Notre Dame All-Time Bowl History

What is your favorite Notre Dame bowl memory?

Notre Dame has played in 41 bowl games all-time, a number that might seem low considering they’ve been playing football for over 130 years.  However, Notre Dame didn’t play in bowl games out of their belief in amateurism for over 40 years which means for a lot fewer bowl appearances than several other blue-blood programs.

There have been great triumphs and incredible heartbreakers both over those 41 games.

Legends were made, thrilling wins were had, and heartbreaking losses also occurred.

Check out the game-by-game history of Notre Dame in postseason bowl games below.

More Bowl Game History from the College Wire Network:

Alabama / Aub / Fla / LSU / Tenn. / UGA // Mich. / Mich St. / Ohio St. / Wisc. // Okla. / Texas // ND // USC

Notre Dame Football: All-Time Losingest Coaches

The program has lost more than 300 times in its history. So which coaches are responsible for most of those?

Notre Dame has a long football history that fans nationwide flock to.  “Win one for the Gipper”, the Four Horsemen, and the “Play Like a Champion Today” sign are all parts of Fighting Irish lore.  In that long football history that has been played at the university since an 8-0 loss to Michigan in November of 1887, it hasn’t always been national championships and 10-win seasons.

In fact, Notre Dame has lost a total of 330 times in the more than 13 decades they’ve been playing football.  We know which coaches won the most of those games as Brian Kelly set that record before leaving in 2021.  But who has lost the most as Notre Dame’s head coach?

Marcus Freeman isn’t there – yet – but with five in 13 career games he’s already in the top 16.

We went ahead and listed the the top 13 in program history as that’s how many have lost double-digit games at Notre Dame.  Here they are, the all-time losingest coaches at Notre Dame.

Notre Dame football: History of Notre Dame clues on ‘Jeopardy!’

Post how many you got right in the comments.

It has been established more than once on this site that I am fanatical about game shows. With Notre Dame athletics on hiatus until fall save for the track team at the NCAA championships, I have time to try ideas I’ve been wanting to try for a while now. One of them was planted in my head after our own Nick Shepkowski reported on a “Jeopardy!” category that was about ACC schools. I’ve decided to take that idea and narrow the focus to “Jeopardy!” clues about Notre Dame.

Using the site J-Archive, which has records of nearly every game during the show’s current run, I have come across several Notre Dame clues. Many of them were repeats because that’s what happens when you’ve been on for 39 years. However, I feel like I’ve compiled a diverse list of clues that you should be able to respond to if you have even a basic knowledge of Notre Dame, particularly the football program. Check the end of this list for the correct responses:

Should Chicago’s college football team try poaching another from Chicago’s Big Ten team?

Should Chicago’s college football team try to poach another from Chicago’s Big Ten team?

Notre Dame doesn’t use the transfer portal like Lincoln Riley and USC, as the Trojans have become college football’s version of shopping on Black Friday.  The end result may be great but the process in getting there makes you want to vomit.

Notre Dame has been known to pick their spots in the portal, however.  We’ve been tracking all the quarterbacks who enter the portal for obvious reasons, but a compelling non-quarterback entered Tuesday.  It’s especially compelling for Notre Dame because it’s a program just down the road that the Irish have poached a couple of talents from in recent years.

Malik Washington was Northwestern’s leading receiver this past season and entered the portal Tuesday.  He’s listed at 5-9, 180 pounds and although nobody would describe him as a burner, he consistently makes plays on the ball.  It should also be noted that perhaps no Power Five team has had less production from their quarterbacks in the past two seasons.

Washington hauled in 65 receptions for 694 yards (10.7 avg) this year, the sixth-highest total in the entire Big Ten.  He did find the end zone just once but then again, Northwestern threw for just 10 touchdowns all year.

Notre Dame had massive receiver issues this season as a sophomore [autotag]Lorenzo Styles[/autotag] was the only one to amass 300 yards.  If it wasn’t [autotag]Michael Mayer[/autotag] chances are it wasn’t getting done in the passing game and the group of receivers would certainly use some help and experience.

