:: Notre Dame Football: Fighting Irish Lore ::
[click
or hover to order]Knute K. Rockne - 1918-30, 105-12-5 (.881)
"When the going gets tough, the tough get going."
"A winner never quits, and a quitter never wins."
— Knute K. Rockne
Knute K. Rockne was the winningest football coach of all time, with five unbeaten, untied seasons in 13 years and the highest winning percentage in college or professional football history history, going 105-12-5 (.881).
A former Notre Dame player and assistant coach under Jesse Harper, as well as a brilliant chemistry student and lab assistant, Rockne served as Notre Dame Head Football Coach from 1918 through 1930, prior to his tragic death in a 1931 air crash near Bazaar, Kansas.
Rockne also was Notre Dame Athletic Director.
The Rockne Era helped solidify Notre Dame's status as America's team, especially among Catholics of immigrant heritage and others swelling the ranks of Notre Dame's "Subway Alumni," who never attended the university but had a strong loyalty and attachment to her.
During Rockne's tenure, Notre Dame competed from coast to coast, won multiple national champsionships and built Notre Dame Stadium, "The House That Rockne Built."
Rockne was famed as one of the greatest innovators and motivators in coaching history.
VIDEO: Knute Rockne Locker Room Speech
Rockne continued the development of football's passing offense, which Notre Dame invented under Harper, with Rockne as football's first receiver. He further innovated across all aspects of the game, and, inspired by the movements of a chorus line, invented an offense so successful that football banned it because it was impossible to defend against. The "Notre Dame Shift" or "Rockne Shift" involved the entire offensive backfield, then four players (quarterback, fullback, and two halfbacks), being in motion simultaneously prior to the snap.
Another Rockne innovation, anticipating future development of the platoon system, was to start his back-ups, and then make mass substitutions by putting in his real starters later. One commentator observed that Notre Dame actually had two distinct teams, with Rockne saving the best players for installation after the initial "shock troops" had already started wearing down the opposing team.
Rockne coached 20 first-team All-Americans, including George Gipp, the greatest all-around player to ever play the game.
As a running back, Gipp's career rushing total of 2,341 yards, on 369 carries, remained the school record for half a century. His senior-year single-season rushing average of 8.2 yards per carry is still the school record. Gipp also threw for 1,769 yards, on 93 of 187 passing. As a defensive back, Gipp did not allow a single pass completion in his area for his entire collegiate carreer. And Gipp averaged just shy of 40 yards per punt.
George Gipp apparently never played organized football in high school, and came to Notre Dame to play baseball.
Like Rockne, Gipp was an older student. Each was already in his mid-twenties when playing as seniors. And, like Rockne, Gipp had other athletic interests.
As legend has it, Rockne discovered Gipp, when someone shanked a ball out of the playing area at practice, only for some unseen person to boom it back with a massive punt.
Rockne asked who was responsible for the return punt, learned it was Gipp, came to assess his overall athletic prowess, and talked Gipp into coming out for football.
Interestingly, as the record books indicate, it would have been when Rockne was an assistant coach that this turn of events occurred. Gipp played in a few games in 1917, at which time it would have been Jesse Harper's last year as head coach, with Rockne serving as an assistant coach. Rockne would start his tenure as head coach in 1918, the Gipper's sophomore season, the second year that Gipp appears in the Notre Dame Football record books.
VIDEO: "Wake Up the Echoes" Excerpt:
Rockne & Gipper
In Gipp's senior season, 1920, sometime around Notre Dame's away game at Northwestern, the second-to-last game of Gipp's senior season, Gipp contracted strep throat. It was years before the development of penicillin. Some accounts have Gipp staying on in Chicago to keep a promise to a friend to give some high school players tips on punting. And at least one account indicates that Gipp said that point in time was when he started noticing something wrong with his throat. Gipp missed the final game of the season. Within several weeks, without the development of antibiotics, Gipp's strep throat worsened to pneumonia, claiming Gipp's life at age 25.
