At Notre Dame, the first 'America's Team,' they wake the echoes on a run to another national title Between Touchdown Jesus, “Win One for the Gipper," Rudy, and, yes, even the forward pass, there are those who believe football wouldn’t quite be football without Notre Dame.
Ever since 1913, when an end named Knute Rockne helped a small Catholic school based in South Bend, Indiana, pull off a stunner by beating Army, Notre Dame has stood as one of the main shapers of college football.
Rockne didn’t invent the forward pass in that win against Army, but by catching throws in stride — up to then, receivers ran to a spot, stood there and waited — he introduced the pass as a dynamic, game-changing play that now needs no explanation.
Harry Stuhldreher, Don Miller, Jim Crowley and Elmer Layden were immortalized by Grantland Rice in what is widely recognized as the best lead sentence in the history of sports writing: “Outlined against a blue-gray October sky, the Four Horsemen rode again.”.
Rockne went on to coach at Notre Dame, which featured a backfield famously nicknamed the Four Horsemen.
