Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1143622
50 AUGUST 2019 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY LOU SOMOGYI I n virtually every academic year at Notre Dame from August through July, football is center stage in the athletic realm, be it a 4-8 fiasco in 2016 or an uplifting 12-0 regular season in 2018 to secure a College Football Playoff (CFP) bid — and anything else in between. An exception occurred in 2017-18 with the women's basketball pro- gram's amazing run to the national title that merited adulation through- out the country, and the program barely missed a repeat this year. Thus in our annual review of the top 10 stories from the 2018-19 aca- demic year, football storylines remain the fulcrum with plenty of auxiliary subplots everywhere else. 1. PLAYOFF AND CHAMPIONSHIP FEVER, AGAIN Will Notre Dame ever again win a national title in football? That lamentation often is heard from Fighting Irish faithful because of the current program-record 30- year (and counting) drought. That's more than double the previous 14- year such absence (1950-63) of one during the 70 seasons from 1919-88 when the Fighting Irish recorded 13 championships (about one per 5.4 years) that were recognized by the NCAA. Popular belief holds that the land- scape of college football has changed too much, and that Notre Dame's recruiting today won't or can't ever be quite at the level of the southern superpowers, which currently are led by Alabama and Clemson. Yet in 2018 Notre Dame joined the Crimson Tide, Tigers, Ohio State and Central Florida as the lone schools in this decade so far (or from 2010-18) to reach 12-0 at some point in at least two regular seasons. For the first time since 1991-93, Notre Dame also recorded back-to- back campaigns with a minimum of 10 victories. Never, ever take for granted how demanding and unlikely it is to fin- ish a regular season unscathed. In The Fighting Irish football team posted just its fourth perfect regular season in the 69 campaigns since 1950. PHOTO BY ANGELA DRISKELL THE YEAR IN REVIEW Notre Dame's initial trip to the College Football Playoff highlighted the 2018-19 school year in athletics