Notre Dame-Texas, Part II: Where The Sun Don't Shine

In 1913 and 1915, Notre Dame’s first two games in Austin, Texas were Thanksgiving Day meetings in which the Irish romped to 30-7 and 36-7 victories versus the University of Texas, the former ending the Longhorns’ 12-game winning streak.

The next trip to Austin didn’t occur until Oct. 4, 1952, when the No. 5 Longhorns were a prohibitive favorite against head coach Frank Leahy’s Fighting Irish that had fallen upon some harder times. After winning four national titles in the 1940s and going unbeaten from 1946-49, the school’s self-imposed football scholarship cutbacks led to a precipitous fall in 1950 when it finished 4-4-1. The next season was better with a 7-2-1 outcome, but the Irish were crushed by Big Ten champ Michigan State, 35-0, and failed to finish in the Associated Press Top 20 for the second straight year.

The 1952 season had another inauspicious start with a 7-7 tie at Penn — and now the Fighting Irish had to travel a second straight week to powerful Texas, which would go on to win the Southwest Conference that year. Head coach Ed Price’s 2-0 Longhorns opened with a 35-14 win at No. 11 LSU, and then won on the road again at North Carolina 28-7 to put themselves into the national title conversation.

Seldom did any detail get past Leahy, and perhaps this single game best reflected his attention to intangible factors. Studying the lay of the land in Texas’ stadium, Leahy noted how the searing Texas sun would shine along Notre Dame's sideline during the game. Thus, prior to the game he conferred with Texas athletics director/resident legend Dana X. Bible — who joined Notre Dame’s Knute Rockne and George Gipp as inaugural members of the newly opened College Football Hall of Fame the year before (1951) — to arrange a change in logistics.

Back in the early 1940s, Leahy and Bible joined Stanford’s Clark Shaughnessy and the Chicago Bears to first employ the radical T-formation concept that would revolutionize football forever. The relationship between Leahy and Bible during that time reaped dividends 10 years later.

Leahy told Bible that Notre Dame’s main hope was not to embarrass itself against the Longhorns, so he requested that both teams share the same sideline for the game so that the Texas sun wouldn't wilt the Irish. The southern hospitality came through in Bible to accommodate his compatriot. Leahy also asked that his Fighting Irish team be seated “to the left” of where Texas was — and that too was granted.

The purpose for the positioning was because Leahy noted how at a certain time of the day in the second half the Texas sun would be at its peak strength, and it would be right where the Longhorns would be stationed.

It turned out to be an extraordinarily hot afternoon, with temperatures on the field hovering into triple digits. Texas took a 3-0 lead into the halftime locker room — but in the second half the sun began to shine brightest on Texas’ side of the sideline while Notre Dame was in the more shaded area of the field.

After totaling only 55 yards total offense in the first half, Notre Dame wore down the Longhorns in the second half with 233 yards total offense, using a dominant ground attack with future Heisman Trophy winner John Lattner, plus fullback Neil Worden, halfback Joe Heap and quarterback Ralph Guglielmi (all eventual first-round picks) to grind out an 85-yard touchdown march in the 14-3 Irish upset. The final TD drive was aided by a Texas muffed punt return.

The 1952 Fighting Irish would finish No. 3 in the country after defeating the Southwest Conference champ (Texas), Big 8 champ (Oklahoma), Pac-8 champ (USC), and co-Big Ten champ (Purdue), and also tied the Ivy League champ (Penn).

Notre Dame would then finish unbeaten in Leahy’s final season (1953). Then in the return match at home with Texas in 1954, Guglielmi ran for two touchdowns, threw for another and recorded three first-half interceptions on defense to lead No. 2 Notre Dame past No. 4 Texas, 21-0, in head coach Terry Brennan’s Notre Dame debut.

Sunny days returned with the help of staying in the shade that one day in Austin in 1952.

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