Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/542018
BY LOU SOMOGYI D uring the 1993-94 academic year, the Directors' Cup began its first season of using a point system to determine which universities had the best all-around athletic departments (the final total is based on the top point earners in 10 women's and men's sports). It took 12 years before Notre Dame finally cracked the Top 10 in 2005-06. Thereafter, it fell into the 20s again, with a low of No. 27 in 2010. This year, the Fighting Irish joined Penn State as the lone "cold weather schools" to finish in the Top 10 each of the past three years. Yet Notre Dame vice president and seventh-year director of athletics Jack Swarbrick has never used the Learfield Sports Directors' Cup as his gauge of the school's continued excellence on the playing fields or arenas. "It's a consequence, not a goal," Swarbrick said. "If we do our job of pursuing national championships, STATE OF THE IRISH Director of Athletics Jack Swarbrick discusses another year of athletic excellence and the football program Swarbrick has seen Notre Dame finish in the Top 10 of the Directors' Cup for the third straight year, but that is not necessarily his primary gauge of on- field excellence by the school. PHOTO BY JOE RAYMOND