RIP Ara Parseghian

[Steak Snabler]

Won 2 national titles at Notre Dame, and never finished outside the Top 15 in 11 seasons. He was 94.

Ara Parseghian, legendary Notre Dame football coach, dies at 94

RIP

 

[DanielSimpsonDay]

Crossword puzzles would not have been possible without him.

 

[CD Boogie]

Wow. I thought he died a long time ago. RIP.

After winning the Orange Bowl in 1974, the second consecutive bowl win against Alabama, Parseghian retired at age 51 with a record of 95–17–4, which was second only to Knute Rockne. The pressure to win at Notre Dame began to take a toll on his health, he said at the time, and that's why he retired.​

Looks like he made a pretty wise decision, considering he lived for another 43 years after retiring.

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

Thought he had been in really poor health for some time.
R.I.P.

 

[YankeeFan]

Thought he had been in really poor health for some time.
R.I.P.

Didn't he say that scene was bull****?

 

[Riptide]

Didn't he say that scene was bull****?

Wiki: "In the movie Rudy, Devine is given a somewhat antagonistic role, not wanting Rudy to dress for his last game. However, in actuality, it was Devine who came up with the idea to dress Rudy."

 

[Layman]

Didn't he say that scene was bull****?

His granddaughter worked for me (quite a while back), I still play golf with his son in law, a couple of times a year. Football aside, Ara was an incredibly grounded, nice person. He was, "Good People." Opinionated as h*ll, especially if you could get him riffing on the current state of CFB...and ND football, in particular. The family has dealt with a ton of adversity, medically (in particular his grandkids), but has dealt with it in a positive, public fashion. He'll be missed around here. Greatly.

 

[Starman]

For a few years in the 80s-90s, I was in and around the ND area, we covered them off and on, and I bumped into Ara often enough at various events that he kind of vaguely recognized me. At the time he certainly seemed upbeat and energetic for his late 60s/ early 70s.

He said he was in good physical shape by then, but the grind of the ND job was "burning him up" in the early 70s when he quit.

 

[BTExpress]

But could he do magic tricks in the elevator?

 

[expendable]

Wiki: "In the movie Rudy, Devine is given a somewhat antagonistic role, not wanting Rudy to dress for his last game. However, in actuality, it was Devine who came up with the idea to dress Rudy."

No good deed goes unpunished.

 

[Starman]

If you look back all the way in ND history, their head coaches have been ground down by the job since Rockne.

Everybody thinks Rockne was in his sixties or something because of how he looked in pictures, but he was only 43 when he died. (Think about it: he might have coached into the 1960s). He had a number of off field health problems, possibly stress related, for several years in the twenties.

Then Frank Leahy also had to retire early due to health reasons, then Ara, then Devine, and Holtz had health issues too before he was done.

 

[playthrough]

I still think of him first as a broadcaster.

 

[micropolitan guy]

Tie, tie for old Notre Dame...

 

[Starman]

Ehhh .. he'd have been crazy to throw some Hail Mary pass or something (with his backup QB) in the final minute. The Sparty defense had like 8 NFL draft picks.

 

[dixiehack]

Tie, tie for old Notre Dame...

My old roommate, who wasn't even born in the 60s, still has RBDN66 as his Bama vanity tag.

 

[micropolitan guy]

Ehhh .. he'd have been crazy to throw some Hail Mary pass or something (with his backup QB) in the final minute. The Sparty defense had like 8 NFL draft picks.

Notre Dame ball on its own 30-yard line with 1:10 left. I understand his strategy; ND was No. 1 and would not drop with the tie. In that era, he could do it. Today, he'd probably be roasted, except he could say he was playing for OT, when someone would have won the game. Either way, I remember watching it in black & white on our old 15-inch TV with rabbit ears.

Neither team played in a bowl. ND declined them at that time; MSU was barred from Pasadena by the stupid no-repeat rule.

 

[Steak Snabler]

My old roommate, who wasn't even born in the 60s, still has RBDN66 as his Bama vanity tag.

Alabama fans like to crow about a "missing ring" in 1966 (there was even a book written about it), but that Alabama team played a weak schedule even before you account for the pre-integration talent level in the SEC at that point. They played one true road game the entire regular season, at Tennessee, and were very fortunate to win that one 11-10 when the Vols missed a short field goal on the last play. Their other "road" game was against Ole Miss in Jackson. Everything else was in Birmingham, Tuscaloosa and Mobile.

Then again, 1966 Alabama is the only preseason No. 1 to go undefeated and not win the title. So there's that.

 

[dixiehack]

There's also a school of thought that the national media was sick of Bama (hmmm, sounds familiar) after it had won back-to-back titles, the second going to a team with a loss and a tie after everyone in front of it collapsed on New Years Day (in the first season AP experimented with voting after the bowls.) Mix in the understandably raw feelings around the civil rights clashes and you can see how it went off the rails.

 

[Michael_ Gee]

Notre Dame ball on its own 30-yard line with 1:10 left. I understand his strategy; ND was No. 1 and would not drop with the tie. In that era, he could do it. Today, he'd probably be roasted, except he could say he was playing for OT, when someone would have won the game. Either way, I remember watching it in black & white on our old 15-inch TV with rabbit ears.

Neither team played in a bowl. ND declined them at that time; MSU was barred from Pasadena by the stupid no-repeat rule.

Of the 44 starters in that Mich St.-ND game, I think 12 wound up as first round NFL draft choices.

 

[HanSenSE]

Just to add to the threadjack, but hard to imagine an era when there were only about a dozen bowl games. And the no-repeat thing? Yet both were reality during my life as a sports fan.