Ranking the Top 131 FBS Programs of the Last 40 Years: 14. Notre Dame

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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/jimbobbypaul on 2023-08-11 20:01:11.

Main hub thread with the full 131 rankings

To me, Notre Dame is THE premier college football team. When I think of college football historically, I think of the golden helmets, the Four Horsemen, the “Play Like a Champion Today” sign, Rudy. The Notre Dame-USC rivalry for the Jeweled Shillelagh is the greatest intersectional rivalry in college sports, and one of the best rivalries period. Notre Dame “only” ends up #14 on the list due to a rough patch in the 2000’s, but are arguably the greatest team over CFB’s full history, ranking 4th in win percentage (.729), 4th in wins (938), 2nd in national titles (11), 1st in consensus All-Americans (107), 1st in Heisman winners (7), and 1st in NFL Draft picks (525). Full respect to my Notre Dame brothers out there, from a USC fan.

Best Seasons and Highlights

1. 1989: 1. Notre Dame: 12-1 (52.718)
2. 1988: 1. Notre Dame: 12-0 (52.172)
3. 2018: 3. Notre Dame: 12-1 (46.895)
4. 2012: 3. Notre Dame: 12-1 (46.135)
5. 1992: 3. Notre Dame: 10-1-1 (44.693)
6. 1993: 4. Notre Dame: 11-1 (41.648)
7. 2019: 7. Notre Dame: 11-2 (37.874)
8. 2017: 9. Notre Dame: 10-3 (36.282)
9. 2021: 8. Notre Dame: 11-2 (33.857)
10. 1995: 12. Notre Dame: 9-3 (31.139)
11. 1991: 14. Notre Dame: 10-3 (29.830)
12. 2020: 8. Notre Dame: 10-2 (29.295)
13. 1990: 11. Notre Dame: 9-3 (28.750)
14. 2002: 12. Notre Dame: 10-3 (27.928)
15. 2015: 16. Notre Dame: 10-3 (26.489)
16. 2006: 21. Notre Dame: 10-3 (22.373)
17. 1987: 16. Notre Dame: 8-4 (21.739)
18. 1996: 16. Notre Dame: 8-3 (21.607)
19. 2022: 19. Notre Dame: 9-4 (21.334)
20. 2000: 15. Notre Dame: 9-3 (20.691)
21. 2013: 22. Notre Dame: 9-4 (19.821)
22. 2005: 20. Notre Dame: 9-3 (19.368)
23. 1998: 26. Notre Dame: 9-3 (17.699)
24. 2010: 28. Notre Dame: 8-5 (14.049)
25. 2011: 30. Notre Dame: 8-5 (11.859)
26. 2014: 31. Notre Dame: 8-5 (10.628)
27. 1984: 31. Notre Dame: 7-5 (10.096)
28. 1983: 38. Notre Dame: 7-5 (5.762)
29. 1997: 37. Notre Dame: 7-6 (2.794)
30. 1994: 36. Notre Dame: 6-5-1 (2.329)
31. 2004: 37. Notre Dame: 6-6 (1.594)
32. 2009: 53. Notre Dame: 6-6 (-1.106)
33. 1986: 41. Notre Dame: 5-6 (-1.391)
34. 1985: 42. Notre Dame: 5-6 (-2.586)
35. 2001: 53. Notre Dame: 5-6 (-3.863)
36. 2008: 54. Notre Dame: 7-6 (-4.929)
37. 2003: 59. Notre Dame: 5-7 (-7.038)
38. 1999: 52. Notre Dame: 5-7 (-7.230)
39. 2016: 74. Notre Dame: 4-8 (-14.292)
40. 2007: 96. Notre Dame: 3-9 (-33.441)
Overall Score: 39870 (14th)

332-159-2 record
1 national title
0 conference titles
13-18 bowl record
27 consensus All-Americans
201 NFL players drafted

0 conference titles? Epic fail! Obviously kidding because they’re Independent, but my hot take is that I actually prefer them to be Independent, it’s part of their brand and them joining a conference would be boring. I have Notre Dame winning TWO national titles in my rankings, back-to-back years in 1988 and 1989. In reality, they won it in 1988 but finished #2 in 1989, we’ll get into it. You can see how bad Notre Dame was in the 2000’s, with 6 of the bottom 10 seasons.

Notable consensus All-Americans are WR Tim Brown (1987) who won the Heisman, WR Raghib “Rocket” Ismail (1990) who had 540 rushing and 700 receiving yards, OL Aaron Taylor (1992, 1993) who is Notre Dame’s last 2x consensus AA, WR Jeff Samardzija (2005) who turned down being a 1st round NFL WR to make $100 million in the MLB, WR Golden Tate (2009) who won the Biletnikoff, LB Manti Te’o (2012) who finished 2nd in Heisman voting, OT Ronnie Stanley (2015), LB Jaylon Smith (2015) who was a top 5 talent before tearing his ACL, OG Quenton Nelson (2017) who was about as perfect of an OG prospect as you can get, OT Mike McGlinchey (2017) who made me happy and sad as a 49er fan, DB Julian Love (2018), LB Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah (2020) who won the Butkus Award, OL Liam Eichenberg (2020), S Kyle Hamilton (2021) who made it despite only playing 7 games, and TE Michael Mayer (2022) who’s considered one of the best TEs in the NCAA in recent memory. Notre Dame’s the first team on the list to crack 200 draftees, and with that comes a lot of good players. INHALES, WR Tim Brown, OG Zack Martin, RB Jerome Bettis, DT Bryant Young, RB Ricky Watters, S Harrison Smith, OG Quenton Nelson, QB Steve Beuerlein, WR Golden Tate, DE Justin Tuck, OT Ronnie Stanley, TE Mark Bavaro, TE Kyle Rudolph, and LB Jaylon Smith.