Rockne, years later, would recount to his weakest team how he had visited Gipp the night he died. Slightly different than the film version, an eyewitness account in the "Wake Up the Echoes" documentary by NFL Films made it sound as if Rockne was almost desperate to try to help Gipp. It almost sounded as if Gipp was trying to console Rockne, by telling him that there was, indeed, one thing Rockne could do for him. One day, Gipp promised, there would be a game that Rockne wanted more than anything; tell them, Gipp said, to go win one for the ol' Gipper. That day would come roughly eight years later, with Rockne, the winningest coach in history, facing the prospect of a losing season, and going up against one of the game's toughest teams, in front of thousands at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.
In the meantime, almost as soon as Gipp's era ended, Notre Dame welcomed the backfield that would become known as The Four Horseman.
With the Four Horsemen and the Seven Mules, Rockne would lead Notre Dame to victory and a consensus national championship in the 1925 Rose Bowl, Notre Dame's only bowl appearance prior to 1970.
Notre Dame's backfield of Elmer Layden, Harry Stuhldreher, Don Miller, and Jim Miller would earn their nickname during a victory over Army in front of 55,000 at The Polo Grounds in the Bronx, when legendary New York Herald Tribune sportswriter Grantland Rice compared them with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse:
Outlined against a blue, gray October sky the Four Horsemen rode again.
In dramatic lore they are known as famine, pestilence, destruction and death. These are only aliases. Their real names are: Stuhldreher, Miller, Crowley and Layden. They formed the crest of the South Bend cyclone before which another fighting Army team was swept over the precipice at the Polo Grounds this afternoon as 55,000 spectators peered down upon the bewildering panorama spread out upon the green plain below.
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Stories differ as to how the four backs ended up on horseback in a photograph soon after. One account has a Notre Dame priest with a flair for public relations asking the four to come, in full uniform, to a small farm on campus, to pose with footballs sitting on the backs of four plowhorses. Another account has a student press assistant using horses from a South Bend livery stable. In any event, the picture was taken and provided to wire services, the photo appeared around the country, and the legend was set for the ages.
In that era, there generally would be four members of the backfield, the quarterback, fullback, and two halfbacks. And there generally would be seven linemen. Once the backfield had its nickname "The Four Horseman," there apparently was felt a need to also honor the seven-man line, paced by center and captain Adam Walsh.
The line became known as "The Seven Mules."
Even including the win over national juggernaut Army, Rockne reportedly still felt that appearing in the 1925 Rose Bowl, played in Pasadena at the conclusion of the 1924 season, would be needed to complete Notre Dame's claim to a consensus national championship.
When the Irish beat Stanford 27-10, triumphing over legendary coach Pop Warner and legendary player Ernie Nevers, it did indeed solidify their claim to the consensus national title.
And Notre Dame would not compete in another bowl game until a #1 vs. #2 match-up with Texas in the 1970 Cotton Bowl.
During Notre Dame's last trip to Pasadena, for a regular season game against UCLA in Charlie Weis's third season, the Los Angeles Times published a lengthy retrospective, which is linked from the "resource links" section below. The Times' piece included an account of a Rose Bowl official who, in recent years, visited the Notre Dame campus, apparently incognito, and stationed himself outside a dorm that, legend has it, was built using Notre Dame's purse from the 1925 Rose Bowl.
The representative greeted the first student that came out of Dillon Hall, introduced himself, and asked if the student had heard the tale about the dorm being build with Rose Bowl money. The student replied, yes, certainly, incoming freshmen in Dillon were told at orientation how Dillon Hall was known as the Rose Bowl dorm. According to the Times, the Rose Bowl official did not need a plane to fly back to Los Angeles.
However, Rockne reportedly turned the train journey to the Rose Bowl into a cross-country exhibition for the Notre Dame team, taking a few weeks there and back, and taking a different route back that maximized public exposure.
