Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM MARCH 2025 13 55 Years Ago: March 7, 1970 Notre Dame posted its first NCAA Tournament victory in 12 years with a 112-82 blowout of Mid-American Conference champion Ohio in the then 25-team field. The victory in front of a capacity audience of 13,450 at the University of Dayton Arena was highlighted by what is now deemed an unbreakable record in the tourney's history — 61 points by Notre Dame junior guard Austin Carr. In the first 11 minutes, Carr tallied 21 points, but Notre Dame didn't take the lead for good until the 6:29 mark. By halftime the Irish built a 54-41 advantage with Carr scoring 35 points on 15-of-23 shooting from the field. "The only thing I was thinking about was getting past the first round because it had been so long since Notre Dame won a game in the tourna- ment," Carr said. "I was probably more focused in the first half than normal because of that." The previous single-game tourney scoring record was 58 set in 1965 by Princeton's Bill Bradley. Carr eclipsed it with 49 seconds left, finishing 25 of 44 (56.8 percent) from the field and 11 of 14 (78.6 percent) from the foul line. In the round of 16 versus No. 1 Kentucky, Notre Dame led 87-86 before Irish big men Collis Jones and Sid Catlett fouled out in the 109-99 defeat. Carr scored 52 points on 22-of-35 shooting (62.9 percent) from the field. In the regional consolation game against Big Ten champ Iowa, Carr added 45 more points in a 121-106 loss. His 52.7 points per game average remains a single-year NCAA Tournament standard, as does his 41.3 career average in seven contests. A distant second is Bradley at 33.7. 20 Years Ago: March 29, 2005 Spring practice opened under new Fighting Irish head coach Charlie Weis. Per usual, the tone was instantaneously positive under a new regime. "By the way a defense lines up, he can call out where the play should go and where a certain person should go or where the quarterback should throw the ball," Irish sophomore running back Darius Walker said. "Then when we run the play, it works out exactly like he said. That shows how he knows the game inside and out." Weis also is described as having an "I refuse to lose" aura because of his background, highlighted by one Super Bowl ring while working for Bill Par- cells with the New York Giants and then three (2001, 2003 and 2004) in four years as Bill Belichick's offensive coordinator at New England. "It's really important for the attitude of the head coach to permeate through the team," Weis said. "I've taken what I've learned under the two Bills — Belichick and Parcells — and I've tried to copycat the things I think have worked the best. "The team has to have the personality of the head coach. I think they're on their way to getting what I stand for, therefore there's a better chance of that relationship coming to fruition." 15 Years Ago: March 26, 2010 Spring practice opened under first-year head coach Brian Kelly after the previous regime under Weis finished 16-21 his last three seasons. The new boss sensed a lethargy while constantly emphasizing a faster pace. "We stink right now," Kelly said after the March 31 session, the fourth of the spring. "We're just so far from where we need to be in terms of attention to detail." Finding a quarterback to operate the offense was another major issue after the early departure of Jimmy Clausen to the NFL. Junior Dayne Crist was com- ing off ACL surgery, classmate Nate Montana was a walk-on and Tommy Rees was an early enrollee a few months out of high school. 10 Years Ago: March 2015 Notre Dame's men's basketball team put together what could be consid- ered the greatest month in the program's history. First, the Irish won more games in that month than any other ever, finishing 8-1. Moreover, five of those wins were against ranked opponents, also a standard in a single month. Second, it was the first and only time Notre Dame won a conference cham- pionship. Third, it joined the 1978 Final Four team as the only teams to win three straight NCAA Tournament games. Led by seniors Jerian Grant and Pat Connaughton in the ACC Tournament, the Fighting Irish: • On March 12 defeated Miami, 70-63, a team that earlier in the year won at Notre Dame. • On March 13 in the semifinals, shocked No. 2 Duke, 74-64 — a Blue Devils outfit that would go on to win the national title. • On March 14 in the championship, scored on an amazing 16 of 18 pos- sessions in the second half while going on a 34-15 run (including 26-3 at one point) in a stunning 90-82 conquest of North Carolina — which would capture the national title a year later. "I'm a little bit in awe of what my team did," remarked jubilant head coach Mike Brey, who had his first losing record (15-17) a year earlier. "To win a championship going through Tobacco Road is extremely powerful." With a supporting cast to Grant and Connaughton that included Demetrius Jackson, Zach Auguste, Steve Vasturia as starters — all of whom averaged double-figure scoring — with V.J. Beachem and freshman Bonzie Colson coming off the bench, Notre Dame next advanced to the Elite Eight for the first time in 36 years with hard-fought wins over Northeastern (69-65), No. 24 Butler (67-64 in overtime) — the same day Brey's mother, Betty, passed away — and No. 14 Wichita State (81-70). In the NCAA Midwest Regional Final, No. 1 and 37-0 Kentucky made all 9 of its field goal attempts in the final 12:16, plus 2 free throws with six seconds remaining, to survive a 68-66 classic versus the Irish. Augmenting it as the greatest month in the school's basketball history, the Irish women were 9-1, also winning the ACC title and advancing to the NCAA Tournament championship before losing to No. 1 UConn. The two programs combined for a 69-9 mark overall — 32-6 by the men and 37-3 by the women — with their .885 winning percentage the best in the land by any two Division I programs. UNDER THE DOME Anniversaries In Notre Dame Athletics History: March Notre Dame won its first and only conference championship in men's basketball in 2015, capturing the ACC title by beating Duke (74-64) and North Carolina (90-82) on back-to-back nights in Greensboro, N.C. PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN