand after last week:
#5 Michigan lost at home to I-AA powerhouse Appalachian State, 34-32, dropping their record to 860-283-36 for a winning percentage of .7447. It was the first time that a I-AA school had ever defeated a ranked I-A school. This week, unranked Michigan hosts unranked Oregon.
Unranked Notre Dame lost at home to unranked Georgia Tech, 33-3, dropping their record to 821-270-42 for a winning percentage of .7432. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to #14 Penn State.
Michigan's lead remains at 15/10,000ths of a point.
One final note about last weekend: it marked the first time since 1934 (and only the second time EVER) that Notre Dame and Michigan both started their seasons with a loss.
This week's game kicks off at 6:00 EDT on ESPN.
Go Irish! Beat Lions!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
While Parseghian enjoyed his second national title, Joe Paterno, Penn State's head coach since 1966, had completed his third perfect season in eight years as the Lions' head coach. And, for the third time, Paterno's Lions had failed to win the national title. Because of Penn State's notoriously soft schedules in those days, the Lions were left out in the cold when the final polls came out each year.
Paterno, who also served as Penn State's athletic director for a number of years, realized that the weakness of his schedules had to be addressed. Part of the solution came in the form of the very school that deprived Penn State of the national title in 1973. At the end of the 1976 season, Notre Dame met Penn State in the Gator Bowl. Although Notre Dame defeated Penn State, 20-9, the game rekindled a long-dormant series, sowing the seeds for a series renewal that would help define both programs in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Prior to the Gator Bowl, the schools had only played four times between 1913 and 1928, with Notre Dame chalking up a 3-0-1 record in those games. Despite a 48-year hiatus, however, the bowl game generated tremendous interest among the fan bases of both schools. As two proud football independents, a future series seemed like a match made in Heaven. Following the game, Paterno and the legendary Edward "Moose" Krause, Notre Dame's longtime athletic director, started discussions into scheduling a series between the schools. They agreed to an ambitious twelve-game series that would commence in 1981. . . .
Notre Dame and Penn State are two of college football's traditional powers, which makes the brief pre-1981 series history all the more surprising. The schools first played in 1913 at New Beaver Field in State College. Notre Dame won that first game, 14-7, and went 4-0-1 in the first five games in the series. The Lions would not register their first win in the series until 1981, when JoePa's boys defeated Gerry Faust's Irish, 24-21. Overall, the Irish hold a tenuous lead in the series with a 9-8-1 record overall.
The Lions dominated the series throughout most of the 1980s, winning six of the first seven games after the series was revived. Notre Dame finally got back on track by winning in back-to-back seasons against Penn State in 1988 and 1989. The Irish win in 1988 was the home finale of that season's national championship team, while the Irish win at State College in 1989 was the final victory in Notre Dame's school-record 23-game winning streak. Penn State rebounded in 1990 and 1991 with two more victories over the Irish.
In 1992, the curtain was falling on the series that had helped to define the two programs for the past 12 seasons. Penn State would join the Big Ten Conference the next year, but made one final trip to South Bend to play as a football independent against Notre Dame. Played in temperatures just below freezing with snow falling periodically throughout the game, the game was tense, as both teams struggled to score in the wintry conditions. Trailing 16-9 late in the game, Irish QB Rick Mirer led a late drive, culminating with a TD pass to RB Jerome Bettis. Still trailing 16-15, the Irish opted to go for the win. The resulting play, a scrambling pass from Mirer into the hands of a diving Reggie Brooks, instantly became one of the most famous plays in school history. The successful two-point conversion gave the Irish a 17-16 win before sending the series back into another dormant period.
The series resumed last year in South Bend. On a bright sunny day that was the complete opposite of the last time the teams had met, Brady Quinn and the #4 Irish pounded the #19 Nittany Lions, 41-17. It was the most convincing win in the series since the Lions registered a 30-point win over the Irish in 1985.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-Notre Dame has won four out of the last six games in this series, dating back to 1988.
-Saturday's game will be the first in the series since 1988 in which one of the teams is not ranked.
-Saturday will mark Notre Dame's first visit to Beaver Stadium since 1991. That year, the #12 Irish fell to the #8 Lions, 35-13, in one of the worst losses in the Holtz Era.