While Rockne reportedly indicated his aim, on the way out at least, was to gradually acclimate the team to warmer climates, the team reportedly held open practices along the way that were like exhibition games. And the trip back was like a national coming out tour expanding the national popularity of Notre Dame football.
Notre Dame officials apparently decided, as a result, that bowl games took too much time out of the academic schedule. And Notre Dame would not return to bowls for 45 years.
Notre Dame apparently earned the first invitation to that 1925 Rose Bowl, that is, they were invited before a west coast team was. So the Rose Bowl then had to figure out which team to invite as an opponent. Rockne wanted to play Southern Cal, apparently, but the Rose Bowl settled on an elite Stanford team with Coach Pop Warner and halback Ernie Nevers. The game was close for a time, and controversial with a disputed, momentum-building goal-line stand by Notre Dame. And Stanford had better statistics. But Elmer Layden had two interception returns for touchdowns to help bring about a Notre Dame rout.
Rockne would get his wish to start playing Southern Cal in 1926, when Notre Dame and Southern Cal launched the biggest rivalry in college football, indisputably the biggest intersectional (cross-country) rivalry in college football. The initial game was a 13-12 Notre Dame victory in Los Angeles. Notre Dame capped of a 9-1 season with the win over the Trojans.
The following year, 1927, Notre Dame would host Southern Cal at Soldier Field in Chicago. In the old configuration at Soldier Field, 120,000 piled in for the game, one of the largest crowds ever to watch a college football game. Notre Dame won another close one, 7-6, to finish that year 7-1-1.
(Note that, for decades, Notre Dame and Southern Cal would always play each other the final game of the year, regardless of location. In fact, the last time Southern Cal played a football game in snow was at Notre Dame in the 1950's. Eventually, an arrangement would be struck where the game would be moved up to October if it was cold-weather Notre Dame.
This later arrangement, in turn, would result in Notre Dame effectively pairing the Southern Cal with another warm-weather opponent, so that when Southern Cal played at Notre Dame in October, Notre Dame would play the other warm-weather opponent on the road at the end of the season, and vice versa. Today, that second warm-weather opponent is Stanford. For a time, it was Miami of Florida.)
Rockne had only 12 losses in 13 years, four of them coming in 1928. Ironically, it was that year's team, whom Rockne feared might end with a losing record, that Rockne challenged to "win one for the Gipper" against national juggernaut Army at Yankee Stadium.
Rockne's "Win one for the Gipper" speech was the most famous pep talk by this most famous of motivators.
VIDEO: Knute Rockne, All-American: "Win One for the Gipper" (Reagan and O'Brien)
The film version, engraved on a plaque in the home locker room at Notre Dame Stadium, as depicted in the film "Rudy," featured George Gipp saying "Rock, sometime when the team's up against it, and the breaks are beating the boys, tell them to go out there with all they've got, and win just one for the Gipper. I don't know where I'll be then, Rock, but I'll know about it; and I'll be happy."
A Rockne player who reputedly had never had a big play scored the winning touchdown in that game, saying as he crossed the goal line, "there's one for the Gipper." That player later would go on to be a successful head coach at Texas, before serving his country in World War II. Jack Chevigny died a hero's death in the Pacific Theater.
Rockne proved correct in his fears of a losing season. Notre Dame finished 5-4, and would have had a losing record if not for the huge upset win over Army.
In 1929, Notre Dame was building Notre Dame Stadium, "The House that Rockne Built," and played a nine-game slate consisting entirely of road games. Rockne once again led Notre Dame to an undefeated, untied consensus national championship.
Rockne also was fighting a case of phlebitis that sometimes resulted in him being confined to a wheelchair or needing to coach by phone or through a loudspeaker.
Notre Dame played three more games at Soldier Field, including a 13-2 victory over Southern Cal, with roughly 113,000 spectators. Another memorable game at Soldier Field was a win over Wisconsin featuring big runs by fullback Joe Savoldi.
