John Lattner, 1932-2016: From Cruiser To Aircraft Carrier
During his years at Notre Dame from 1950-54, multi-purpose extraordinaire John Lattner was enrolled in the Air Force ROTC.
Early in his freshman year in 1950, though, Lattner was informed by head coach Frank Leahy that he should be in another branch of the military.
“Ah, Johnny Lattner, you should have been in the Navy – you’re a cruiser!” Leahy would tell him.
The greatest athletes have a tendency to look as if they’re in cruise control, but Leahy’s statement was about maximizing Lattner’s skills with a more passionate effort.
“He used that line quite a bit, especially when I was a freshman,” said Lattner, whose Leahy impersonations could have been a road show. “I wasn’t a real fast back. I was a big back for those days, about 195 pounds and close to 6-foot-3…but I thought I was better than a cruiser. I thought I’d be a PT boat, at least.
“My speed wasn’t the best, but most of the time it was because I had no intensity. I had to push myself all the time – and Leahy would help. I had some talent, don’t get me wrong, but I had to keep improving on what I had. I wasn’t gifted with a lot of speed. I could play defense and I had a little strength behind my running … but if I didn’t hit the hole fast enough, or would get tackled from behind, then there was that reaction from Coach that I wasn’t extending myself.”
The autumn of 1950 was not a pleasant time for Leahy, who had already produced four national titles at Notre Dame and never lost a game from 1946-49. But the recruiting gravy train ended in the late 1940s, injuries arose…and all of a sudden the Irish finished 4-4-1 in 1950.
A product of Chicago’s Fenwick High School, Lattner was the rock upon whom Leahy would return Notre Dame to glory. The Irish head coach assembled excellent recruiting classes in 1950 and 1951 that would propel three consecutive Top 4 finishes from 1952-54, with Lattner, a two-time consensus All-American and the 1953 Heisman Trophy winner, serving as the crown jewel.
Lattner averaged an astonishing 18 yards per carry as a senior at Fenwick High, but due to NCAA freshman ineligibility back then, he couldn’t join the Notre Dame varsity until 1951. With the United States embroiled in the Korean War at the time, freshmen were made eligible in 1951, and the genesis of one of the great backfields in Notre Dame annals was borne.
· Freshman quarterback Ralph Guglielmi started in the 19-12 victory at USC to conclude the 1951 rebuilding year (7-2-1 record), would be the third pick in the 1955 NFL Draft, and is enshrined in the College Football Hall of Fame.
· Sophomore fullback Neil Worden, Lattner’s classmate, would be the No. 9 pick in the 1954 NFL Draft and actually finished with more yards rushing at Notre Dame (2,039) and more touchdowns (29) than Lattner (1,724 and 27, respectively).
· Freshman Joe Heap, a three-time Academic All-American, was the No. 8 pick in the 1955 NFL Draft and became the first Irish player to eclipse 1,000 yards receiving and 1,000 yards rushing in his career. The only other players to do so since then are Raghib “Rocket” Ismail (1988-90) and Theo Riddick (2009-12), who did it in four years.
· Yet Lattner, the No. 7 pick in the 1954 NFL Draft, was the centerpiece. He wasn’t as swift as Heap, as powerful as Worden or as bold as Guglielmi…but there wasn’t a better all-around player in the nation, never mind at Notre Dame, during his college career.
These days, a triple-threat player is defined as a runner, receiver and return man. In Lattner’s day, it was about playing offense, defense and special teams.
In 1952, the year Notre Dame defeated four different conference champions or co-champs – Texas, Oklahoma, Purdue and USC, and tied Ivy League champion Penn – Lattner was the lone Irish player to start on both offense and defense. Plus, he was the punter and return man.
One year later as a senior, Lattner didn’t lead the unbeaten Irish (9-0-1) in rushing, receiving, interceptions, tackles or touchdowns, but he still won the Heisman for his overall body of work.
A demon on defense, Lattner set the career interceptions record (13) at Notre Dame, could run inside or outside on offense, completed four passes for 111 yards, averaged nearly 16 yards per catch during his career, returned two of the eight kicks booted to him as a senior for TDs, averaged about 11 yards per punt return during his career and handled the punting.
Like John Lujack before him and Paul Hornung after him, Lattner was the consummate “triple threat” – and then some.
