1) BC '93

2) Miami '89

3) Miami '85

4) Michigan State '10

5) Michigan '11

6) USC '05

7) Michigan '06

8) Michigan '91

9) TAMU '87

10) Colorado '90

11) Stanford '90

12) Tennessee '91

to mark the last great year with a season in which we didn't actually win the title.

And lots of eating our own

After the Michigan drubbing of 2007, I was damn near catatonic. It got a smidge easier as the year progress, aided by some actual wins on the record, but 2007 was a real pull-off-your-fingernails kind of year. We were so abysmally bad. It's tough to watch a team you know is the worst team likely field in Notre Dame's entire history, and that there was pretty much nothing that could be done to fix it in the short term. And doing things like losing to Navy for the first time in over 40 years certainly didn't help matters.

This year, it sucks real bad that we've lost. But if one's looking for hope, there's a lot more to find this year, and it's much more readily available.

and I am totally despondent, considering that I am going to deliberately avoid an ND game for the first time in my life, I think we need to keep our heads and keep an eye on those things that are truly measurable.

These past two games pretty much defy explanation. When was the last time ND committed nine turnovers (I'm not really counting the last one since it didn't matter) in two games? I know our brains are wired to seek out patterns (this is why I often wonder if my ipod is sentient), but sometimes those patterns are phantasms.

I think we need to step back to August 2010 and revisit the questions we were asking then and see how we stack up. I don't think "We need to not turn the ball over 5 times a game" was anywhere on that list. I do think that the things ND fans wanted to see were:

- Improved play on OL
- Improved play on DL
- Improved DL recruiting
- steady progress in the running game
- More physical play, in general
- program building (through depth, cultural changes, etc)

15 games in, I think Kelly's made strides in all areas, frankly. I'd have liked to have won more games, of course, but I like where we are now a lot better than where we were at the end of Ty's first season. I don't have that "smoke and mirrors" feeling. Quite the opposite. I think there is an excellent team somewhere in there, it just needs to emerge. What's preventing that emergence is the $15MM question, but I don't think it's tied into the maladies we were looking to cure before Kelly got here.

And while there are no excuses, there's been some pretty weird, unpredictable shit that's happened, from a rash of key injuries to multiple deaths (!) around the program. It's no wonder we're staggering. Despite all that, I do see signs of life and the laying of a foundation, and that's the most important thing for the long-term health of the program.

I think that's really a person-to-person decision. For me, the backward evolution that each of the last three coaches "accomplished" during their respective tenures (and that recognizes what was a 2-year forward evolution and then huge regression to end up net negative under Weis) combined with the university's lack of progress on many fronts until the past 3-4 years (Gug, training table, etc.) tells me that we need a real cleansing of the program that might take 5 years. But I won't harshly judge somebody who may think the turnaround should be done in a shorter period of time.

Next year's schedule is too bizarre (I think some fan created the schedule on EA Sports NCAA video game, and then convinced Swarbrick to make it happen).

Do we have to wait until 2013 to expect any success at a high level?

Maybe I should just watch episodes of Night Court during Saturday afternoons in the Fall until then.

http://www.utopia-asia.com/unews/article_2006_04_01_000000.htm

1. Its the first week in probably a month that it hasn't been a monsoon here and

2. I'm going golfing, because if I want to ow my balls, I'll do it to myself with my shitty golf-play than watch us piss away another one.

It's cathartic.

Plus you get to delve into more analytical matters. One more loss and I'll be entirely dispassionate about the season. Hey, look at that, we lost to Tulsa, and here are the numbers that explain why.

It's quite freeing.

--
Sometimes I rhyme slow sometimes I rhyme quick.

Starting around Midnight Saturday, finished up Sunday night.

I woke up the next morning on my couch. My wife and daughter were unimpressed.

I'm glad to know others were feeling the same way I was. That makes me feel less...obsessed or something.