Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/616353
Notre Dame & Clemson: Eerie Paths Notre Dame's football team has been on a remarkably similar trajectory as Clemson the past several de- cades. • Both won their most recent national title in the 1980s, the Tigers in 1981 and Notre Dame in 1988. • From 1985-93, Clemson was 6-2 in bowl games and had six straight years from 1986-91 in which it never lost more than two games. From 1987-93, Notre Dame was 5-2 in bowl games and averaged only two losses per season. • Starting in 1994, both programs started trending downward for nearly two decades with almost identical records. From 1994-2011, Clemson was 131-92 (.587) and 4-11 in bowl games. Over that same period, Notre Dame was 130-89-1 (.593) and 2-9 in bowl games. • Both Notre Dame and Clemson were heralded the past 20 years for consistently assembling top-10 or top- 20 football classes in February — but never really fulfilling huge expectations in the autumn. • In 2012, both Notre Dame and Clemson had breakthroughs. The Irish finished 12-1 and had their first top-five finish since 1993. Clemson posted an 11-2 ledger and had its first top-10 placement (coaches poll) since 1990. • Clemson's Dabo Swinney is 74-26 in his last 100 games as head coach. In Brian Kelly's last 100 contests as the head coach, including the final 23 at Cincinnati in 2008-09, he is 76-24. • In Swinney's fifth season at Clemson, his Tigers defeated LSU in the Peach Bowl, 25-24, on a field goal as time expired. In Kelly's fifth season at Notre Dame, his Fighting Irish defeated LSU in the Music City Bowl, 31-28, on a field goal as time elapsed. • The year after defeating LSU in a bowl, Swinney and his Tigers de- feated 12-1 Ohio State in the Orange Bowl, 40-35, for its first major bowl victory in the BCS era. Likewise, this season, Kelly and Co., will play 11-1 Ohio State in the Fiesta and will attempt to win its first major bowl outing since 1993. In the last four seasons, starting with that 11th-hour bowl win against LSU, Clemson has become a "pro- gram," no longer just another team. It has finished 11-2, 11-2 and 10-3 with bowl wins against LSU, Ohio State and Oklahoma — and this year enters the four-team College Football Playoff No. 1 with a 13-0 ledger. Can Notre Dame continue that pattern in 2015 with a major bowl win over Ohio State — and then in the years to come? — Lou Somogyi Clemson's Dabo Swinney (74‑26) and Brian Kelly (76‑24) have posted nearly identical records over their past 100 games as head coaches. PHOTO BY BILL PANZICA