-State College has not been kind to the Irish, historically. Since Knute Rockne led them to victory there in 1926, the Irish have won there only once. In 1989, the #1 Irish won at Beaver Stadium, beating the #17 Lions, 34-23. Overall, Notre Dame's record at the current Beaver Stadium is 1-5.
-Among current Division I-A schools, Notre Dame and Penn State rank #2 and #10 in all-time winning percentage and #2 and #7 in all-time wins, respectively.
-Penn State's mascot, the "Nittany Lion," is a reference to the mountain lions that once roamed Mount Nittany near the campus of Penn State University.
-Last Saturday's 33-3 Irish loss at home to Georgia Tech ranks as the worst season-opening loss in the 119 seasons of Notre Dame football. The previous worst season-opening loss came in 1976, when the #11 Irish lost by 21 at home to #9 Pittsburgh.
-Saturday's 30-point defeat was also the sixth worst home loss in school history.
-A loss on Saturday would give the Irish four consecutive losses for the first time since 2001. That streak started with a Fiesta Bowl loss to Oregon State, and included losses at Nebraska, at home to Michigan State, and at Texas A&M.
-Jimmy Clausen is slated to become the first true freshman to start at QB for the Irish since Brady Quinn at Purdue in 2003.
-Charlie Weis is 8-1 (.889) in road games. His first loss on the road was last season's finale at Southern Cal.
-These teams are currently not scheduled to meet again.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand after last week:
#5 Michigan lost at home to I-AA powerhouse Appalachian State, 34-32, dropping their record to 860-283-36 for a winning percentage of .7447. It was the first time that a I-AA school had ever defeated a ranked I-A school. This week, unranked Michigan hosts unranked Oregon.
Unranked Notre Dame lost at home to unranked Georgia Tech, 33-3, dropping their record to 821-270-42 for a winning percentage of .7432. This week, unranked Notre Dame travels to #14 Penn State.
Michigan's lead remains at 15/10,000ths of a point.
One final note about last weekend: it marked the first time since 1934 (and only the second time EVER) that Notre Dame and Michigan both started their seasons with a loss.
This week's game kicks off at 6:00 EDT on ESPN.
Go Irish! Beat Lions!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Notre Dame vs. Georgia Tech
Frank Leahy was an intriguing man and brilliant coach. In eleven seasons at N.D., he won four national titles, and coached six undefeated teams. While he won 86.4% of his games as a head coach (second all-time behind only his mentor, Knute Rockne), by the time the 1953 season commenced at N.D., Leahy’s run at the school was about to come to an end. The sequence of events that led to his departure started during an October afternoon in South Bend when the Irish were playing traditional foe, Georgia Tech.
From the start of his time at Notre Dame in 1941 through the end of the 1949 season, Leahy had reasserted N.D.’s claim as the preeminent program in the country. Before joining the Navy during World War II, Leahy led the Irish to the national title in 1943, the program’s first since 1930. After he returned from the military in 1946, Leahy’s teams did not lose for the remainder of the decade. From 1946 through the end of the 1949 season, the Irish went an amazing 36-0-2, and won three national titles, finishing #2 in 1948. Overall, he won four national titles in his first eight seasons as head coach. Going into the 1950s, the road to continued unprecedented domination of college football seemed set.
Things did not happen that way, however. Several factors combined in the 1950 season to derail Leahy’s juggernaut, including university-imposed scholarship reductions, injuries, and the changing composition of Leahy’s players. By 1950, gone were the World War II veterans that comprised Leahy’s greatest teams. In 1950, the Irish stumbled to a 4-4-1 record. For Leahy, whose Irish squads had racked up a 60-3-5 (.919) record between 1941 and 1949, the losing took a devastating toll. He took each loss as a personal failure, as if he himself were letting down the school, alumni, fans, and even the Almighty Himself.
After back-to-back 7-2-1 seasons in 1951 and 1952, decent seasons by anyone’s reckoning except Leahy’s, the Irish looked to get back on track in 1953. After a season-opening win against #6 Oklahoma (Oklahoma’s last loss before their record-setting 47-game winning streak), the Irish looked ahead to a showdown against Georgia Tech at Notre Dame in their fourth game of the season.
In those days, Georgia Tech was a formidable power. Since 1950 they had gone undefeated in 31 straight games, going 29-0-2 along the way. Coach Bobby Dodd’s Jackets were a powerful team, outscoring their opposition 325-59 on their way to a 12-0 record in 1952. In several polls, they had been named national champions in both the 1951 and 1952 seasons.
