Tag: tyrone willingham

Notre Dame Football: Reliving Pete Carroll’s Dominance Over Irish

These were some tough years to be a Notre Dame fan.

It was a massive football news day Wednesday as word came out [autotag]Pete Carroll[/autotag] was stepping down as head coach of the Seattle Seahawks.  He led the Seahawks to a championship in Super Bowl 48 but before his run in the Pacific Northwest, Carroll oversaw a dynasty at USC.

And that dynasty came largely at the expense of Notre Dame.  Sure he wasn’t exactly coaching against Ara Parseghian or Lou Holtz, but dominance is dominance.

The years from 2001-2009 aren’t particularly fun for Notre Dame fans to look back on but with Carroll stepping down let’s take a quick stride down memory lane and remember just how bad things were in this rivalry when he was leading USC.

Former Notre Dame captain on Tyrone Willingham: ‘This guy’s full of —-!”

Hardly surprising to hear looking back…

Oh, what a time the early-2000s were for Notre Dame football. After an unexpected Bowl Championship Series appearance in 2000, 2001 produced a major regression and Bob Davie’s dismissal.

In came George O’Leary from Georgia Tech. Days later, O’Leary went out: He was fired for lying on his resume.

The man chosen to fix the Notre Dame football mess was Tyrone Willingham who the Irish hired away from Stanford. Willingham had success early, but he was fired three years into his tenure as head coach.

How quickly did some guys in the room see that coming?

Former Notre Dame captain and linebacker Mike Goolsby was on “The Two Irish Brothers” podcast and shared it didn’t take long for him to feel out on Willingham.

“I can truly remember sitting there having that inner dialogue with myself saying ‘this guy is full of —-,” said Goolsby, “But I was like, I’ve got to go along with it because I haven’t started yet.”

When you hear a story like that it’s hardly a surprise Willingham’s tenure ended like it did. We’ve heard the stories about his passion for golf, and how it was reflected in Notre Dame’s awful recruiting rankings under him. But to hear from one of the Irish leaders from that time puts those three seasons in even a worse light.

How the heck did he get Brady Quinn, Jeff Samardzija and Tom Zbikowski to buy into his act?

That was perhaps the most impressive thing he did while at Notre Dame.

Check out the full cut of Goolsby discussing Willingham here.

Massive news: Notre Dame lands Mike Denbrock as next offensive coordinator

Ladies and Gentlemen: We got him

For the last two years we’ve called the unspoken feud between Notre Dame and LSU college football’s current cold war.

You can add another chapter to that today.

Reports are out that Marcus Freeman has landed his number-one target to take over as offensive coordinator – LSU play caller [autotag]Mike Denbrock[/autotag].

Denbrock turns 60 in January and has had two stints at Notre Dame previously.  One was for three years as the offensive tackle and tight ends coach under [autotag]Tyrone Willingham[/autotag], the other featured a variety of offensive roles under [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] from 2010-2016.

Denbrock is fresh off a regular season that he helped take LSU quarterback Jayden Daniels to epic levels as Daniels became the third Heisman Trophy winner in Tigers history.

Denbrock also coached at Cincinnati from 2017-2021 where he spent four seasons with [autotag]Marcus Freeman[/autotag].

We’ll have more on this absolutely huge story as it develops.  In the meantime, find out more about Denbrock’s career with the writeup we did Wednesday.

Notre Dame football: Frontrunner emerging for offensive coordinator replacement?

Will it happen?

Could a frontrunner be emerging for Notre Dame just days into their search for a new offensive coordinator?

According to Pete Sampson and Bruce Feldman of The Athletic, LSU offensive coordinator [autotag]Mike Denbrock[/autotag] has “legitimate interest” in returning to Notre Dame in the same role.

Denbrock has coached at Notre Dame twice before.  From 2002-2004 he oversaw the tight ends and offensive tackles on [autotag]Tyrone Willingham[/autotag]’s staff while he filled a number of roles under [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] from 2010-2016, including being the primary play caller.

Denbrock spent 2017-2021 at Cincinnati where he coached with Marcus Freeman for four seasons.

Denbrock has had an incredibly strong run of late including this season where he helped turn quarterback Jayden Daniels into the third Heisman Trophy winner in LSU program history.

More on this as it develops and if you’re interested, we took a deeper look at Denbrock late Thursday morning.

Social media reaction to Deion Sanders being named Sports Illustrated ‘Sports Person of the Year’

This actually brings back a Notre Dame memory of sorts…

It doesn’t seem like that long ago that Tyrone Willingham was the talk of college football.  In 2002 he helped jumpstart Notre Dame an 8-0 start and No. 4 ranking before being upset by Boston College at home.