Top 5 Seasons

Worst Season: 2007 (3-9 overall, Independent)

I remember being fascinated with this team when I first got into football. How could Notre Dame football be so BAD? Don’t trip over your feet being the first to tell me “Charlie Weis”. Weis was in his 3rd season as Notre Dame head coach after a somewhat promising first 2 years, going 9-3 and 10-3. 5 star QB recruit Jimmy Clausen had been the most sought after recruit in the country and the most hyped QB prospect in years, and Weis got him to South Bend. Despite all this, people knew it’d be a rebuilding year for Notre Dame, but how bad could it be? Pretty bad. The Irish opened with a brutal 3-33 loss to Georgia Tech, followed up by losses of 14-31 to #14 Penn State and 0-38 to Michigan. They wouldn’t get their first win until October, beating UCLA in a circus act 20-6. Notre Dame had just 140 yards against UCLA, but the Bruins’ walk-on QB McLeod Bethel-Thompson threw 4 interceptions and UCLA fumbled 5 times, leading to Notre Dame’s first win to improve to 1-5. Unfortunately, things would get even worse, losing 0-38 at home to #14 USC, and the 43 game win streak against Navy was broken, losing 44-46 in 3OT. At 1-9, Notre Dame at least managed to beat Duke and Stanford to end the year 3-9.

The 9 losses were the most in Notre Dame history, the 0-38 losses to Michigan and USC were 2 of their 10 worst losses ever, and they were 1-6 at home. Jimmy Clausen threw for 1254 yards 7 TD 6 INT while Evan Sharpley threw for 736 yards 5 TD 3 INT. The rushing offense averaged just 2.1 yards per carry, and no RB had more than 463 yards. 4 players were still picked up in the 2008 NFL Draft including S Tom Zibikowski, who is 8-0 as a professional boxer. Weis wouldn’t last much longer, but Clausen ended up having a fantastic career at Notre Dame, just without the wins, completing 68% of throws for 3722 yards and 28 TD 4 INT in 2009.

5. 1992 (10-1-1 overall, Independent)

Nothing special, just a good, solid year for Notre Dame. A 3-1-1 start sent them down from #3 to #13 with a loss to #18 Stanford and tie with #6 Michigan, and none of the teams they beat finished with a winning record. Well, they’d go on to be arguably the best team in the country in their final 7 games, beating Pittsburgh 52-21, BYU 42-16, Navy 38-7, and #9 Boston College 54-7(!). Down 9-16 against #22 Penn State in the snow, RB Jerome Bettis scored a TD and coach Lou Holtz elected to go for 2, getting it for the 17-16 win. The season was wrapped up with a 31-23 rivalry win over #19 USC, and finally #4 Texas A&M 28-3 (sorry Matt Ryan) in the Cotton Bowl. Notre Dame finished the year #4 in the AP Poll and #3 in my rankings, averaging 36.4 PPG while giving up just 15.1 PPG. QB Rick Mirer, who’d be taken 2nd overall in the 1993 Draft, threw for 1876 yards with 15 TD 6 INT. The run game was Notre Dame’s strong suit, with 2nd Team All-American RB Reggie Brooks (1343 rushing yards, 13 TD), future NFL Hall of Fame RB Jerome Bettis (825 yards, 10 TD), consensus All-American OG Aaron Taylor, and All-American TE Irv Smith Sr. (father of the Cincinnati Bengals TE). CB Tom Carter was a 3rd Team All-American on defense, intercepting 5 passes. Future NFL Hall of Famer DE Bryant Young was also on the team.

1992 Notre Dame is my 112th best team since 1983.

4. 2012 (12-1 overall, Independent)

During this era of college football there was seemingly a “team of destiny” every year, namely 2010 Auburn, 2013 Auburn, and 2012 Notre Dame. Notre Dame was doubted all year long and nearly lost games they should’ve won handily, but they just kept winning. LB Manti Te’o was already one of the best LBs in the country coming into the year, but leveled up to become one of the best players period, leading the #1 regular season defense in the country. Freshman QB Everett Golson unsat veteran Tommy Rees as the starter, and would win his first 11 games as a starter. After a few decent wins early, it was a 20-3 clobbering of #10 Michigan State that made people think Notre Dame could be pretty decent. They followed it up with a complete defensive domination of #18 Michigan—after losing on a last second TD in the first “Under the Lights” game in Michigan history the previous year, the ND defense was out for blood on Denard Robinson this year, intercepting him 4 times in a 13-6 win. A 41-3 win over Miami (FL) in a “Catholics vs. Convicts” reboot plus 20-13 OT win over #17 Stanford were making Notre Dame look like a team of destiny. Te’o became a national story for the loss of his online girlfriend (which turned out to be a catfish), and people were actually rooting for Notre Dame for once. They weren’t taken seriously as national title contenders until they beat #8 Oklahoma on the road. The 5-1 Sooners were 11 point favorites over 7-0 Notre Dame, but Te’o had a sack, TFL, and INT to seal a 30-13 win. The remaining schedule was fairly easy save for a 29-26 3OT win over Pittsburgh, but Notre Dame entered the National Championship at #1 an…

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