Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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44 DECEMBER 2017 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY LOU SOMOGYI T he Older I Get, The Better I Was. This title for a book by Brian Crane is not an un- common sentiment among hu- mans. Tales do tend to grow taller and accomplishments become greater as Father Time progresses. Yet when college football his- torians speak about the greatest collection of talent ever assem- bled, it's not a case of romanti- cizing the past to herald the 1947 Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Seventy years later, head coach Frank Leahy's Notre Dame squad remains immortalized among eminent historians as the deepest and perhaps greatest col- lection of college football talent ever assembled by one school. Working for Sport magazine in November 1965, former Newsweek sports editor Bill Furlong wrote: "There have been more spectacu- lar teams. There have been teams with a more diverse attack. There may even have been teams with 11 better men. "But there has never been a team w i t h t h e e n o r- mous depth, with the deep-ranging quality, with the assurance that it could lose its first string, its second string and perhaps even part of its third string — and still remain undefeated." On the 50th anniversary of that team in 1997, longtime revered foot- ball analyst Paul "Dr. Z" Zimmer- man of Sports Illustrated penned a feature entitled "The Golden Boys." The theme was to rate what he con- tended were the two greatest college teams of all time — Notre Dame in 1946 and Notre Dame in 1947. "Which team was better? Hard to say," Zimmerman wrote. "Both were national champions, both were un- beaten. … Most veterans of both teams give a slight nod to the 1947 squad." ESPN's Beano Cook, acknowledged as "The Pope of College Football" prior to his 2012 death, maintained that no team ever rivaled the talent volume of Notre Dame's '47 outfit. "It is the greatest collection of talent ever assembled in one college team — and it's not even close," Cook said. "The great Army teams of 1944-45 dominated the opposition more, but all the other schools had their best players overseas [during World War II]. Some even had to suspend their programs. "After the war, there was a much greater collection of talent at a lot of schools, but none nearly as deep as Notre Dame." THE STARTING 11 Two aspects made the 1947 crew worthy of such adulation. The first was the starting 11 that played both offense and defense in that era. The group featured 1947 Heisman Trophy winner John Lujack at quar- terback, who is often considered the greatest all-around athlete to attend the school. The two-time unanimous All-American and now 92-year-old Lujack also earned monograms in basketball, baseball and track — the last person to achieve the feat at Notre Dame. However, the 1947 roster was rife with premier tal- ent everywhere. Left end: Jim Martin — En- shrined in the College Foot- ball Hall of Fame, he received the George Gipp Award as the top athlete on campus in 1949 — even though classmate Leon Hart was the Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year nation- ally that same season. Left tackle: George Connor — A member of both the Col- lege and Pro Football Halls of Fame, the 1946 Outland Trophy winner, (the first recipient of the honor) is generally regarded as the greatest interior lineman in school history. Left guard: Bill Fischer — The 1948 Outland Trophy winner, two years after Connor, also is in the College Football Hall of Fame. Center: Bill Walsh — Not to be confused with the San Francisco 49ers Hall of Fame head coach, he beat out 1946 first-team All- American George S t ro h m e y e r f o r the starting role. R i g h t g u a r d : Marty Wendell — Named a first- team All-America by Collier's, he was often classified by teammates as the player they least wanted to go against in practice be- cause of his sheer physicality and the feeling that he had to earn the right to start every day. Right tackle: Zygmont Czarobski — A member of the College Football Hall of Fame, he brought levity to the ultra-serious, business-like Leahy troops with his whimsy. Right end: Leon Hart — Although only a sophomore, he made Sporting News' first-team All-America unit. Hart won the Heisman Trophy in 1949 and has been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. The running corps featured yet an- other College Football Hall of Fame member in Emil "Six Yard" Sitko, who played semi-pro ball with Great Lakes before heading off to World War II and returning to lead Notre Dame in rushing all four seasons from 1946-49. Terry Brennan, Notre Dame's head coach from 1954-58, and John "Pep" THE BEST EVER Notre Dame's 1947 national champs may have had the greatest collection of talent in college football history Quarterback John Lujack won the 1947 Heisman Trophy, but he had plenty of help on what is considered the deepest college football team ever. PHOTO COURTESY NOTRE DAME MEDIA RELATIONS