Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/605097
UPON FURTHER REVIEW TODD D. BURLAGE tional championship game. And in 2011 and 2013, Shaw's Cardinal needed No- vember wins over Notre Dame to help secure a spot in the Fiesta Bowl and Rose Bowl, respectively. With both teams still in consideration to earn a place in one of the New Year's Six bowl games this postseason, the latest matchup adds another chapter to what is quickly becoming one of the best rivalries in college football between two of the most successful coaches in the nation. Kelly and Shaw have each won at least eight games in all five seasons since their rivalry began in 2011, and both coaches will again bring highly ranked teams into Saturday's game. Interestingly, only twice in program history has a ranked Irish team played a ranked opponent in consecutive sea- sons more than the five against Stan- ford (2011-15) — nine straight against USC from 1972-80, eight with Michi- gan from 1987-94 and eight versus USC from 2002-09. And while fierce competition on the football field helps to define the rela- tionship between Stanford and Notre Dame, it remains only one small thread of the fabric these two proud schools share. Two coaches that have won 75 per- cent of their games the last five seasons have also graduated almost 100 percent of their players during their current coaching tenures. According to 2015 Graduation Success Rate numbers that were released earlier this month, Stan- ford's football program ranked first in the country with a 99 percent gradua- tion rate, and Notre Dame was fifth at 93 percent. Consider the entire rosters of stu- dent-athletes at both schools, men and women, and Notre Dame and Stan- ford tied with Duke in 2015 for the best graduation rate in the country at 98 percent. "I have a lot of respect for what Notre Dame does on and off the field, in the classrooms, in their admissions stan- dards," Shaw said. "It's a university that understands what the term stu- dent-athlete is all about." With mirrored values and missions, these two universities also share a con- nection that stretches from the football field and classrooms all the way up to the corner administrative offices. Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick earned his law degree from Stanford, while Cardinal athletics director Ber- nard Muir spent six years grooming in the Notre Dame athletic department from 2000-05. The similarities between these two schools are endless, and that's much of what fuels their relationship and re- spect. A rivalry that began in 1925 at the Rose Bowl with Knute Rockne and the Four Horsemen traveling to Pasadena, Calif., adds a 19th consecutive meet- ing and a 30th overall matchup this weekend, with hopefully many more to come between two schools that dem- onstrate what is right about college sports. ✦ Todd D. Burlage has been a writer for Blue & Gold Illustrated since July 2005. He can be reached at tburlage@blueandgold.com