Notre Dame-Boston College: The Unavoidable Theme This Week
Notre Dame and Boston College were not originally scheduled to play this season and were not slated to meet again until 2022.
The coronavirus altered plans this August when football schedules throughout the country were revised. One of them included Notre Dame becoming a full-time football member in the Atlantic Coast Conference in 2020 and, consequently, playing a 10-game league schedule.
Boston College was one of four ACC teams added to the Fighting Irish docket this year, and their placement on the schedule became immediately conspicuous: Nov. 14 — the week after Notre Dame faced preseason and projected No. 1 Clemson.
This couldn’t be just a coincidence … could it?
The last time Notre Dame vanquished the No. 1 team in the land was on Nov. 13, 1993, a 31-24 triumph against Florida State to move to 10-0 and replace the Seminoles at the top spot.
All that was left to cap a perfect regular season — and then a national title in the Orange Bowl versus underdog Nebraska — was a home date with a Boston College team the Irish had annihilated 54-7 a year earlier.
In the annals of all-time heartbreaking losses for Notre Dame, the 41-39 defeat to Boston College in the 1993 regular-season finale would have to be at least among the top three, if not at the top.
It was the consummate definition of a letdown — the “L word” that will be the overwhelming storyline this week following the dramatic, pulsating 47-40 double-overtime victory versus top-ranked Clemson this past weekend.
Just like in 1993, the Notre Dame student body — social distancing mores be damned — stormed the field to jubilantly celebrate with the team. The floodgates of rapture opened after decades of hearing how the Irish were unable to win the “big one” on grand stages.
Even prior to the Clemson game, though, Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly issued a forewarning five days earlier.
“If you empty the tank this weekend and don’t have anything left for BC, they’re going to beat you — flat out,” Kelly said five days prior to the Clemson game. “There has to be a measure of emotional mastery here. … That’s what we’ve been building up for, that competitive greatness on Saturday, but still understanding that there’s a lot of football still in front of us.”
Coincidentally, nine years after that Florida State/Boston College gamut of emotions, in 2002 the Irish stunned No. 11 FSU on the road to improve to 8-0 and move up to No. 4 in the country — and promptly lost to Boston College again the next week (14-7) at home.
This is not just modern-day psychobabble. Letdowns always have been a part of human nature and athletics, including three other of the most emotional wins in Notre Dame’s football annals from long ago:
• In 1928, head coach Knute Rockne — the consummate psychologist — gave his famous “One For The Gipper” speech prior to playing superpower Army, winners of 11 straight including an 18-0 shutout of the Irish a year earlier.
In an emotional frenzy, Notre Dame shocked the Black Knights, 12-6.
You know what happened the next week? Rockne’s troops were whipped 27-7 at home by Carnegie Tech.
• In 1935 at heavily favored Ohio State, the winners of 10 straight and headed to a national title, the Irish trailed 13-0 in the fourth quarter before staging an amazing rally for an 18-13 win — and made itself the front-runner to win it all. In 1969, the centennial year of football, it was voted the greatest college game of the first 100 years.
You know what happened the next week? Head coach Elmer Layden’s unbeaten crew lost at home to a Northwestern team that was under .500.
• In 1957, coming off a 2-8 season that included a 40-0 defeat at Oklahoma (still the largest margin of defeat at home), head coach Terry Brennan’s Fighting Irish traveled to Norman as a three-touchdown underdog against a Sooners outfit that had won an NCAA-record 47 consecutive games. Plus, Notre Dame had just lost two in a row, including 34-6 to Michigan State the week prior.
The Irish then pulled off what is still deemed their greatest upset ever, 7-0, at Oklahoma.
You know what happened the next week? You got it: The Irish lost at home to Iowa.
Prior to last weekend, Kelly’s greatest “what though the odds” win in his 11 seasons at Notre Dame was a 30-13 conquest of double-digit favorite Oklahoma in Norman in 2012 during an unbeaten regular season.
The following week, Notre Dame trailed at home in the fourth quarter against Pitt, 20-6, before an amazing rally sent the game into overtime and some good fortune (and a missed infraction by the officiating crew on Notre Dame) resulted in a 29-26 triple-overtime win.
Notre Dame and Boston College faced each other last Nov. 23 on the ND's Senior Day, a 40-7 romp and the fourth straight victory of what is now a current nation-leading 13-game winning streak for the 7-0 and No. 2-ranked Irish.
It also was Notre Dame’s seventh consecutive conquest of the Eagles dating back to 2009, and the largest margin of victory since … oh, the aforementioned 54-7 slaughter in 1992.
Count on the “L word” to be the prevalent theme this week — and about 100 replays of David Gordon’s 1993 field goal.
Also … count on this 2020 Fighting Irish crew to be more locked in than ever, especially with a bye coming up Nov. 21, after first-semester final exams.
There will be an emotional lull coming up somewhere for the Fighting Irish. They’re inevitable. Don’t expect it to be this week, though — because that's exactly what many will be projecting.
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