Wide receivers coach [autotag]Chansi Stuckey[/autotag] has the cavalry coming but counting on several underclassmen is a risk I certainly wouldn’t prefer taking.  Growth and development will help Styles, [autotag]Deion Colzie[/autotag], [autotag]Tobias Merriweather[/autotag], and the incoming freshman group, but it would certainly be nice to have some proven veteran experience as well and Washington would accomplish that.

And heck, [autotag]Ara Parseghian[/autotag], [autotag]Ben Skowronek[/autotag], and [autotag]Brandon Joseph[/autotag] all worked out alright so why not do it again?

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USC-Notre Dame classic photos from John McKay-Ara Parseghian glory days

.@IrishWireND would agree: The 1964-1974 11-Year War between John McKay and Ara Parseghian needs an @ESPN @30for30 documentary. #USC

When people talk about “the good old days,” such a longing for nostalgia can cloud the memory. When a person is quick to say how much better things were back then, it can simply be a longing for the innocence of childhood, or a return to a time when things were simpler. That can be a naive instinct. It might not be informed by reality or a mature understanding of a situation.

Human beings long to go back to what is comfortable, but that doesn’t necessarily mean things were actually better in the past. Emotions can — and do — overpower reason and rationality.

Yet, some times, things really and truly were better back in the day.

Consider the USC-Notre Dame football rivalry.

From 1964 through 1974, John McKay of the Trojans and Ara Parseghian of the Irish gave USC-Notre Dame 11 special games and a battle of iconic coaches who regularly competed for national titles.

Notre Dame won the national title in 1966 under Parseghian. USC won it all in 1967 under McKay.

USC won the national title in 1972. Notre Dame came back and won the national championship in 1973. USC won it in 1974.

Even after McKay and Parseghian left, the schools won natties in consecutive seasons yet again: Notre Dame in 1977 under Dan Devine, USC in 1978 under John Robinson.

The 1960s and 1970s were glory years for USC and Notre Dame. Relive their rivalry when it was at its height in these amazing photos:

Legendary college football coach Vince Dooley dead at 90

RIP to a legend.

Former Georgia head football coach and athletic director Vince Dooley died Friday at the age of 90.  Dooley had been hospitalized due to complications from COVID and pneumonia earlier this month.

Dooley is Georgia’s all-time winningest football coach and the fourth-winningest coach in the history of the SEC with the 201-77-10 mark he registered from 1964-1988.  Only Bear Bryant, Nick Saban, and Steve Spurrier won more games in SEC play.

Just how long was Dooley at Georgia?

For Notre Dame fans, which we’re guessing most of you reading this are seeing as this site is named Fighting Irish Wire, 1964 was also [autotag]Ara Parseghian[/autotag]’s first year in South Bend and 1988 was the third year of [autotag]Lou Holtz[/autotag], which happened to be Notre Dame’s last national championship team.

Dooley coached Georgia to the national championship in 1980 which they secured after beating Notre Dame 17-10 in the Sugar Bowl.  Until 2017, that was the only time Notre Dame and Georgia had ever met.

Dooley is survived by his wife of 62 years, Barbara, children Deanna, Daniel, Denise, and Derek, 11 grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to our friends at UGA Wire, the Georgia football family, and college football fans everywhere with the passing of an all-time great.

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Athlon Sports ranks greatest college football champs since 1968

Who is the greatest college football team you’ve ever seen?

Who is the greatest college football team since 1968?

Every college football fan has their own answer to that but for me it’s the 1995 Nebraska Cornhuskers.  They went 12-0 overall, weren’t challenged all season long as they won every game by at least 14 points, beat four top-10 teams by an average of 31.5 points per game.  Their style of play doesn’t fit what works in college football today but they were unstoppable in every sense of the word.

