“Lad, come away from there. Visit that man during basketball season.”
but not during football season. That's a funny story from the Leahy era. I think Johnny Lujack told it.
The Leahy section starts at about 24:50. Lujack telling that story starts around 30:00. The chant of "Leahy! Leahy! Leahy!" at 27:13. Oh hell, anyone who hasn't already seen it should watch the whole section. As you know, well worth the time. A shout out to our own Leahy! Thanks for sharing your Dad with all of us.
I had this movie memorized back in the day (and probably still do). It was required viewing for the recruits during recruiting weekends and we managed to catch it many times. I tried to hide the fact that I would always tear up at the end with the final montage, starting at about the 49 min mark with Lou's speech, the Harry Oliver kick, John Facenda's/the Voice of God's narration, etc. (and even my very white Adidas in the frame at 50:11 as TB scored while I was standing by that pylon. As part of his NFL HOF speech embedded below, they used a wider shot of that same play. At the 8:05 mark, it shows the rest of me including me pumping my arm in his direction with a football in my hand. Not sure what I was thinking there and, in retrospect, I am confident Tim already knew which way to run. My brother saw that live on TV and was horrified at the thought of what would have happened to me if the ball had slipped out of my hand and gone flying onto the field or even tripped him. Thankfully, I was a trained professional and have big hands. You know what that means ladies! Big gloves! I now notice that the official had his right arm out to box me out as he backed out of the way, or least for a point of reference so he didn't back up too far and trip over someone and end up on his butt. That half was spent on the enemy's sideline, try to avoid blocking Bo and that Harbaugh fellow. We switched sides for the second half and I ended up in the opposite corner, in front of our own cheerleaders, for the play WHEN JOEL CAME DOWN IN BOUNDS, DAMMIT! Good times.)
Kind of makes me wish I didn't recently pay extra to update my computer's drivers, thereby losing the ability to play sound.
I can't portal
August 1985, per his 1987 Football Guide profile. So that was the beginning of Lou's second and final season there. He had been a GA there during the 1983 and 1984 seasons, so already a GA there while Lou was coaching his last season at Arkansas in 1983. Lou made him recruiting coordinator at Minn.
He was a GA at Iowa State during 1982 season, where he had played QB for two years before switching to flanker his last two seasons, graduating in 1981.
Below is a really old school profile of him re high school career. I never knew he was a also hockey standout.
He was also, at least nominally, the QBs coach for 1986 season. In reality, Louis Leo Holtz was the de facto QB coach and the Offensive coordinator/playcaller. Pete Cordelli coached the WRs; Mike Stock (having also coached for Ara and serving as two-time Co-Captain and leading rusher for him at Northwestern) coached RBs, Tony Yelovich coached O-Line, and George Stewart coached the TEs. Saw Coach Yelo at an event last September and happy to report he is still going strong.
And the camera focused on Vinny who was calling a recruit. You could see his eyes light up when the recruit told him their conversation was being televised. I wonder who the recruit was. That class would have enrolled in the fall of 1990
(inadvertently) being too slick.
Before that he had been really happy with the way I had devised for setting up the Stadium locker room on recruiting weekends to get across ND's storied history to the recruits. Rather than have it look barren other than a few recruit jerseys in one corner with helmets, I found and hung the jerseys of my own all-time ND team in the empty lockers, together with some players that were recently in Super Bowls, etc. In the recruits' lockers, I added a full uniform with our signs that said "[Recruits Name] Your Number is [X], Before You Leave Notre Dame, Make It One That Will Be Remembered." (We had these in the teams' ACC practice locker room lockers for those guys that did not have a jersey number that was previously worn by an All-American(s). The current players had signs that listed the past AAs that had worn their jersey number, to remind them to try live up to it. For instance, Tim Brown's listed Alan Page, Ken MacAfee, etc. No pressure). Linked is an article re TB's jersey number choice.
I remember one recruit asked if he could try on the uniform and I said sure. He came back out of the game day training room over there to show his mom and they were both beaming. The new set up evidently got the recruits' attention as Vinny went out of his way to track me down before the first weekend was even over to thank me. (I thought my fellow managers were screwing with me when they said Vinny had stopped by the manager's office was looking for me.) The weekend must have been going well, as he too was beaming when we finally met up.
Grey Champion sweatshirts for Rockne, The Gipper, The Four Horsemen, Leahy, non-authentic and some authentic jerseys (when I could find them in the recesses of the Varsity issue room) jerseys for Bertelli, Lujack, Hart, Lattner, Hornung, Huarte, George Connor, Dave Casper, Daryle Lamonica, Nick Buoniconti, Alan Page, Rocky Bleier, Joe Theismann, Tom Clements, Thom Gatewood, Joe Montana, Ross Browner, Luther Bradley, Ken MacAfee, Bob Golic, Vagas Ferguson, Bob Crable, and then more recent Super Bowl guys like Mark Bavaro, Dave Duerson, Tom Thayer, Eric Dorsey. There were several others but I forget and certainly numerous other greats that deserved to be included. When the assistant coaches came over to see the display (word got out), they kiddingly pressured me to add Joe Yonto but he wasn't having it. I distinctly remember Coach Stew walking down the line of lockers saying the names out loud and repeatedly being surprised to learn that player X played for ND. Joe Yonto and George Kelly watched and smiled as none of it was a surprise to them.
Anyway, after that, Vinny encouraged me to talk to the players and their families when they came to the Stadium locker room as part of their tour, rather than just sit there and hit the play button on the Victory March when they walked in. That went well for a while, until he and I were talking to one recruit and I mentioned we were playing at Hawaii during what would be his senior year, if he chose ND. Vinny quickly and emphatically corrected me to say that would be the year after his senior year. I then said, "well, if you play a fifth year...." Vinny got annoyed and cleaned that up too and it occurred to me that it was because we did not have such a policy (even though we were about to have about 7 guys back as fifth years for 1987, including 4 of our 5 starting O-Linemen). After that Vinny wasn't as eager to have me open my mouth. Oops.
So just an example of him being the straight shooter, and I never saw him be anything but. I liked the guy although he was more aloof than some of the other assistants. We were lucky to have him.
(P.S. You know ND has a great history when one can forget about The Four Horsemen and Johnny Lattner and need to go back and edit them in)
during the time when I followed ND the most.
A buddy's older brother was an OG for Faust/Holtz. Later I had a teammate who was a three year starter at OG...and another teammate was a 5* OT recruit for Holtz and Co.
I love ND football...but those times were helpful. I had 2 cousins that played in late 70's/early 80's and that was when it all started for me. I loved ND basketball in early 80's as well.
Moff...I read every one of his posts multiple times...great stories.
for and you and your teammates would have broken me in half during HS, with my 135 pounds of raw fury. I used to be able to throw a football pretty well and several ND players commented that they couldn't believe I didn't play QB in HS. However, if they saw a picture of me in HS they would have immediately understood why. I later managed to gain 50 pounds freshman year by hitting the dining hall and food sales (Mmmm Sarge's pizza....), as well as hitting the Rock weight room and Bball or FB with my roommates constantly). But even then, the guys in your HS league still probably would have broken me in half. Our HS football league was located several planes lower than yours. I watched a HS game while on break a couple years after I got to ND and "our" poor QB could barely reach the WR on a quick out and it was a wounded duck. We sucked at sports generally, although we rocked at wrestling and soccer due to the paisans who lived in the very Italian Raritan section of our school system - home of the Bongiovi - aka "Bon Jovi" as morphed by one descendant - family, USMC Medal of Honor winner John Basilone, etc. Our field and fieldhouse was named for John Basilone and he deserved better.
Actually, our basketball team got really good a couple years after I graduated and won the state championship in 1987. It didn't hurt that they had the Miller brothers (Lance and David) who went on to play at Villanova, as well as Eric Murdock who became an All-Big East star at Providence before being taken in the 1st round pick by the Bucks. The star coach of the local Catholic school, Immaculata (Theo Riddick later played there) taught at our HS back then but coached Bball across the highway at Immaculata. That is until Eric and the Miller Brothers were freshmen and the coach was smart enough to come back to coach our school. (I spotted Eric at the gym in our old home town earlier this year and said hello to him. The fact that he was wearing a Providence shirt helped. He still looks like he could play. Cool guy.)