Notre Dame would get crushed at USC at the end of November to finish the regular season 9-2.  Despite the tough November, The Sporting News named Willingham their Sportsman of the Year for 2002.

Memories of that immediately came to mind to me Thursday morning when Sports Illustrated announced Colorado head football coach Deion Sanders as their 2023 ‘Sports Person of the Year’.

Sanders was certainly the story of college football for the first half of September as the Buffaloes were 3-0, but they’d finish the year with just a 4-8 mark and were blown out far more often than they were competitive.

Regardless, Sports Illustrated still named him and as you can probably guess, social media had a field day reacting.

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.

Watch: 2004 highlights of Notre Dame win over Stanford

Were you at this game?

2004 was a so-so year for Notre Dame, ultimately finishing 6-6. One game came one week after losing to No. 15 Purdue as Stanford came to Notre Dame Stadium. It looked like the 3-2 Irish might drop to .500 sooner as they trailed the Cardinal, 15-10, going into the fourth quarter. But two touchdowns and one incomplete Hail Mary at the end later, the home fans could be content with a 23-15 Irish victory:

[autotag]Ryan Grant[/autotag] scored the go-ahead touchdown, his second of the game, early in the fourth quarter. [autotag]Brady Quinn[/autotag] threw for 173 yards and ran for the Irish’s other fourth-quarter touchdown. Quinn did not have any touchdown passes, and neither did Cardinal quarterback Trent Edwards despite throwing for 267 yards.

By all accounts, this was far from the prettiest game in this rivalry, and most fans probably have forgotten about it. But this still was a bright spot at a time when [autotag]Tyrone Willingham[/autotag] was fighting for his job, which he ultimately lost. At least he was victorious on this afternoon.

Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.

Follow Geoffrey on Twitter: @gfclark89

Photos from last Gator Bowl to feature Notre Dame

If you don’t remember this game, you probably have blocked it from your memory.

The bowl matchups are out, and where Notre Dame is headed should come as no surprise. Almost every bowl projection before Sunday had the Irish in the Gator Bowl, and that’s exactly where they’re headed. The Irish will meet South Carolina, a program they have clashed with four times before but not at all since 1984. This year’s game will be played at 3:30 p.m. EST on Dec. 30 in Jacksonville, Florida.

This will be the Irish’s fourth Gator Bowl, and they have no place to go but up after their last appearance in the 2003 edition. [autotag]Tyrone Willingham[/autotag] had led the Irish to a 10-2 regular-season record in his first season, but that didn’t matter to Philip Rivers and NC State. Rivers threw for 228 yards and two touchdowns in a 28-6 trouncing of the Irish. It didn’t help that [autotag]Pat Dillingham[/autotag] threw three interceptions.

Here are some images from a game that proved to be a sign of things to come for the rest of Willingham’s tenure:

The day after: Lasting thoughts on Notre Dame’s loss to USC

What stood out in your mind?

It was a good effort but not quite enough for Notre Dame to get an upset on the road against USC. The game was closer than the score, even if the Irish failed to get the game within one score late in the game. There were positive and negatives and here are my thoughts that have lingered in my mind since the game finished last night.

Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.

Follow Mike on Twitter: @MikeFChen

Notre Dame football 2022: Fighting Irish Wire staff game-by-game predictions

What record does Notre Dame put up in Marcus Freeman’s first year?

Notre Dame enters a rare time in its modern football history where the Irish are playing for a new head coach despite the previous one not being relieved of his duties. [autotag]Charlie Weis[/autotag], [autotag]Tyrone Willingham[/autotag], and [autotag]Bob Davie[/autotag] were all forced out while [autotag]Lou Holtz[/autotag] didn’t exactly have the prettiest of exits.  

What comes with that however isn’t a sense of rebuild but more of a reload.  How does Notre Dame take the incredibly strong standing it accomplished under [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] and grow that into a team with a legitimate shot at winning a national championship under [autotag]Marcus Freeman[/autotag]?

The first year isn’t an easy one for Freeman as Notre Dame has trips to Ohio State and USC on the docket, while a neutral site game in Las Vegas against BYU won’t be easy and welcoming a pre-season top-five Clemson team to South Bend highlights the home slate.

So what is a fair expectation for this squad?  And where do you expect the Irish to be playing come bowl season?

Here is how the Fighting Irish staff sees the season going – game by game. 9jin8k ujynhbthuihgu 7hygtfr