Savoldi also had the only score in a 7-0 victory at Carnegie Tech.
Notre Dame closed out the 1929 season playing Army in freezing weather at Yankee Stadium. In one of the most dramatic plays in Notre Dame football history, Army appeared about to score, when Jack Elder intercepted an Army pass on Notre Dame's 7-yard-line and returned it 93 yards for a touchdown. It was the only score in a 7-0 Notre Dame win in front of nearly 80,000 spectators in the Bronx.
The Irish finished 1929 undefeated and untied at 9-0, with the consensus national championship.
Notre Dame would win back-to-back consensus national titles, brining home a championship while also inaugurating Notre Dame Stadium.
Yet another Notre Dame backfield of All-Americans was in place, including quarterback Frank Carideo, fullback Savoldi, and halfbacks Marty Brill and Marchy Schwartz.
Notre Dame also had six All-American linemen in 1930 or 1931, including center Tommy Yarr, guards Nordy Hoffman and Bert Metzger and tackle Joe Kurth.
Two key Notre Dame wins in 1930 included a 7-6 victory over Army at a rainy Soldier Field, with Schwartz scoring from 54 yards out in front of 110,000 onlookers. The following week, Notre Dame closed out the season with a 27-0 victory at Southern Cal, with reserve Bucky O'Connor scoring two touchdowns.
Notre Dame was 10-0 on the year.
VIDEO: "Wake Up the Echoes" Excerpt:
Rockne later years, tragic plane crash
We will never know how long the Rockne era would have lasted at Notre Dame had the man not been struck down so young. But Rockne's boys continued to shape Notre Dame football and the sport he loved for decades. Former Four Horseman Elmer Layden was a highly successful head coach at Notre Dame in the 1930's, including winning a nonconsensus national championship, before leaving to become NFL Commissioner.
Former Rockne lineman Frank Leahy (who also was Vince Lombardi's line coach at Fordham under former Four Horseman Jim Crowley) replaced Layden as Notre Dame Head Coach, becoming the second-winningest Head Coach in college football history, behind only Rockne.
(Although, perhaps a testimony to just how high Notre Dame has reached over the years, with respect to Notre Dame tenures alone, Leahy was third-winningst behind Rockne, and Rockne's own coach Jesse Harper.)
Another Rockne player, Edward "Moose" Krause, would serve as a Leahy assistant coach, and as acting head coach for a few games. And Moose Krause took over from Leahy as Notre Dame Athletic Director. Moose Krause would continue as a legendary Irish Athletic Director right up until the beginning of the 1980's.
Rockne as Notre Dame player, helping introduce passing offense to the sport as football's first true receiver
As a Notre Dame player at end under Head Coach Jesse Harper, Rockne would become the first receiver in football history. As the story goes, Rockne and quarterback Gus Dorais had summer jobs as lifeguards in Sandusky, Ohio. In their free time, they practiced throwing a football like a baseball up and down the beach. (The most important event that summer, of course, was that Rockne met his future wife Bonnie, one of the local girls in Sandusky.)
Various accounts indicated that, over the previous several decades of football's existence, there might have been a scattered handful of isolated individual plays, where something occurred involving the forward movement of a football through the air. Apparently in one or more instances, the plays should have been deemed illegal. And apparently these plays might have involved something more limited than today's forward pass, perhaps more of a type of forward pitch. One report indicates that Notre Dame itself might have had, perhaps, one play considered a forward pass.
But then, in 1913, with Head Coach Jesse Harper at the helm, Notre Dame was in the midst of a national tour against top opponents, including national power Army. Dorais and Rockne convinced Harper to let them roll out the forward pass they had been working on perfecting.
Notre Dame did not simply introduce the forward pass. In that game, to a sport previously unacquainted with it, Notre Dame introduced an explosive passing offense.