Heading into the game, Notre Dame was ranked #1 with a 3-0 record, while Georgia Tech was ranked #4 with a record of 4-0-1. The game was hard-fought throughout the first half, as the defenses did a good job of keeping the opposition out of the endzone. Notre Dame’s team that year featured a formidable offense that broke the 30-point plateau five times in their ten-game schedule, but Tech’s defense did a good job of containing QB Ralph Guglielmi and RB Johnny Lattner, that season’s Heisman Trophy winner. Near the end of the first half, however, the Irish finally managed to score the game’s first touchdown. They went to the locker room with a tenuous 7-0 lead. Then, one of the most bizarre episodes in the annals of Notre Dame football occurred.
Many of Leahy’s friends had long been concerned about the coach’s anxiety during games and what it might do to his health. At halftime of the George Tech game, those fears were finally realized. The 46-year-old Leahy collapsed in the locker room, downed by a pancreatic attack. Fearing the worst, the team chaplain administered the Last Rites to the coach on the floor of the locker room in Notre Dame Stadium. Meanwhile, the players were confused by this turn of events. Many were sons of former Notre Dame players from the Rockne Era and, having heard so many stories of how Rock would pull fast ones on his players as a way to motivate them, several players thought that Leahy was faking it. Only when the coach was carted away in an ambulance did the gravity of the situation set in.
Many of the players returned to the field with tears in their eyes, and were motivated by the concern about their coach’s health. What had been a close game for the first two quarters turned into a relatively easy victory for Notre Dame, as the Irish racked up a 27-14 win. The Jackets’ 31-game unbeaten streak had come to an end, and the Irish were in the driver’s seat for a fifth national title in the Leahy Era.
In the wake of the Georgia Tech victory, Leahy would recover, and lead the Irish to a 9-0-1 finish that year. The controversial nature of that one tie led pollsters to choose 10-1-0 Maryland as that season’s national champion, leaving the undefeated Irish at #2. Still, Leahy had registered a sixth undefeated season in 11 years at Notre Dame. After the 1953 season came to a close, however, the Leahy Era ended. A new university president, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, had grand visions for building Notre Dame into a great national university, and felt that Leahy’s titanic presence undermined that mission. Using Leahy’s health as a cover story, the administration of Notre Dame let their four-time national champion coach go, replacing him with the 25-year-old coach of the freshman team, Terry Brennan. With the legendary Leahy gone, the Notre Dame program faded into obscurity, from which it would not emerge for ten years….
For a series with two schools that are separated by some 600 miles, Notre Dame and Georgia Tech share an interesting and colorful gridiron history. Since the first series game in Atlanta in 1922, Notre Dame and Georgia Tech have played 33 times, making the Jackets one of the ten most frequent opponents on Notre Dame schedules through the years. Overall, the Irish hold a 27-5-1 advantage over the Yellow Jackets in the all-time series. Notre Dame is 15-2-0 in series games played at Notre Dame.
Given the strong tradition that both teams bring to this game, it is not surprising that they have played a number of memorable games. For movie aficionados, the 1975 game featured a 24-3 Irish victory, including a game-ending sack by Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger, later immortalized in the 1993 film Rudy. In 1978, QB Joe Montana and the visiting Irish dodged empty liquor bottles and other projectiles thrown by rowdy Tech fans for long enough to notch a 38-21 victory. Late in the 1980 season, a Tech squad that would finish the season 1-9-1 tied the #1 Irish, 3-3, at Georgia Tech, derailing Notre Dame's hopes for a national title that year. More recently, Notre Dame defeated Tech in 1997 in the Notre Dame Stadium Rededication Game, 17-13. The following season, the Jackets defeated the green jersey-clad Irish, 35-28, in the Gator Bowl following the 1998 season. Last season, Brady Quinn and the #2 Irish traveled to Georgia Tech for the 2006 season opener. After fighting through a tough first half in front of a hostile crowd, the Irish managed to pull out a 14-10 victory in Atlanta.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-The Irish have won 17 of their last 21 season openers, dating back to the start of the Holtz Era in 1986. The only four years during that period in which they failed to start the season with a win were: 1986, when the Irish lost to Michigan at home, 24-23; 1995, when they lost to Northwestern at home, 17-15; 2001, when they lost at Nebraska, 27-10; and 2004, when they lost at Brigham Young, 20-17.
-This is the first time the Irish are starting a season at home since 2003, when they opened at home with Washington State. The Irish won that game, 29-26, in overtime.
-The Irish are 8-2-1 in the last eleven series games against Georgia Tech, dating back to 1974.
-Georgia Tech has not won at Notre Dame since notching a 28-13 victory in 1959. Their only other win at Notre Dame came in 1942.
-The Irish have opened three other seasons with games against the Yellow Jackets: 1974; the 1997 Rededication Game at Notre Dame Stadium; and last season in Atlanta. Notre Dame won all three games.
-Notre Dame has an all-time record of 99-14-5 (.860) in season opening games.
-The last time the Irish started a season unranked was 2005. That team started the season 4-2 on the way to a final record of 9-3.
-The last time the Irish had a first-time starter at QB in their season opener was 2000, when Arnaz Battle started in an Irish win over Texas A&M at N.D.
-Charlie Weis’s record at home is 10-3 (.769), while his September record is 7-2 (.778). Overall, he is 19-6 (.760) through his first two seasons.
- Bob Davie (1997-2001) was 16-9 (.640) through two years, while Ty Willingham (2002-04) was 15-10 (.600) during the same timeframe.
-Charlie Weis already has 19 wins as head coach at Notre Dame. Ty Willingham had 21 wins in his entire three-year career at the school.
-These schools have no future games scheduled at this time.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand going into the 2007 season:
Michigan finished 11-2 last year, moving their record to 860-282-36 for an all-time winning percentage of .7453. This week, #5 Michigan opens at home against Division I-AA powerhouse Appalachian State.
Notre Dame finished 10-3 last year, moving their record to 821-269-42 for an all-time winning percentage of .7438. This week, unranked Notre Dame opens at home against unranked Georgia Tech.
Michigan's lead over Notre Dame stands at 15/10,000ths of a point, the equivalent of a two-game lead for the Wolverines.
The 119th season of Notre Dame football kicks off on Saturday afternoon at 3:30 EDT on NBC.
Go Irish! Beat Jackets!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
From the start of his time at Notre Dame in 1941 through the end of the 1949 season, Leahy had reasserted N.D.’s claim as the preeminent program in the country. Before joining the Navy during World War II, Leahy led the Irish to the national title in 1943, the program’s first since 1930. After he returned from the military in 1946, Leahy’s teams did not lose for the remainder of the decade. From 1946 through the end of the 1949 season, the Irish went an amazing 36-0-2, and won three national titles, finishing #2 in 1948. Overall, he won four national titles in his first eight seasons as head coach. Going into the 1950s, the road to continued unprecedented domination of college football seemed set.
Things did not happen that way, however. Several factors combined in the 1950 season to derail Leahy’s juggernaut, including university-imposed scholarship reductions, injuries, and the changing composition of Leahy’s players. By 1950, gone were the World War II veterans that comprised Leahy’s greatest teams. In 1950, the Irish stumbled to a 4-4-1 record. For Leahy, whose Irish squads had racked up a 60-3-5 (.919) record between 1941 and 1949, the losing took a devastating toll. He took each loss as a personal failure, as if he himself were letting down the school, alumni, fans, and even the Almighty Himself.
After back-to-back 7-2-1 seasons in 1951 and 1952, decent seasons by anyone’s reckoning except Leahy’s, the Irish looked to get back on track in 1953. After a season-opening win against #6 Oklahoma (Oklahoma’s last loss before their record-setting 47-game winning streak), the Irish looked ahead to a showdown against Georgia Tech at Notre Dame in their fourth game of the season.
In those days, Georgia Tech was a formidable power. Since 1950 they had gone undefeated in 31 straight games, going 29-0-2 along the way. Coach Bobby Dodd’s Jackets were a powerful team, outscoring their opposition 325-59 on their way to a 12-0 record in 1952. In several polls, they had been named national champions in both the 1951 and 1952 seasons.
Heading into the game, Notre Dame was ranked #1 with a 3-0 record, while Georgia Tech was ranked #4 with a record of 4-0-1. The game was hard-fought throughout the first half, as the defenses did a good job of keeping the opposition out of the endzone. Notre Dame’s team that year featured a formidable offense that broke the 30-point plateau five times in their ten-game schedule, but Tech’s defense did a good job of containing QB Ralph Guglielmi and RB Johnny Lattner, that season’s Heisman Trophy winner. Near the end of the first half, however, the Irish finally managed to score the game’s first touchdown. They went to the locker room with a tenuous 7-0 lead. Then, one of the most bizarre episodes in the annals of Notre Dame football occurred.
Many of Leahy’s friends had long been concerned about the coach’s anxiety during games and what it might do to his health. At halftime of the George Tech game, those fears were finally realized. The 46-year-old Leahy collapsed in the locker room, downed by a pancreatic attack. Fearing the worst, the team chaplain administered the Last Rites to the coach on the floor of the locker room in Notre Dame Stadium. Meanwhile, the players were confused by this turn of events. Many were sons of former Notre Dame players from the Rockne Era and, having heard so many stories of how Rock would pull fast ones on his players as a way to motivate them, several players thought that Leahy was faking it. Only when the coach was carted away in an ambulance did the gravity of the situation set in.
Many of the players returned to the field with tears in their eyes, and were motivated by the concern about their coach’s health. What had been a close game for the first two quarters turned into a relatively easy victory for Notre Dame, as the Irish racked up a 27-14 win. The Jackets’ 31-game unbeaten streak had come to an end, and the Irish were in the driver’s seat for a fifth national title in the Leahy Era.
In the wake of the Georgia Tech victory, Leahy would recover, and lead the Irish to a 9-0-1 finish that year. The controversial nature of that one tie led pollsters to choose 10-1-0 Maryland as that season’s national champion, leaving the undefeated Irish at #2. Still, Leahy had registered a sixth undefeated season in 11 years at Notre Dame. After the 1953 season came to a close, however, the Leahy Era ended. A new university president, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, had grand visions for building Notre Dame into a great national university, and felt that Leahy’s titanic presence undermined that mission. Using Leahy’s health as a cover story, the administration of Notre Dame let their four-time national champion coach go, replacing him with the 25-year-old coach of the freshman team, Terry Brennan. With the legendary Leahy gone, the Notre Dame program faded into obscurity, from which it would not emerge for ten years….
For a series with two schools that are separated by some 600 miles, Notre Dame and Georgia Tech share an interesting and colorful gridiron history. Since the first series game in Atlanta in 1922, Notre Dame and Georgia Tech have played 33 times, making the Jackets one of the ten most frequent opponents on Notre Dame schedules through the years. Overall, the Irish hold a 27-5-1 advantage over the Yellow Jackets in the all-time series. Notre Dame is 15-2-0 in series games played at Notre Dame.
Given the strong tradition that both teams bring to this game, it is not surprising that they have played a number of memorable games. For movie aficionados, the 1975 game featured a 24-3 Irish victory, including a game-ending sack by Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger, later immortalized in the 1993 film Rudy. In 1978, QB Joe Montana and the visiting Irish dodged empty liquor bottles and other projectiles thrown by rowdy Tech fans for long enough to notch a 38-21 victory. Late in the 1980 season, a Tech squad that would finish the season 1-9-1 tied the #1 Irish, 3-3, at Georgia Tech, derailing Notre Dame's hopes for a national title that year. More recently, Notre Dame defeated Tech in 1997 in the Notre Dame Stadium Rededication Game, 17-13. The following season, the Jackets defeated the green jersey-clad Irish, 35-28, in the Gator Bowl following the 1998 season. Last season, Brady Quinn and the #2 Irish traveled to Georgia Tech for the 2006 season opener. After fighting through a tough first half in front of a hostile crowd, the Irish managed to pull out a 14-10 victory in Atlanta.
\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \
Other notes:
-The Irish have won 17 of their last 21 season openers, dating back to the start of the Holtz Era in 1986. The only four years during that period in which they failed to start the season with a win were: 1986, when the Irish lost to Michigan at home, 24-23; 1995, when they lost to Northwestern at home, 17-15; 2001, when they lost at Nebraska, 27-10; and 2004, when they lost at Brigham Young, 20-17.
-This is the first time the Irish are starting a season at home since 2003, when they opened at home with Washington State. The Irish won that game, 29-26, in overtime.
-The Irish are 8-2-1 in the last eleven series games against Georgia Tech, dating back to 1974.
