Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/408565
UPON FURTHER REVIEW TODD D. BURLAGE nine first- and second-round picks. But ask any of the former Irish what or who made the biggest difference in the program, and they all point to the coach. "Coach Holtz was a master moti- vator," said All-American linebacker Ned Bolcar, a two-time Irish captain in both '88 and '89. "We got to a point as players under him that we knew nobody could beat us." It's an interesting take from Bolcar considering Holtz, conversely, was certain every team on the schedule was going to beat him, at least before family dinner on Wednesday. All of those pessimistic weekly press conferences in which Holtz counted the ways his mighty Irish faced certain doom earned the coach the reputation of a sandbagger, and somehow being disingenuous in his pregame assess- ments. But interestingly, Holtz insists there was nothing phony about his fear of blowout losses to teams such as SMU, Navy, Air Force or Rice. And the atten- tion to detail from Holtz, born out of worry and concern, lifted his program to an .872 win percentage (64-9-1) from 1988 through the 1993 campaign. No wonder Holtz couldn't eat or sleep, winning at that pace against the toughest schedules in the country ev- ery year. "When I talked about being nervous about an opponent, that was authen- tic," Holtz said. "I would go into the press conference on [Tuesday] and I was scared as all get out. The first three days of a game week were mis- erable and full of negatives, and that wasn't by design; that was sincere." Opponent worries began for Holtz about the same time he was leaving the field haunted by the game mis- takes his Irish just made on any given Saturday. The concerns magnified on Sunday when the Irish staff would study film together and log all the pos- itive plays the upcoming opponent made in its previous game. And by Tuesday before the weekly press conference? "I was very nervous, actually a total wreck," Holtz said. "I couldn't sleep, all I did was worry. You didn't want to be around me." But by Wednesday, when the game plan was in and the pads were off after practice, Holtz noted: "Now we knew what we were doing, we're having fun, then my confidence grows." As did weekend prospects for his team. The mood had again swung, a win- ning streak was ready to grow, and Holtz could finally eat again, at least until the next game and press confer- ence. "If they would've had that press conference on Thursday or Friday, I would've been a completely differ- ent person," Holtz said. "That's why I didn't have dinner with my family until Wednesday." And now 25 years later, we all fi- nally know the secret … a successful coach is a hungry coach. ✦ Todd D. Burlage has been a writer for Blue & Gold Illustrated since July 2005. He can be reached at tburlage@blueandgold.com