–“Did you hear that they’re going to resurface Notre Dame Field with cardboard?”

–“Why?”
—“Because the Irish always play better on paper.”

With the possible exception of LeGarrette Blount’s boxing team, no NCAA program has more critics than Notre Dame football.  There are people that love to hate Notre Dame for being over-hyped, and there are people that hate to love Notre Dame for always failing to live up to that hype.  But there’s something that the former group, the critics, don’t want to admit- they need Notre Dame.  And there’s something that you, the neutral, need to understand as well- you should support Notre Dame.  For better or worse Notre Dame is different from any other college football program but what those critics won’t admit is that college football is better when Notre Dame is relevant, and what they choose to ignore is that Notre Dame represents a lot of what is right with college football. 

Full disclosure: I’m Irish-Catholic, cheering for Notre Dame wasn’t so much a choice as much as a moral obligation.  And that seems to fuel the critics; this program is what-it-is because of the fans.  But how the school got those fans seems antiquated at best and almost dangerous at worst.  A normal college football team doesn’t just represent their University but also their alumni and even their fans that never attended the school.  But Notre Dame represents even more than that. 

First let’s get the good out of the way:  Notre Dame has the 2^nd highest graduation rate of any D-I football program.  Number 1 is Navy, whose “students” are, ya know, contractually obligated to stay, so I am perfectly content in saying that Notre Dame has the highest true graduation rate of any major college football program.  Speaking of which, according to US News’ rankings Notre Dame is the 20^th best school in the country.  Stanford is the only school with a higher ranking and a legitimate football program (sorry Harvard I said legitimate program.)  Yes, U of Florida may have a National Championship and Erin Andrews but I’d rather cheer for a school that graduated 16 congressmen, 3 former governors (none of whom resigned in scandal), 4 ambassadors, Josiah Bartlet and Regis. 

There’s also the appeal of cheering for a program with history- Notre Dame has more “National Championships” than I can count although only 11 of them are official but most of those shouldn’t count because they were before the Louisiana purchase, although I’m told their win over the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria were quite decisive.  Joking aside, they haven’t won a Championship since the last time the Dodgers won one, so you know it’s been a long time.  The idea that Notre Dame has always been successful is a fallacy- over the last 84 years they have been to 29 bowl games, Alabama has been to 56.  Notre Dame has a long history but you don’t cheer for them if you just want success, you cheer for them because you’re proud of them.

Now on to the other stuff:  there is no other college athletic program that has ever captured an entire country’s immigrants like Notre Dame has for the Irish; I have no clue whether this is a good thing or not but like the ‘30s/‘40s Italian community rallied around the Yankees because of Joe DiMaggio, it eventually just becomes a family thing.  Similarly I have no clue whether it’s a good thing to have so many people cheer for Notre Dame because of their religion.  More than ever before, we have become a secular society and the hurdles that Catholics used to face are now non-existent, therefore it feels ridiculous to have your religion dictate your football- unless of course you’re from Nebraska in which case your religion is your football.  And Nebraska is what we’ve come to expect in college football, everyone in the entire state cheers for the ‘Huskers, so much so that on game days Memorial Stadium becomes the 3^rd largest city in the state.  But they don’t have as many critics because all of their fans are concentrated in the state (or like me, they are the offspring of former Cornhuskers);  well they do have critics- Sooners fans- but let’s be honest they’re not smart enough to be reading this.  However Notre Dame fans are scattered throughout the country- their numbers may not be that much larger than the Nebraskas of the football universe, but when they are coast to coast Notre Dame just feels larger. 

Who are USC’s rivals?  UCLA, academics, and Notre Dame.  Who are Michigan’s rivals?  Ohio State, hard work, and Notre Dame.  Navy’s rivals?  Army, the Village people, and Notre Dame.  I can keep going: Stanford, Pittsburgh, Purdue, Boston College, Michigan St, Army, the list goes on and on, Notre Dame has more “rivals” than any school in the country.  There are two reasons for this- 1) They have no conference so they have to freedom to constantly schedule a series with any school and 2) their fans are all over the place.  With the constant turnover of college teams, fans make rivalries.  And as I mentioned- Notre Dame’s fans are everywhere, and that makes Notre Dame a National-team, which leads to undue over-exposure, which leads to critics.  The Lou Holtzs and Beano Cooks are so visible and so vocal that they shine a light on Notre Dame that the team doesn’t necessarily deserve (or need.)  And suddenly Notre Dame becomes overrated which results in them being hated by a lot of people.  But that overrating is a very real thing: recently there was a comparison of pre-season rankings vs. end-of-season rankings and not surprisingly Notre Dame fell short of expectations more than anybody.  Well more than almost anybody.  (FYI- Oregon and Boston College consistently were the most underrated by preseason rankings.)  But Notre Dame was the second most “over-rated” team by the pre-season rankings, Michigan was the first. 

And that brings us to this past weekend.  Notre Dame ranked, Michigan not.  But the Wolverines pulled it out to beat the Irish.  Just like they did 122 years ago when they first matched up- that’s right it was 1887 when Michigan first beat Notre Dame.  In fact, like the Forrest Gump of the NCAA, Notre Dame Football has always been in important points in college football history.  There was the 1913 upset over Army when Notre Dame won by being the first team to consistently use this new invention called “the forward pass.”  There were the 4 different times they played in the “Game of the Century” (Ohio State, 1935; Army, 1946; Michigan St, 1966; Florida St, 1993.)  But it’s the ND-Michigan series that still stands out as the best, and this past weekend’s game only adds to the lore.  The two teams are 1 (Michigan) and 2 (Notre Dame) in terms of all time winning percentage.  They have played 37 times.  And like usual, most people assume that Notre Dame have dominated the series but in fact Michigan leads the series 21-15-1.  Notre Dame may have the luck of the Irish, but Michigan’s record against them proves that they, like all of college football, are actually lucky to have the Irish.