Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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20 APRIL/MAY 2026 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY TYLER HORKA A plethora of former Notre Dame football players from the Lou Holtz era stood up straight at attention the morning of the Fighting Irish's home opener last year. There were still quite a few more hours before kickoff, but the guys were locked in as if they were the ones waiting to run through the Notre Dame Stadium tun- nel later that night. Why? "Coach Holtz was speaking, and it was like we were back in time," said Bryan Flannery, an Irish defensive line- men in the late 1980s. "He's still got it." Holtz passed away March 4, while peacefully resting with his loved ones by his side at his home in Orlando, Fla. He was unapologetically himself right on up until the eve of his death. Flan- nery's former teammate, linebacker Frank Stams, said in September, with Flannery nodding in agreement, "I'm still scared of him, without a doubt." Him, of course, being Holtz. Scared, in a good way. Holtz was tough on his players. That was with a purpose of making them better players, though, and he most often succeeded in that. He made his pupils better people, too. "We love him to death, and we'll run through walls for him," Flannery said. The following stories from six of Holtz's former players, including Flan- nery and Stams, were shared during the 2025 Notre Dame football season on WSBT Radio's Gameday Sportsbeat. 'MASTER OF PSYCHOLOGY' So much of coaching is about push- ing the right buttons. Knowing how much to lean into a certain idea before backing off of it entirely and intently changing course. Holtz was a master of that — a "master of psychology" — per linebacker Ned Bolcar, a team captain of the 1988 national championship team. "Coach Holtz believed you were going to lose every game, whether it was SMU coming off a two-year probation or Navy who we'd beaten 30, 40 years in a row, or it could be a USC game," Bolcar said. "[He'd wait] until a day or two before the game or the day of the game, then all the work you put in that week, preparing like you didn't have a chance, working your ass off, and now because we did all of that, we were going to win the game." "That was the beauty of Coach Holtz, we always had our edge," Stams added. "We always went into a game — heck, we played Rice, and I don't think Rice had won a game in two or three years MIND GAMES AND MORE Player-told tales from the Lou Holtz era at Notre Dame "We love him to death, and we'll run through walls for him," former Irish defensive linemen Bryan Flannery said of Holtz. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA