Ara Parseghian had come to Notre Dame in 1964 and immediately revived a program that had suffered through a miserable two-win campaign in 1963. Over Ara’s first seven seasons in South Bend, he finished in the national top 10 every year and won a national title in 1966. There was some slippage in 1971 and […]
Read about the 1989 Notre Dame-Michigan game, from the backdrop to the game itself to the aftermath.
The pressure was on for head coach Gerry Faust in his fourth year. His first three years in South Bend had failed to produce a major bowl bid. 1982 and 1983 were marked by November collapses. The 1984 Notre Dame football team had 17 starters coming back and expectations were that they could save the […]
Even though 1982 had ended on a dour note, with three straight losses ruining hopes for a major bowl bid, the 1983 Notre Dame football team entered the season with high hopes. It was the third year for head coach Gerry Faust, the team had shown significant improvement in his second season and pollsters were […]
After a rough rookie year in 1981, Gerry Faust’s second year on the sideline in South Bend was looking better. Notre Dame won big games and was poised to get to a major bowl. Then a late fade sent Faust and the Irish back to the drawing board. READ GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS The 1982 […]
The 1981 Notre Dame football team came into the season brimming with optimism. The program had won national titles as recently as 1973 and 1977. The 1980 Irish contended for #1 deep into the season. Even a coaching change didn’t dim the good feeling. In fact, the hiring of uber-optimistic Gerry Faust only enhanced it. […]
There was something magical about the third year of a Notre Dame football coach’s tenure. Ara Parseghian and Dan Devine had each won a national championship in Year Three. Brian Kelly reached the BCS National Championship Game in 2012. The 1988 Notre Dame football team is a part of that third-year magic, winning a national title for Lou Holtz.
The 1977 college football season defined by a dramatic January 2, when the four major bowl games were played. Two big blowouts created chaos and a controversial national champion.
The Georgia Bulldogs have been a pretty consistent winner over the years, but only once have they won the national championship. That came in the 1980 college football season, when a freshman running back named Herschel Walker came blazing onto the scene and transformed Georgia and the entire SEC for the three years he was in Athens.
The glorious legacy of Notre Dame football history is no secret. Neither are the program’s current struggles, at least relative to the expectations of a traditional national power. That’s what makes Lou Holtz’s tenure in South Bend, from 1986-96, stand out. The Last Golden Age is a season-by-season narrative on each year of the Holtz era
Brian Kelly’s tenure in South Bend began with a year that saw a slow start and strong finish on the football field, but was ultimately overshadowed by a tragedy in between. It was an emotional roller coaster for the 2010 Notre Dame football team as they began a new era. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS Start […]
The nation’s top two Catholic football-playing universities, Notre Dame and Boston College, meet on a reasonably regular basis. But when they played at the 1983 Liberty Bowl it was only the second time they’d met on the field. Here’s a look back on how the Jesuit schools found their way to Memphis in late December. […]