By contrast, during my time just a few years earlier, the star players knew to go elsewhere. A kid I knew in middle school (who helped relegate me to the B team in basketball) is an example. Terry Bross ended up going to HS elsewhere, then started at Center for a St. Johns Final Four team and then played in the Mets system before briefly pitching in the majors for the Mets and Giants in the early 90s.... But I digress.
And those are some great guys you are referring to that went from your HS to ND. I remember my brother back in the day getting a kick out of pronouncing your cousins' name with gusto. Who knew I'd be friends with their cousin one day. Do I remember correctly that your cousin's dad played on the Gold Medal Olympic team with Bill Russell and KC Jones, among others?
P.S. A website re our HS's only glory days is linked. Another tangent: I just looked at the team photo and now remember that one of the assistant coaches of that Championship team was Mr. Fischer, one of my favorite HS teachers. Still remember his class on "20th Century Asia" in which he spent a lot of time sharing his photos and stories about living in India for a while. A really cool laid back dude. One day in August 1984, when my mom, hometown girlfriend, and I were driving on Rt. 31 in Roseland on or about my first day at ND as a frosh, we heard someone honking wildly at us and waving to get our attention. It was Mr. Fischer. He had been driving back across country and just happened to stop at the ND exit at that moment to get gas when he saw us driving next to him. We had him follow us back to campus and he came up to my dorm room in Grace and we caught up a bit. I thanked him for helping me get there. Good times. What are the odds?
PPS: I also just noticed from the team photo that Tony Iovine was on 1987 bball team. He would later enroll at ND as a regular student. Never knew who you were going up against in pick up games at ND. (I once got my ass kicked in a Grace Hall inter-section intramural bball game by a guy who I learned soon leaned was voted "Mr. Colorado" in basketball but just wanted to be a regular student at ND) Likewise, Tony was just another ND student who played on a state Championship team. Years later, he was one of the four or five of us Bridgewater-Raritan HS West/ND guys who were out at the bar together when the dude who went to Delbarton/Georgetown became utterly perplexed and dismayed when he realized that 4 or 5 guys from a public high school got into ND without a similar elite private school education. ("Wait, wait, you went to a public high school too?!") What a pretentious douche.
It is in the area of Camp Pendleton in northern San Diego county, southern Orange County in California.
He was the most interesting part of The Pacific.
his home town. Must have passed it a 1,000 times, so was nice to see his story in The Pacific.
Holtz recruit.
at Minn and came with him to ND at the very beginning. Coach Cordelli played QB for Lou at NC State and coached for him at Arkansas and Minn. Coach Stew played Offensive Linemen for Lou at Arkansas (and was an AA there) and coached OL at Minn. He then coached TEs at ND the first two years. Tony Yelovich came over from Stanford to coach the OL at ND under Lou, solo for the first two years. Mike Stock had returned to ND to Coach under Gerry and stayed on that first year with Lou coaching RBs.
On Defense, Foge came over from being Head Coach at Pitt to coach MLBs and be DC. Kurt Schottenheimer coached the OLBs in 1986. Joe Yonto was brought back by Lou to coach DL and George Kelly became Lou's right hand man in running the FB program. Terry Forbes coached DBs the first two years.
For 1987, Jim Strong moved down from Minn (having coached for Lou there) and took over for Mike Stock who I believe went to NFL. Barry Alvarez came over from Iowa for the 1987 season and took over for Coach Schott at OLB when Kurt joined his brother Marty in the NFL. In 1988, John Palermo came down from Minnesota to coach DL, having coached under Lou there. Joe Moore joined the staff for 1988 and he and Tony Yelovich split OL duties, with Coach Yelo coaching Cs and Gs, and Moore coaching Ts and TEs. Coach Stew then moved to OLBs/DEs, because Barry Alvarez moved to ILBs and DC for the 1988 season. Chuck Heater came over from Ohio State in 1988 to coach the DBs. And the rest is history.
up until about 30 years ago.
but I stand by my decision. ;)
P.S. Please pass along my best your better half.
Easter dinner yesterday.
Assistant Rector, and I am certain he remains so. And I was thinking last night that seeing the artist also known as “JT”( for multiple reasons including his musical prowess) wearing his ND Football swag from his days playing on the team might just have help influence this freshman to sign up as a mgr.
It…. Oh wait