-Georgia Tech has not won at Notre Dame since notching a 28-13 victory in 1959. Their only other win at Notre Dame came in 1942.
-The Irish have opened three other seasons with games against the Yellow Jackets: 1974; the 1997 Rededication Game at Notre Dame Stadium; and last season in Atlanta. Notre Dame won all three games.
-Notre Dame has an all-time record of 99-14-5 (.860) in season opening games.
-The last time the Irish started a season unranked was 2005. That team started the season 4-2 on the way to a final record of 9-3.
-The last time the Irish had a first-time starter at QB in their season opener was 2000, when Arnaz Battle started in an Irish win over Texas A&M at N.D.
-Charlie Weis’s record at home is 10-3 (.769), while his September record is 7-2 (.778). Overall, he is 19-6 (.760) through his first two seasons.
- Bob Davie (1997-2001) was 16-9 (.640) through two years, while Ty Willingham (2002-04) was 15-10 (.600) during the same timeframe.
-Charlie Weis already has 19 wins as head coach at Notre Dame. Ty Willingham had 21 wins in his entire three-year career at the school.
-These schools have no future games scheduled at this time.
-In the ongoing competition between Michigan and Notre Dame for college football's all-time best winning percentage, here is where things stand going into the 2007 season:
Michigan finished 11-2 last year, moving their record to 860-282-36 for an all-time winning percentage of .7453. This week, #5 Michigan opens at home against Division I-AA powerhouse Appalachian State.
Notre Dame finished 10-3 last year, moving their record to 821-269-42 for an all-time winning percentage of .7438. This week, unranked Notre Dame opens at home against unranked Georgia Tech.
Michigan's lead over Notre Dame stands at 15/10,000ths of a point, the equivalent of a two-game lead for the Wolverines.
The 119th season of Notre Dame football kicks off on Saturday afternoon at 3:30 EDT on NBC.
Go Irish! Beat Jackets!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
Friday, April 06, 2007
Notre Dame Spring Football '07
It’s often said that great programs don’t rebuild they just reload.
In the world of college basketball, teams like UCLA, Kansas, Kentucky,
North Carolina, and Indiana seem to be able to always attract quality
talent. In the same way, the great college football programs seem to
be able to sustain excellence even when crops of excellent college
players have exhausted their eligibility.
For the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, sustaining excellence has been a
challenge in recent years for a variety of reasons. From the late
1980s through the early 1990s, former Irish coach Lou Holtz attracted
some of the best talent in the country. His teams from 1988 through
1993, a seven-year stretch, went 63-9-1 (.870) against some of the most
difficult schedules in the history of college football, winning one
national title and barely missing out on two others. Since that time,
however, it has been painfully obvious to fans of the Irish that the
N.D. program has been in a 13-year period of perpetual rebuilding,
unaccustomed territory for Notre Dame historically.
Consider this: during only one other period since 1913 have the Irish
been out of the national title picture for this long. Starting in
1954, and spanning the next ten seasons, Notre Dame would not seriously
contend for the national title. That streak came to an end in 1964,
when first-year Irish coach Ara Parseghian nearly took Notre Dame to
the national title before falling in the last minute in the season
finale at Southern Cal.
Since Jesse Harper became the program’s first true full-time head coach
in 1913, the Irish have had their ups and downs, having won more
consensus national titles than any program in college football history,
but also incurring their share of embarrassing seasons. Even the
incomparable Knute Rockne had to endure the rebuilding process on a
couple of occasions. In 1925, he dealt with the reality of having lost
the core of his 1924 national championship team, anchored by the “Four
Horsemen” backfield and the “Seven Mules” line. Despite a severely
depleted starting corps, he managed a 7-2-1 campaign, which he followed
with seasons of 9-1-0 and 7-1-0 in 1926 and 1927, respectively.
In 1928, Rock experienced his one truly miserable season under the
Golden Dome, going only 5-4-0. The team was a unit consisting of young
players mostly, and struggled against Notre Dame’s difficult schedule.
(That season’s most memorable moment came at halftime of the Army game,
when Rockne delivered his famous “Win One for the Gipper” speech.)
From the ashes of that five-win campaign, however, Rock would string
together perhaps his two greatest seasons, claiming consensus national
titles in 1929 and 1930, winning the last 19 games that he would ever
coach.
