probably the worst loss I've seen in my days of watching ND

by Jay, San Diego, Tuesday, May 12, 2009, 11:30 (6225 days ago)
edited by Jay, Tuesday, May 12, 2009, 11:40

was Holtz's #1-ranked Irish loss to unranked Stanford in 1990. Talk about inexcusable. Not only were the teams an utter mismatch in terms of talent, the loss also derailed a national championship run. In terms of the stakes at hand, I'm not sure any of Boob's, Ty's, or Charlie's losses meant as much as this one did. We've had other #1-ranked teams knocked off the rails, but never by so pitiful an opponent.

I'll always love Lou, but he had some stinkers, just like any other coach.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wuSmfNeB4M

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http://www.nytimes.com/1990/10/08/sports/notre-dame-loss-may-shuffle-polls.html

Notre Dame Loss May Shuffle Polls
By THOMAS ROGERS
Published: Monday, October 8, 1990

Top-ranked Notre Dame suffered one of the most painful upset losses in its prestigious football history Saturday to a determined Stanford team that had lost three of its first four games.

The giant-killer Cardinals took the lead for good, 36-31, with 36 seconds to play, on Tommy Vardell's fourth 1-yard touchdown plunge of the game. But the Fighting Irish, who had been unbeaten, provided their fans with a final thrill by marching to the Stanford 23-yard line. From there Rick Mirer threw into the end zone for Derek Brown, but the tight end dropped the ball as time ran out.

Notre Dame, which lost three fumbled punts and had to play without Raghib (Rocket) Ismail, their wide receiver and punt returner, because of a severely bruised thigh, was unable to duplicate the last-second magic that snatched victories away from Michigan and Michigan State earlier in the season.

The shocking loss by Notre Dame and an impressive 31-22 victory by the defending national champion, Miami, over Florida State will probably scramble the upper echelons of the polls, which appear today. Expected to profit most from the sudden troubles of last week's top dogs are Michigan, Auburn, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Miami and Florida, all highly ranked teams that won on Saturday. Virginia, Tennessee and Brigham Young, all idle this weekend, may also move up.

Palumbis Hits 26 of 34

Coach Dennis Green of Stanford gave much of the credit for the upset of Notre Dame for a huge, physically dominating offensive line that enabled Jason Palumbis time to pick out receivers while hitting 26 of 34 passes for 256 yards.

''Jason is a very steady player who throws with great accuracy,'' Green said yesterday by phone from Palo Alto, Calif. ''He was sacked a couple of times early on, but was able to keep his composure and keep our offense functioning. Even when we were losing some tough games earlier, we knew we were capable of fielding a strong offense both on the ground and in the air.''''