Notre Dame-Virginia Tech: Irish Try To Avoid Another Home-Wrecking Debut
This will be Virginia Tech’s first football meeting against Notre Dame. The Hokies also will be the 74th different opponent that the Fighting Irish will face in Notre Dame Stadium, which opened in 1930 in what would be head coach Knute Rockne’s final season before losing his life in a plane crash.
Notre Dame’s record against first-time visitors in its 86-year-old edifice is 59-13-1 (.815 winning percentage), with the tie occurring against Kansas in 1933. The most recent such game occurred last year when the Irish defeated UMass, 62-27.
However, there has been a disturbing pattern in the last seven years. Notre Dame has lost more frequently to a first-time, unranked visitor, some of which had not even had two decades in the Football Bowl Subdivision. Here are the unlucky 13 for the Fighting Irish, listed chronologically:
USC 1931 16-14
Purdue 1933 19-0
Texas 1934 7-6
Iowa 1940 7-0
Michigan 1942 32-20
Missouri 1972 30-26
Clemson 1979 16-10
Florida State 1981 19-13
Penn State 1982 24-14
Connecticut 2009 33-30 (2OT)
Tulsa 2010 28-27
South Florida 2011 23-20
Louisville 2014 31-28
Especially notable is the last four because UConn and South Florida didn’t even become FBS members until the turn of the century in 2000, Tulsa was not a member of a major conference and Louisville started a true freshman quarterback (now a receiver) in Reggie Bonnafon.
Brian Kelly also became the first Fighting Irish head coach to lose to three first-time visitors to Notre Dame Stadium (Tulsa, USF and Louisville). Adding a fourth against Virginia Tech would only add more fuel to a season that burned down before the end of September.
Virginia Tech head coach Justin Fuente also is in his first season with the Hokies, just like Bobby Petrino was with Louisville in 2014. Losing to a first-year coach would only add to the frustration.
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