The game of college football has changed in many ways since the time of
Rockne, but excellence is still achieved in the same way. Coaches have
to land top-quality recruits, and then lead their recruits to victory
through capable coaching. Through the years, Notre Dame has had its
share of both great and lousy coaches, and most of them have been able
to funnel the built-in advantages of Notre Dame into recruiting top
talent. What seems to have differentiated the great coaches from the
not-so great ones, then, is their ability to manage a game, make
adjustments, and find a way to win, even when defeat seems inevitable.
Now we come to the upcoming 119th season of college football at Notre
Dame. Spring practice has been underway for the past several weeks,
and there are numerous questions to be tackled for Charlie Weis and his
staff. Unlike many of his predecessors, Weis did not come to Notre
Dame with an astounding amount of talent already in place. Next
season’s senior class, for example, has all of eight players remaining,
only two of whom have seen substantial playing time. Weis has been
able to make the most of his situation, however, helping to turn Brady
Quinn in a highly regarded quarterback, and making the previously
anonymous Jeff Samardzija a household name. (And with a name like
that, that’s saying quite a bit!)
Two thousand-seven will be an interesting season in many ways because
of the questions that have to be answered. Many of those questions
will be confronted this spring, while others may not be answered until
next season. Among the issues facing this program as spring practice
continues in South Bend:
-Who will step up to lead this team after the loss of the program’s
three most visible stars, namely, Quinn, Samardzija, and Darius Walker,
who declared early for this year’s NFL draft?
-With the importance of the quarterback position in Weis’s offense, who
will be the new starter? Redshirt-freshmen Zach Frazer and Demetrius
Jones, as well as last season’s backup junior Evan Sharpley will
compete for the position. The headliner, however, is this season’s
most highly-rated (and touted) recruit, Jimmy Clausen, whose brothers
both played QB at Tennessee, and whose career already has been highly
scrutinized.
-How will new Defensive Coordinator Corwin Brown’s 3-4 defensive scheme
be implemented, and will it help the Irish to stop the defensive
meltdowns that have been all too frequent in the last three seasons?
-In a similar light, will the much-maligned secondary finally improve
this year?
-How will Weis handle the increasingly crowded backfield with
luminaries such as Travis Thomas, James Aldrich, Munir Prince, and true
freshman Armando Allen vying for the starting spot? Apparently, that
question has been partially answered, as Prince is looking to move to
the secondary, where he was an All-State performer for DeSmet Jesuit
H.S. in St. Louis.
-With Weis’s recent announcement that the entire coaching staff would
be assisting in Special Teams, how will it effect that underwhelming
unit’s performance?
-In a question that feels like deja vu all over again, will the Irish
get a consistent kicking game going?
-Finally, how will this team, comprised of many freshmen and
sophomores, respond to this season’s poorly assembled schedule, which
features the team playing four of its first six games at tough venues,
and eight consecutive games to start the season without a bye?
This year’s spring practice is being scrutinized by Irish fans who are
curious to see what direction this team will go after last season’s
meltdowns in its final two games. The Blue & Gold Game is on April 21
in the House that Rockne Built.
Best wishes for a happy and healthy Easter celebration!
Go Irish!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
In the world of college basketball, teams like UCLA, Kansas, Kentucky,
North Carolina, and Indiana seem to be able to always attract quality
talent. In the same way, the great college football programs seem to
be able to sustain excellence even when crops of excellent college
players have exhausted their eligibility.
For the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, sustaining excellence has been a
challenge in recent years for a variety of reasons. From the late
1980s through the early 1990s, former Irish coach Lou Holtz attracted
some of the best talent in the country. His teams from 1988 through
1993, a seven-year stretch, went 63-9-1 (.870) against some of the most
difficult schedules in the history of college football, winning one
national title and barely missing out on two others. Since that time,
however, it has been painfully obvious to fans of the Irish that the
N.D. program has been in a 13-year period of perpetual rebuilding,
unaccustomed territory for Notre Dame historically.
Consider this: during only one other period since 1913 have the Irish
been out of the national title picture for this long. Starting in
1954, and spanning the next ten seasons, Notre Dame would not seriously
contend for the national title. That streak came to an end in 1964,
when first-year Irish coach Ara Parseghian nearly took Notre Dame to
the national title before falling in the last minute in the season
finale at Southern Cal.