On the day, Dorais went 13 of 17 for 246 yards and five touchdowns, accounting for all of Notre Dame's scoring in a shocking 35-13 upset rout of Army. As reported by NBC's Pat Haden on air, Dorais' first pass attempt of the day was a 25-yard touchdown pass to Rockne. (Check the resource links below for the local newspaper accounts of the game, including a photo of Rockne running for a receiving touchdown.)
Rockne had multiple athletic interests, including track and boxing, and only really played football for Notre Dame his junior season, under coach John L. Marks, and his senior season, under Coach Harper. It was as a senior that Rockne helped introduce passing offense to football, in the process named a third-team All-American.
Rockne, a brilliant chemistry student who graduated magna cum laude, was invited to stay on at Notre Dame as a graduate assistant, associated with the department of Father Julius Nieuwland, the Notre Dame Priest-Scientist who discovered synthetic rubber.
He did so, conditioned upon the promise that he could assist Coach Harper with the football team.
Rockne Earlier Life
Rockne was born in Voss, Norway, to parents Martha and Lars, March 4, 1888, less than a year after Notre Dame started playing football in 1887.
Rockne immigrated with his family though Ellis Island in 1893, settling in Chicago. It was in Chicago that Rockne was introduced to football.
After working for a U.S. postal distribution facility for four years after high school to save money for college tuition, Rockne enrolled in Notre Dame, where he played football his final two years, ran track, pursued other diverse activities, and was a brilliant chemistry student.
The name "Knute" sounds like "Canute," as explained by President Ronald Reagan during the dedication ceremony for a Knute Rockne memorial postage stamp in 1988. During the filming of "Knute Rockne: All-American," in which Reagan played legendary Notre Dame player George Gipp, those making the movie consulted Rockne's widow Bonnie, who explained that one actually pronounces the "K" in Knute.
Reagan on Rockne, and "Knute Rockne, All-American"
Knute Rockne died tragically in 1931 in a plane crash, shocking all America.
In 1940, he would be the subject of a film, "Knute Rockne, All-American," starring Pat O'Brien as Rockne, Gale Page as Bonnie, and, after he reportedly sought the role with great intensity, a young Ronald Reagan as George Gipp.
The film reportedly was the last one permitted to be filmed on the Notre Dame campus until "Rudy."
The "Win one for a Gipper" speech, as depicted in "Knute Rockne, All-American," would later be engraved on a plaque inside the Notre Dame locker room at Notre Dame Stadium, "The House that Rockne Built."
VIDEO: "Knute Rockne, All-American" Trailer
Many years later, of course, Reagan would become President Ronald Reagan. Later in his presidency, legendary Notre Dame Head Basketball Coach Richard "Digger" Phelps would be serving on a committee addressing subjects for commemorative postage stamps by the U.S. Postal Service. After Digger Phelps successfully promoted the idea of a Knute Rockne commemorative stamp, the President himself came to campus for the stamp unveiling and dedication ceremony, held in the basketball arena to accomodate the tremendous interest of Rockne fans.
Reagan had much to say about the character of Rockne the man, and what he meant to America.
Said Reagan:
... that inner strength is what Notre Dame and the legend of Rockne are all about. You know, so much is said about Rockne's influence on his ballplayers, but actually he liked to talk about their influence on him. In his autobiography, he described his inability to sleep one night before a big game. So, he was up early in the lobby and saw two of his boys come down the stairs and go out, and then others came and followed them. And though he had a pretty good idea of what was going on, he decided to follow along. "They didn't realize it,'' he said in his diary, "but these youngsters were making a powerful impression on me.'' And he said, "When I saw them walking up to the Communion rail to receive and realized the hours of sleep they had sacrificed, I understood what a powerful ally their religion was to them in their work on the football field.''
And after Rockne found -- here at Notre Dame -- his own religious faith, a friend of his at the University of Maryland asked him if he minded telling him about it. "Why should I mind telling you?'' he said. "You know all this hurry and battling we're going through is just an expression of our inner selves striving for something else. The way I look at it is that we're all here to try and find, each in his own way, the best road to our ultimate goal. I believe I've found my way, and I shall travel it to the end.'' And travel it to the end he did. And when they found him in the Kansas cornfield where the plane had gone down, they also found next to him a prayer book and at his fingertips the rosary of Notre Dame, the Rosary of Our Lady. Someone put it so well at the time: Knute Rockne did more spiritual good than a thousand preachers. His career was a sermon in right living.
Yes, we've seen more change in the last 50 years, since Knute Rockne was with us, than in all the other epics of history combined. You are the beneficiaries of this, and it is you who'll continue the struggle and carry mankind to greater and greater heights. As Americans, as free people, you must stand firm, even when it's uncomfortable for you to do so. It won't always be easy. There will be moments of joy, of triumph. There will also be times of despair, times when all those around you are ready to give up.
It's then I want you to remember our meeting today. And "some time when the team is up against it and the breaks are beating the boys, tell them to go out there with all they've got and win just one for the Gipper. I don't know where I'll be then, but I'll know about it, and I'll be happy.'' Good luck in the years ahead, and God bless you all. Thank you.
President Ronald W. Reagan Remarks at the Unveiling of the Knute Rockne Commemorative Stamp at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, March 9, 1988 - Public Papers of Ronald Reagan, Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, National Archives and Records Administration
Rockne Era Results
1918: 3-1-2
(George Gipp on roster)
September 28 W Case Tech 26-6 A
Nov. 2 W Wabash 67-7 A
Nov. 9 T Great Lakes 7-7 H
Nov. 16 L Michigan State (R) 7-13 A
Nov. 23 W Purdue 26-6 A
Nov. 28 T Nebraska (S) 0-0 A
NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP (nonconsensus); undefeated, untied
1919: 9-0-0
(George Gipp on roster)
Oct. 4 W Kalamazoo 14-0 H 5,000
Oct. 11 W Mount Union 60-7 H 4,000
Oct. 18 W Nebraska 14-9 A 10,000
Oct. 25 W Western Michigan 53-0 H 2,500
Nov. 1 W Indiana (R) (at Indianapolis) 16-3 N 5,000
Nov. 8 W Army 12-9 A 8,000
Nov. 15 W Michigan State 13-0 H 5,000
Nov. 22 W Purdue 33-13 A 7,000
Nov. 27 W Morningside (S) 14-6 A 10,000
NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP (nonconsensus); undefeated, untied
1920: 9-0-0
(George Gipp on roster)
Oct. 2 W Kalamazoo 39-0 H 5,000
Oct. 9 W Western Michigan 41-0 H 3,500
Oct. 16 W Nebraska 16-7 A 9,000
Oct. 23 W Valparaiso 28-3 H 8,000
Oct. 30 W Army 27-17 A 10,000
Nov. 6 W Purdue (HC) 28-0 H 12,000
Nov. 13 W Indiana (at Indianapolis)13-10 N 14,000
Nov. 20 W Northwestern 33-7 A c20,000
Nov. 25 W Michigan State 25-0 A 8,000
(George Gipp’s last game was the Nov. 20 contest against Northwestern. Gipp contracted strep throat and died from pneumonia on Dec. 14 at age 25.)
