A Mixed Legacy

It wasn't surprising that Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz spent most of his press conference following the Irish's 60-6 demolition of Pittsburgh last Saturday dancing around reports that he would soon resign. After all, Holtz's 11-year tenure at Notre Dame has been a tease of sorts, a dalliance with greatness that has ultimately fallen short.

If this is Holtz's final season with the Irish—as SI went to press on Monday night he was expected to announce his resignation on Tuesday—he will have coached the same number of years at Notre Dame as Frank Leahy (1941-43, 1946-53) and Ara Parseghian (1964-74), and two fewer than Knute Rockne (1918-1930). Holtz is 99-29-2 (7-2 so far this year), with games against Rutgers, USC and an undetermined bowl opponent left. He is six wins shy of Rockne's school record (105-12-5) but last among the four coaches in winning percentage and national titles: Leahy four, Rockne won three and Parseghian two.

In one sense, any comparison with Rockne, Leahy or Parseghian is unfair to Holtz. His predecessors coached in eras in which there were few powerful programs, and the scholarship limitations and widespread TV exposure that have leveled the college playing field were yet to come. Notre Dame was in a class by itself.

But even in the on-any-given-Saturday world of '90s college football, Notre Dame is the most fertile ground for sowing a dynasty. In December 1985 Holtz inherited a program left in disarray by Gerry Faust (30-26-1 in five seasons). In 1988 Holtz took the Irish to a 12-0 record and the national title. His swift rebuilding seemed to promise many championships to follow. But while Notre Dame has contended four times since then, it has not won another title.

Holtz coached two of the most cherished games in Notre Dame history, a 31-30 victory over Miami in 1988 and a 31-24 win over Florida State in '93, both emotional upsets of No. 1-ranked teams at Notre Dame Stadium. Those games underscored Holtz's biggest strength: his ability to prepare for a key game. At this, few coaches at any level are better.

However, his ledger also shows stunning home field failures, the most galling of which was a 41-39 upset by Boston College one week after the '93 win over Florida State. That loss probably cost Holtz a second national title, and it started a slide that culminated in a 6-5-1 record in 1994. There have been plenty of other sour defeats. In '90 Holtz's team was No. 1 when it suffered an inexplicable 36-31 home loss to unranked Stanford. Two years later the Irish lost again at home to the Cardinal, 33-16. Last season began with a home defeat by Northwestern; five weeks ago, Air Force upset the Irish in South Bend.

Holtz's recruiting, too, has been marked by great promise followed by disappointment. The coach lured prized quarterback Ron Powlus from Berwick, Pa., in 1993, but in his three years as a starter, Powlus has developed glacially in Holtz's ground-based offense, and the Irish have never been in national championship contention.

Yet the resilient Holtz has survived criticism, which peaked in 1993 with the publication of Under the Tarnished Dome, a book that detailed widespread use of anabolic steroids by Irish players and various other wrongdoings in Holtz's program. It is odd that he would resign now. Notre Dame's recruiting, poor in the early '90s, has rebounded. Notre Dame's most recent recruiting efforts show signs of bearing fruit. Holtz is not running from a disaster, nor is he being pushed out by school officials.

More likely he has been used up by the job, as Leahy and Parseghian were. It is the nature of Notre Dame that even its most successful coaches flame out early. Irish coaches often leave as failures or legends. Unique to the end, Holtz will leave as neither.
—TIM LAYDEN

Dillon's a Dilly