Notre Dame's Toughest Schedules: Top 10

This week’s announcement about Notre Dame and Michigan renewing their rivalry for the two years in 2018-19 elicited some consternation about the Fighting Irish schedules in those seasons.

In 2018 Notre Dame opens with the Wolverines in the opener at home, plays Stanford the same month and then has four of its last five games, and five of its last seven, on the road, including Florida State and then at USC in two of the last three weeks.

Then in 2019 there are road trips to Louisville (Labor Day), to the Peach State twice for Georgia and Georgia Tech, and then also Michigan and Stanford — with USC interspersed before the trips to Atlanta and Michigan.

There is no way to gauge how difficult the future might be. But we do know how difficult some schedules from the past were. Here is what we believe were/are the 10 toughest schedules in school history — which we can use as a standard to measure any future slates:

10. 1958: USC The Worst?

The most amazing aspect about this 6-4 season was it wasn’t until the 10th and final game that Notre Dame faced a foe that was under .500 — and that was at USC, who it defeated 20-13 thanks to a phenomenal goal-line stand. Two of the losses were to teams that finished 2 (Iowa) and 3 (Army), and three others were in the top 20. Fifth-year head coach Terry Brennan was fired despite finishing 17th in the country.

9. 1986: A Rough Debut

First-year head coach Lou Holtz noticed the schedule upon his hiring and called it “your average death march.” It began with Big Ten champ Michigan (quarterbacked by Jim Harbaugh), trips to Michigan State and No. 2 Alabama (helping lead to a 1-4 start), and concluded with national champ Penn State, SEC champ LSU in Death Valley and at USC. The Irish finished 5-6, losing five games by a total of 14 points.

8. 1987: Into The Fire

Holtz’s first Irish team had a No. 3 ranking in strength of schedule, but his second was No. 1 with a 71-34-2 record (.671) — not including a 35-10 loss to 10-2 Texas A&M in the Cotton Bowl. Still the Irish won at Michigan (26-7), whacked Big Ten/Rose Bowl champ Michigan State (31-8) and then-No. 10 Alabama (37-6), and Pac-10 champ USC (26-15), before falling at Penn State, national champ Miami and the Aggies.

7. 1990: Burned At Home

This is a season when the Irish beat co-Big Ten champs Michigan and Michigan State, Cotton Bowl champ/defending national champ Miami, SEC champ Tennessee in Knoxville and USC in the Coliseum — and still finished “only” 9-2 during the regular season because of blowing 24-7 and 21-7 leads at home against Stanford and Penn State. It also lost, 10-9, to No. 1 Colorado in the Orange Bowl.

6. 1985: Faust’s Finale

Fifth-year head coach Gerry Faust was on the hot seat, and the schedule didn’t help during this 5-6 campaign. Since the NCAA first started recording strength of schedules in 1977, this is one of only two where the opposition finished above .700 (.701) — which is like a .400 batting average in major league baseball — and the other is by Notre Dame too (more on that later). His era concluded with losses to No. 1 Penn State (36-6), No. 17 LSU (10-7) and No. 4 Miami (58-7). Other defeats included 20-12 at a Michigan team that finished No. 2 with junior QB Harbaugh, and 21-15 to a 12-1 Air Force outfit.

5. 1929: Rock’s Traveling Show

Notre Dame Stadium was under construction, so Knute Rockne’s 9-0 national champions had to travel ever week during their season from Oct. 5 through Nov. 30 en route to a national title. Among their victories were against defending national champ USC at Chicago’s Soldier Field, avenging previous year defeats to Carnegie Tech and Georgia Tech in Pittsburgh and Atlanta, respectively, topping Navy in Baltimore and clinching the national title against top rival Army in Yankee Stadium. This also was an era when travel was done by railroad.

4. 1952: Leahy’s Lads

How does a 7-2-1 team finish No. 3 in the country, like this one did? By defeating four major conference champs in the Big 8 (Oklahoma), Southwest (Texas), Pac 8 (No. 2 USC) and Big Ten (co-champ Purdue), and tying a fifth in the Ivy League (Penn).

Head coach Frank Leahy coached four national title teams at Notre Dame and two other unbeatens, but he was proud of this team as much as any because of the schedule it had to navigate (including a 22-19 upset loss at home to Pitt).

3. 1978: Devine Ending

The defending national champions with head coach Dan Devine and QB Joe Montana opened 0-2 with home losses to Missouri and Michigan, but then reeled off eight consecutive wins against a slate that included at co-Big Ten champ Michigan State and other top-20 teams such as Purdue, Pitt, Navy and Georgia Tech, not to mention Tennessee, before a controversial 27-25 loss at co-national champ USC.

The .709 winning percentage by the opponents is the highest since the NCAA began keeping the stat in 1977 — and that doesn’t even including defeating 9-3 Houston, 35-34, in the Cotton Bowl to finish No. 7 in the AP poll. Overall, the 86-34-2 mark by the opposition was a remarkable .713 winning percentage.

2. 1989: Left At The Altar

Holtz’s 12-1 Irish defeated seven teams that finished in the AP Top 18, highlighted by a 21-6 victory over 11-0 and No. 1 Colorado in the Orange Bowl. Also vanquished were Big Ten champ Michigan in Ann Arbor and Pac-10/Rose Bowl champ USC. Alas, the Irish finished No. 2 to Miami, which defeated the Irish head-to-head in November and received the nod despite also having one loss.

1. 1943: Toughest Ever

Leahy’s third Irish edition joins Nebraska 1971 as the only two in history to defeat the teams that finished 2 (14-13 versus semi-pro war team Iowa Pre-Flight), No. 3 (35-12 at Michigan) and No. 4 (33-6 against Navy at Cleveland).

Oh, by the way it also won against the teams that finished No. 9 (Northwestern), No. 11 (Army) and No. 13 (Georgia Tech). Its lone defeat came in the closing seconds of the finale to another semi-pro war team, Great Lakes, on a Hail Mary pass (the one school that should never lose on such a play).

That 1943 team is the only one in college football history to lose its regular-season finale, not play in a bowl and still finish No. 1. Never was an exception as deserving as that 9-1 Notre Dame squad.

Seven of the 10 teams it faced that year finished in the AP Top 13. Even the three that didn’t (Pitt, Wisconsin and Illinois) had respectable traditions. Pitt was the “Team of The 1930s” under Jock Sutherland, Wisconsin finished No. 3 a year earlier, and the Illini came in at No. 15 in 1944. Furthermore, only three of the 10 games played by the Irish in 1943 were at home.