1921: 10-1-0
(Four Horsemen on roster as freshmen)
Sept. 24 W Kalamazoo 56-0 H 8,000
Oct. 1 W DePauw 57-10 H 8,000
Oct. 8 L Iowa 7-10 A 7,500
Oct. 15 W Purdue 33-0 A 7,500
Oct. 22 W Nebraska (HC) 7-0 H 14,000
Oct. 29 W Indiana (at Indianapolis) (R)
28-7 N 10,000
Nov. 5 W Army 28-0 A 7,000
Nov. 8 W Rutgers (at Polo Grounds, NYC) 48-0 N
12,000
Nov. 12 W Haskell 42-7 H 5,000
Nov. 19 W Marquette 21-7 A 11,000
Nov. 24 W Michigan State 48-0 H 15,000
1922: 8-1-1
(Four Horsemen on roster)
Sept. 30 W Kalamazoo 46-0 H 5,000
Oct. 7 W St. Louis 26-0 H 7,000
Oct. 14 W Purdue 20-0 A 9,000
Oct. 21 W DePauw 34-7 H 5,000
Oct. 28 W Georgia Tech 13-3 A 20,000
Nov. 4 W Indiana (HC) 27-0 H c22,000
Nov. 11 T Army 0-0 A 15,000
Nov. 18 W Butler 31-3 A 12,000
Nov. 25 W Carnegie Tech (S) 19-0 A 30,000
Nov. 30 L Nebraska 6-14 A 16,000
1923: 9-1-0
(Four Horsemen on roster)
Sept. 29 W Kalamazoo 74-0 H 10,000
Oct. 6 W Lombard 14-0 H 8,000
Oct. 13 W Army (at Ebbets Field, Brooklyn) 13-0 N c30,000
Oct. 20 W Princeton 25-2 A 30,000
Oct. 27 W Georgia Tech 35-7 H 20,000
Nov. 3 W Purdue (HC) 34-7 H 20,000
Nov. 10 L Nebraska 7-14 A 30,000
Nov. 17 W Butler 34-7 H 10,000
Nov. 24 W Carnegie Tech 26-0 A 30,000
Nov. 29 W St. Louis (R) 13-0 A 9,000
CONSENSUS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP; undefeated, untied
1924: 10-0-0
(Four Horsemen)
Oct. 4 W Lombard 40-0 H 8,000
Oct. 11 W Wabash 34-0 H 10,000
Oct. 18 W Army (at Polo Grounds) 13-7 N c55,000
Oct. 25 W Princeton 12-0 A 40,000
Nov. 1 W *Georgia Tech (HC) 34-3 H c22,000
Nov. 8 W Wisconsin 38-3 A 28,425
Nov. 15 W Nebraska 34-6 H c22,000
Nov. 22 W Northwestern (at Soldier Field)13-6 N 45,000
Nov. 29 W Carnegie Tech 40-19 A 35,000
ROSE BOWL
Jan. 1 W Stanford (at Pasadena, Calif.) 27-10 N c53,000
1925: 7-2-1
Sept. 26 W Baylor (R) 41-0 H 13,000
Oct. 3 W Lombard 69-0 H 10,000
Oct. 10 W Beloit 19-3 H 10,000
Oct. 17 L Army (at Yankee Stadium) 0-27 N c65,000
Oct. 24 W Minnesota 19-7 A c49,000
Oct. 31 W Georgia Tech (R) 13-0 A 12,000
Nov. 7 T Penn State (R) 0-0 A c20,000
Nov. 14 W Carnegie Tech (HC) 26-0 H c27,000
Nov. 21 W Northwestern 13-10 H c27,000
Nov. 26 L Nebraska 0-17 A c45,000
1926: 9-1-0
Oct. 2 W Beloit 77-0 H 8,000
Oct. 9 W Minnesota 20-7 A c48,648
Oct. 16 W Penn State (R) 28-0 H 18,000
Oct. 23 W Northwestern 6-0 A c41,000
Oct. 30 W Georgia Tech (R)12-0 H 11,000
Nov. 6 W Indiana 26-0 H 20,000
Nov. 13 W Army (at Yankee Stadium) 7-0 N c63,029
Nov. 20 W Drake (HC) (S) 21-0 H 20,000
Nov. 27 L Carnegie Tech 0-19 A c45,000
Dec. 4 W USC (2:00) 13-12 A c74,378
First Notre Dame - Southern Cal Game
NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP (nonconsensus)
1927: 7-1-1
Oct. 1 W Coe (R) 28-7 H 10,000
Oct. 8 W Detroit 20-0 A c28,000
Oct. 15 W Navy (at Baltimore).19-6 N 45,101
Oct. 22 W Indiana 9-6 A 16,000
