Ten things you might not have known about the late, great Lou Holtz who won 100 football game at the University of Notre Dame and the 1988 national championship.
— At his first press conference at Notre Dame, he demonstrated his quick wit by saying that when watching the Irish on television, he was relieved to see that the fans “weren’t armed” but felt that the upcoming schedule “had to be a misprint.”
— During his first season, he kept a bowl of buckeyes — supposedly lucky buckeyes — on his desk. They apparently didn’t work because he started that year 1-4. (The buckeyes were probably a carry-over from his one year as an Ohio State assistant in 1968 — a season when the Buckeyes won the national title.)
Years later, the lucky buckeyes seemed to have vanished.
— During one practice, Holtz — all 150 pounds of him — chased down Tony Rice on a quarterback keeper and jumped on his back for going the wrong way on the play.
— As entertaining as he could be, Holtz was actually a bit of a loner. Most of his assistants left after a couple of years. And when former Notre Dame coach Ara Parseghian played golf with Holtz, he used to laugh that after Holtz’s tee shot, he would drive off on his own and nobody would see him again until they were on the green.
— He won the one national championship in 1988, but he came very close to two more as the Notre Dame coach and he actually helped the Irish win another one when his 1977 Arkansas team upset No. 2 Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl. With Notre Dame’s win over No.1 Texas and Oklahoma out of the way, the No. 5 Irish leapfrogged to No. 1.
Of course, Holtz had other thoughts on that final poll. “I thought we were going to be national champs after we beat Oklahoma (and after he had suspended three of his star players.)” Oklahoma had been a two-touchdown favorite, but the Razorbacks crushed them, 31-6, for the same 11-1 record as the Irish.
— Holtz always treated local journalists well. His motto was, “You don’t want to get in an argument with someone who buys (newspaper) ink by the barrel.”
— When his hometown of East Liverpool, Ohio, wanted to set up a Lou Holtz museum after his Notre Dame years, he declined unless they also honored other people from the area who excelled in such fields as medicine, industry, religion and entertainment. East Liverpool organizers agreed and so the Lou Holtz/Upper Ohio Valley Hall of Fame became a reality in 1998.
— Although Holtz was loved by most Irish fans — with that later upgraded to “beloved” — the athletic director and Notre Dame administration were more than happy to see him go after the 1996 season.
“Too big for his britches,” one Notre Dame insider privately said, although that was hard to envision because Holtz sometimes slimmed down close to 140 pounds near the end of a grueling season.
— Holtz was full of witticisms, but maybe his best was when he was at William & Mary for his first head coaching job. After one painful loss, he moaned, “Well, we played more like Mary than William today.”
Like most of us, he learned to be a little more politically correct as the years went by.
— He would readily admit that his greatest joy as a coach was seeing his former players thrive in their lives after football. A group of them formed the Lou’s Lads Foundation that raises money for charity work and scholarships for those in financial need.
Said former defensive back Mark Monaghan, an emergency room physician who helped start Lou’s Lads: “The older I get, the more I reflect on my formative years and think of what propelled me into the older version of myself. The more that happens, the more I appreciate everything Coach Holtz did for me — on and off the field. The maturity and work ethic that was first instilled by my family was hardened, matured and truly tested during my college years.
“I owe who I am today to Coach Holtz.”
Bill Moor was the Tribune sports editor during Lou Holtz’s Notre Dame coaching career from 1986 to 1996. Contact Bill at bry14zzo@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: 10 things you might not know about former Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz
Reporting by Bill Moor, Special to The Tribune / South Bend Tribune
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