Since Jesse Harper became the program’s first true full-time head coach
in 1913, the Irish have had their ups and downs, having won more
consensus national titles than any program in college football history,
but also incurring their share of embarrassing seasons. Even the
incomparable Knute Rockne had to endure the rebuilding process on a
couple of occasions. In 1925, he dealt with the reality of having lost
the core of his 1924 national championship team, anchored by the “Four
Horsemen” backfield and the “Seven Mules” line. Despite a severely
depleted starting corps, he managed a 7-2-1 campaign, which he followed
with seasons of 9-1-0 and 7-1-0 in 1926 and 1927, respectively.
In 1928, Rock experienced his one truly miserable season under the
Golden Dome, going only 5-4-0. The team was a unit consisting of young
players mostly, and struggled against Notre Dame’s difficult schedule.
(That season’s most memorable moment came at halftime of the Army game,
when Rockne delivered his famous “Win One for the Gipper” speech.)
From the ashes of that five-win campaign, however, Rock would string
together perhaps his two greatest seasons, claiming consensus national
titles in 1929 and 1930, winning the last 19 games that he would ever
coach.
The game of college football has changed in many ways since the time of
Rockne, but excellence is still achieved in the same way. Coaches have
to land top-quality recruits, and then lead their recruits to victory
through capable coaching. Through the years, Notre Dame has had its
share of both great and lousy coaches, and most of them have been able
to funnel the built-in advantages of Notre Dame into recruiting top
talent. What seems to have differentiated the great coaches from the
not-so great ones, then, is their ability to manage a game, make
adjustments, and find a way to win, even when defeat seems inevitable.
Now we come to the upcoming 119th season of college football at Notre
Dame. Spring practice has been underway for the past several weeks,
and there are numerous questions to be tackled for Charlie Weis and his
staff. Unlike many of his predecessors, Weis did not come to Notre
Dame with an astounding amount of talent already in place. Next
season’s senior class, for example, has all of eight players remaining,
only two of whom have seen substantial playing time. Weis has been
able to make the most of his situation, however, helping to turn Brady
Quinn in a highly regarded quarterback, and making the previously
anonymous Jeff Samardzija a household name. (And with a name like
that, that’s saying quite a bit!)
Two thousand-seven will be an interesting season in many ways because
of the questions that have to be answered. Many of those questions
will be confronted this spring, while others may not be answered until
next season. Among the issues facing this program as spring practice
continues in South Bend:
-Who will step up to lead this team after the loss of the program’s
three most visible stars, namely, Quinn, Samardzija, and Darius Walker,
who declared early for this year’s NFL draft?
-With the importance of the quarterback position in Weis’s offense, who
will be the new starter? Redshirt-freshmen Zach Frazer and Demetrius
Jones, as well as last season’s backup junior Evan Sharpley will
compete for the position. The headliner, however, is this season’s
most highly-rated (and touted) recruit, Jimmy Clausen, whose brothers
both played QB at Tennessee, and whose career already has been highly
scrutinized.
-How will new Defensive Coordinator Corwin Brown’s 3-4 defensive scheme
be implemented, and will it help the Irish to stop the defensive
meltdowns that have been all too frequent in the last three seasons?
-In a similar light, will the much-maligned secondary finally improve
this year?
-How will Weis handle the increasingly crowded backfield with
luminaries such as Travis Thomas, James Aldrich, Munir Prince, and true
freshman Armando Allen vying for the starting spot? Apparently, that
question has been partially answered, as Prince is looking to move to
the secondary, where he was an All-State performer for DeSmet Jesuit
H.S. in St. Louis.
-With Weis’s recent announcement that the entire coaching staff would
be assisting in Special Teams, how will it effect that underwhelming
unit’s performance?
-In a question that feels like deja vu all over again, will the Irish
get a consistent kicking game going?
-Finally, how will this team, comprised of many freshmen and
sophomores, respond to this season’s poorly assembled schedule, which
features the team playing four of its first six games at tough venues,
and eight consecutive games to start the season without a bye?
This year’s spring practice is being scrutinized by Irish fans who are
curious to see what direction this team will go after last season’s
meltdowns in its final two games. The Blue & Gold Game is on April 21
in the House that Rockne Built.
Best wishes for a happy and healthy Easter celebration!
Go Irish!
Big Mike
copyright Michael D. McAllister 2007
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