He also had a proclivity to play his best when the stage was the brightest. In the 1953 opener at Oklahoma, his interception sealed a 28-21 Irish victory – the last time the Sooners would lose until four years later, also to Notre Dame. In a hard-fought 28-20 win at Penn, Lattner returned a kickoff for a 92-yard score to tie the game. At arch rival USC, he carried 17 times for 157 yards and four touchdowns.
In between, he scored the clinching TD in a 27-14 win over Georgia Tech to end the Yellow Jackets’ 31-game unbeaten streak. Against teams from every corner of the country, Lattner thrived – and that’s how he won what remains the second closest Heisman race in history.
“I actually lost the Midwest to (runnerup) Paul Giel of Minnesota,” Lattner said. “ I won the East Coast vote because I had a good game against Pennsylvania, and I won the West Coast because I scored four touchdowns against Southern Cal. Television really wasn’t a big impact back then. The publicity had to come from playing in areas where you could get the media’s attention from all over the country.”
Alas, because of a controversial 14-14 tie with Iowa, the Irish finished No. 2 in 1953 to unbeaten Maryland. The Terrapins lost to Oklahoma – where the Irish won in the opener – in the Orange Bowl, but back then the final polls were completed after the regular season.
“You sucked it up a little bit because there wasn’t anything you could do about it,” Lattner said. “There were five polls back then and we won three of them, but the only two that counted were the UP and AP.”
After his graduation, Lattner played with the Pittsburgh Steelers and finished third in the Rookie of the Year balloting. However, because of his ROTC commitment, he had to be with the Air Force the next two years, where he suffered a football career-ending knee injury while playing at one of the bases.
He might have been a cruiser early in his career, but Lattner ultimately became the aircraft carrier for Notre Dame’s football program in the early 1950s.
John Lattner By The Numbers
2 Players in college football history – Lattner and Florida quarterback Tim Tebow (2008 and 2009) – who has won the Maxwell Award twice. Lattner won the honor, presented annually since 1937 to the nation’s top player, in 1952 and 1953. Other Notre Dame recipients were Leon Hart (1949), Jim Lynch (1966), Ross Browner (1977), Brady Quinn (2006) and Manti Te'o (2012).
2 Different Heisman Trophies owned by Lattner. His first was destroyed in a 1968 fire at a Chicago restaurant he owned with a partner. It was replaced with a new one, courtesy of the Downtown Athletic Club in New York City.
9 Seconds left in overtime when Lattner scored the game-winning basket in Notre Dame’s 75-74 victory over No. 18-ranked NYU in Madison Square Garden on Feb. 25, 1952. With three top Irish players declared academically ineligible in the second semester, Lattner joined the hoop squad to help out as a reserve.
9-1-2 Notre Dame’s record against ranked opponents in Lattner’s last two seasons, as the Irish finished No. 3 in 1952 and No. 2 in 1953. Since then, Notre Dame had back-to-back Top 3 finishes only one other time: 1988 (No. 1) and 1989 (No. 2).
13 Interceptions recorded by Lattner during his Notre Dame career. It was a school record until 1963, when Tom MacDonald finished with 15. The only other Notre Dame player to record more was Luther Bradley with 17.
16 Notre Dame players in history who were twice named consensus All-Americans. Lattner is the last Irish running back to achieve that feat (1952-53), although the recognition was earned just as much for his play on defense and special teams.
21 Years old Lattner turned on Oct. 24, 1953, when the Notre Dame student body serenaded him with “Happy Birthday” before he scored the final touchdown in a 27-14 victory over Georgia Tech, snapping the Yellow Jackets’ 31-game unbeaten streak.
26 Seasons Lattner held Notre Dame’s career all-purpose yardage (rushing, returning and returns) total before Vagas Ferguson finally eclipsed it in 1979. Lattner rushed for 1,724 yards, caught 39 passes for 613 yards and had 673 yards in returns for a total of 3,010.
40.1 Yards averaged by Lattner on only eight kickoff returns as a senior. Two of his returns resulted in touchdowns, 86 yards versus Purdue and 92 yards against Penn, breaking several would-be tackles along the way.
56 Points that separated Heisman Trophy winner Lattner (1,850) from runner-up Paul Giel (1,794) of the University of Minnesota in the 1953 balloting. It was the closest finish in history until 1985, when Bo Jackson (1,509) edged Chuck Long (1,464) by 45 points.