Oct. 29 W Georgia Tech 26-7 H 17,000
Nov. 5 T Minnesota (S) (1:00-M) 7-7 H 25,000
Nov. 12 L Army 0-18 YS c65,678
Nov. 19 W Drake..32-0 A 8,412
Nov. 26 W USC (at Soldier Field) 7-6 N c120,000 [1]
[1] Paid attendance: 99,573
1928: 5-4-0
Sept. 29 W Loyola (New Orleans) 12-6 H 15,000
Oct. 6 L Wisconsin 6-22 A 29,885
Oct. 13 W Navy (at Soldier Field) 7-0 N c120,000 [1]
Oct. 20 L Georgia Tech 0-13 A c35,000
Oct. 27 W Drake 32-6 H 12,000
Nov. 3 W Penn State (R) (at Philadelphia) 9-0 N 30,000
Nov. 10 W Army (2:30) (at Yankee Stadium) 12-6 N c78,188 [2]
Nov. 17 L Carnegie Tech (R) 7-27 H c27,000 [3]
Dec. 1 L USC 14-27 A c72,632
[1]Paid attendance: 103,081
[2] Won one for the Gipper
[3]First defeat at home since 1905
CONSENSUS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP; undefeated, untied
1929: 9-0-0
Oct. 5 W Indiana 14-0 A 16,111
Oct. 12 W Navy (at Baltimore).14-7 N c64,681
Oct. 19 W Wisconsin (at Soldier Field) 19-0 N 90,000
Oct. 26 W Carnegie Tech 7-0 A c66,000
Nov. 2 W Georgia Tech 26-6 A 22,000
Nov. 9 W Drake (at Soldier Field) 19-7 N 50,000
Nov. 16 W USC (at Soldier Field) 13-12 N c112,912 [1]
Nov. 23 W Northwestern 26-6 A c50,000
Nov. 30 W Army (at Yankee Stadium) 7-0 N c79,408
No home games; Notre Dame Stadium under construction
[1] Paid attendance: 99,351
CONSENSUS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP; undefeated, untied
1930:
10-0-0
Oct. 4 W SMU (4:00) 20-14
H 14,751
Oct. 11 W Navy 26-2 H 40,593 [1]
Oct. 18 W Carnegie Tech 21-6 H
30,009
Oct. 25 W Pittsburgh 35-19 A c66,586
Nov. 1 W Indiana 27-0 H 11,113
Nov. 8 W Pennsylvania 60-20 A c75,657
Nov. 15 W Drake..28-7 H 10,106
Nov. 22 W Northwestern 14-0 A c44,648
Nov. 29 W Army (R-S)(3:30) (at Soldier Field) 7-6 N c110,000 [1]
Dec. 6 W USC 27-0 A c73,967
[1] Dedication of Notre Dame Stadium
[2] Paid attendance: 103,310
Knute Rockne Links & Resources
:: President Ronald W. Reagan Remarks at the Unveiling of the Knute Rockne Commemorative Stamp at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, March 9, 1988 - Public Papers of Ronald Reagan, Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, National Archives and Records Administration
:: Inventing the Forward Pass - New York Times, Nov. 1, 1913 (coverage of Notre Dame introducing football's first passing offense in 1913, including photo of Rockne making a touchdown reception)
:: NOTRE DAME'S OPEN PLAY AMAZES ARMY; Cadets Unable to Break Up Accurate Forward Passing of Westerners. NOTRE DAME'S OPEN PLAY AMAZES ARMY [includes lead-in, link to PDF] - New York Times, Nov. 1, 1913
:: Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation Honors Knute Rockne: Ellis Island Family Heritage Award was presented to members of the Rockne Family - UND.com, April 21, 2004
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