Athlon Sports recently ranked every college football team to win a championship since 1968 and as our colleagues at Cornhuskers Wire pointed out, they got the top overall team wrong.

I’ll make you click the link above to see the entire list but here are where Notre Dame’s champions since 1968 ranked (’73, ’77, ’88).

Notre Dame football: Ara Parseghian through the years

With there being 95 days until Notre Dame starts the 2022 season we take a look back at a legend who won 95 games as Notre Dame’s head football coach.

There are 95 days until Notre Dame opens the 2022 college football season at Ohio State and today we continue the countdown with a look back at [autotag]Ara Parseghian[/autotag] through the years as the legendary head coach won 95 games during his time with the Irish.

Notre Dame football was a shell of itself when it hired [autotag]Ara Parseghian[/autotag] following the 1963 season.  That year the Irish went just 2-7 under Hugh Devore and were seemingly light years away from the perennial national championship contender they once were.

Hired that year was Northwestern head coach Ara Parseghian who went 36-35-1 with the Wildcats which may not seem all that impressive but by comparison the program was just 7-28-2 in the four seasons before his hiring.  Parseghian also went 4-0 against Notre Dame in that time which certainly left an impact on the brass in South Bend.

1964 saw Parseghian lead an incredible turnaround as the Irish went 9-1 and were just minutes away from clinching a national championship before giving up a late touchdown at USC in the season’s final game.  Quarterback John Huarte was still named the Heisman Trophy winner that year and only Tim Brown has won a Heisman at Notre Dame since.

Parseghian would get his first of two titles in 1966 after running out the clock at Michigan State in the famed 10-10 tie.  Just how good was that ’66 team?  They pitched six shutouts in 10 games, had just two games finish within a 23 point margin, and four of those 10 games came against teams ranked in the top 10.

1973 was the second of Parseghian’s national titles with the Irish, culminating in a 24-23 thriller over Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, his first of two wins against Paul “Bear” Bryant and the Crimson Tide, the second being Ara’s final game as Notre Dame’s head coach, as the Irish beat Alabama to cap the 1974 season in the Orange Bowl.

Parseghian finished his Notre Dame career with 95 victories which trailed only [autotag]Knute Rockne[/autotag] at the time of his retirement, although [autotag]Lou Holtz[/autotag] and [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] have both passed Ara since.

One of the best to ever do it at Notre Dame and the key in turning around a program that was on the brink of irrelevance, Parseghian was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1980.

Take a look back at Parseghian through the years below:

Did the mob bomb Knute Rockne’s plane?

Yes or no?

I feel like I’m a very passionate Notre Dame fan and know a lot more than just the current day stories.  It was as much the history and mystic of the football program that drew me in as a fan in the early-nineties as it was [autotag]Lou Holtz[/autotag]’s teams competing for national championships.

From the [autotag]Four Horsemen[/autotag] to [autotag]Frank Leahy[/autotag], [autotag]Ara Parseghian[/autotag], and [autotag]Rocket Ismail[/autotag], I thought I had heard and at least been aware of everything major in Notre Dame’s football history.  I certainly realized I was wrong semi-recently in regards to the man most responsible for Notre Dame football being what it is today, and how that man died.

Or at least a belief some hold about that.

I’m talking about the most notable head coach in college football history of course, [autotag]Knute Rockne[/autotag], and the belief that the mob was responsible for the plane crash that took his life.

Notre Dame-USC: fun facts about epic rivalry

For the first time in two fulls years we can say it: Beat SC.

Notre Dame and USC have made up the greatest intersectional rivalries in all of college football for nearly a century and get set to meet for the 92nd time this Saturday in South Bend.

Last year didn’t see the Irish and Trojans meet due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the Pac-12 not playing out of conference games, the first time the schools didn’t meet since World War II.

Order is restored and things return to normal this Saturday as Notre Dame welcomes USC to South Bend as the rivalry gets renewed once again.

Ever wondered how these two programs came to be great rivals?  Here are 10 things to know about the history of Notre Dame and USC: