Ranking Notre Dame’s Year 11 Results
The last three Notre Dame football head coaches who reached their 11th season at the school stepped down after the final game that year.
There doesn’t appear to be any such plans for Brian Kelly, who is on pace this September to own the record for most games having coached the Fighting Irish. The current standard is 132 by Lou Holtz, who was 100-30-2 (.765 win percentage) from 1986-96.
Kelly enters this season with 129 games (92-37, .713) on the Notre Dame sidelines, so if the 2020 schedule holds up as planned, he will eclipse the mark in the Sept. 26 outing versus Wake Forest.
With a contract extension expected to be announced later this year, in 2023 Kelly could even surpass Knute Rockne for the most seasons as the head coach with 14.
The missing element is a national title, which five previous coaches have achieved at Notre Dame, including Dan Devine (1977), whose tenure lasted only six years.
Kelly has been at the height of his career the past three years with a 33-6 record (.846 win percentage). Believe it or not, that mark is better than years 8-10 for Notre Dame coaching icons Holtz (26-9-1, .736), Ara Parseghian (27-5, .844), Frank Leahy (18-8-3), .672) and even Rockne (23-4-2, .828).
Again, though, all had captured at least one national title by then — and Parseghian also achieved another in year 10. That is always the ultimate trump card at Notre Dame.
Can Kelly continue the momentum on the back stretch? Here were the other year 11 results at Notre Dame from best to worst:
1. Frank Leahy (1953) — 9-0-1
Fittingly, “The Master” capped his career with his sixth unbeaten campaign in 11 years (and seventh in 13 overall when including his stint at Boston College). He was merely 45 years old, but would never coach again.
However, 10-0 Maryland was awarded the national title at the end of the regular season while the Irish finished No. 2. The Terrapins ended up losing to Oklahoma — a team the Irish had defeated in Norman— in the Orange Bowl, but bowl games were not included in the vote back then.
2. Ara Parseghian (1974) — 10-2
One year after winning his second consensus national title, Parseghian became overwhelmed by off-the-field setbacks and demands of the job and stepped down that December.
His 9-2 team rallied around him as a double-digit underdog to topple 11-0 and No. 1 Alabama 13-11 in the Orange Bowl to finish No. 6 in the Associated Press poll and No. 4 in the UPI rankings.
Notre Dame played 48 quarters that season. In 46 of them it allowed a total of merely 88 points. In the other two it permitted 59 — a 24-0 first quarter by Purdue during a 31-20 loss, and a 35-0 third quarter at eventual UPI national champ USC in the regular-season finale after Notre Dame had led 24-6 at halftime.
3. Lou Holtz (1996) — 8-3
After a remarkable 64-9-1 mark from 1988-93 with a national title and several near misses, the program took a conspicuous dip his final three years with a modest 23-11-1 ledger.
A mid-year overtime loss at home to Air Force hastened Holtz’s decision to depart, and in his finale he lost again in overtime, this time at USC, against whom he had been 9-0-1, for a No. 19 finish.
4. Knute Rockne (1928) — 5-4
One-third of Rockne’s losses during a 105-12-5 output came in year 11 — but he would follow that with back-to-back national titles in 1929 and 1930. Highlighting this season was the epic 12-6 “One For The Gipper” upset of unbeaten Army to end the Cadets’ national title hopes.
However, the Irish suffered the ultimate letdown the following week with a 27-7 humbling to Carnegie Tech (the first loss at home in 23 years) and falling 27-14 at USC the ensuing week to close out the season.
----
• Talk about it inside Rockne’s Roundtable
• Subscribe to our podcast on iTunes
• Learn more about our print and digital publication, Blue & Gold Illustrated.
• Follow us on Twitter: @BGINews, @BGI_LouSomogyi, @BGI_MikeSinger, @PatrickEngel_, @ToddBurlage and @AndrewMentock.
• Like us on Facebook.