1966 College Football National Championship

Notre Dame 1966

. Leahy retired after the 1953 season, and Notre Dame's fortunes waned, much as they had in the 1930s after Rockne's death in a plane crash. In 1956 they fell to 2-8, and 1960-1963 they were 14-25. But the next year the program began their 3rd era of greatness, the "Era of Ara."



Hall of Fame coach Ara Parseghian (pictured above) had played at halfback for Miami-Ohio 1946-1947. After a couple of seasons with the Cleveland Browns, he became an assistant at his alma mater under Hall of Fame coach Woody Hayes in 1950. Hayes left for Ohio State the next year, and Parseghian was promoted to head coach. He went a blistering 39-6-1 at Miami 1951-1955, and they were 9-0 and ranked in the AP poll his last year there. Moribund Northwestern, 0-8-1 in 1955, hired him away, and he went 36-35-1 there, in a very tough Big 10, 1956-1963, finishing ranked 5 times (fixed polls).

The Era of Ara began the next year at Notre Dame. Ara Parseghian was the first head coach there that had not graduated from the school since Jesse Harper 1913-1917. The Irish had gone 2-7 in 1963, but Parseghian righted the ship immediately, going 9-1 in 1964, and he went 95-17-4 and won 2 MNCs at Notre Dame 1964-1974. For his career he was 170-58-6.

In terms of talent, and arguably performance as well, Notre Dame 1966 was likely the best team of the decade, with Michigan State 1966 a top contender, and that's what made their game this season such a big deal. Michigan State fielded 4 Hall of Famers (Notre Dame had 2 and Alabama none), and the Spartans would have 4 players taken in the top 8 picks of the next NFL draft, but Notre Dame was actually deeper in talent. The Irish fielded 11 players who would make first-team All American lists during their careers, while Michigan State had 7 and Alabama 5.

The Players

Where to start? That's easy: defensive end Alan Page (pictured above), consensus All American and a college and pro Hall of Famer. He was 6' 5" and 238 pounds, and had 68 tackles this season, then went on to a 15 year pro career with the Vikings and Bears. He won an NFL title in 1969, made 9 Pro Bowls, 6 All-Pro teams, and was named defensive player of the year 3 times. For his career he totaled 173 sacks. While playing for the Vikings, he also got his law degree, and later served on the Minnesota state supreme court 1993-2015.

There were 3 other consensus All Americans this season: guard Tom Regner, running back Nick Eddy, and Hall of Fame linebacker Jim Lynch. Eddy finished 3rd in the Heisman vote this year, and Lynch won the Maxwell Award. Lynch led the team in tackles in 1965 (108) and 1966 (106), and went on to an 11-year pro career with the Chiefs, winning a Superbowl in 1969 over NFL champion Minnesota, which featured his old teammate Alan Page.



The defensive tackles, Pete Duranko and Kevin Hardy, were nonconsensus AA this year, while linebacker Mike McGill and end Jim Seymour would be nonconsensus AA the following year. Seymour (pictured on the cover of Time from October of 1966, #85) had 48 catches for 862 yards and 8 touchdowns this season.

Three more players would be consensus AA in future seasons: safety Tom Schoen, quarterback Terry Hanratty (also pictured on that cover of Time), and tackle George Kunz. Hanratty completed 53.1% of his passes this year for 1247 yards, 8 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions, and he rushed for 5 touchdowns. He finished 6th in the Heisman vote this season. Kunz, who went on to a 12-year pro career and made 8 Pro Bowls, was lost to injury this season, but here is how deep Notre Dame was: his replacement starter was Bob Kuechenberg, who went on to a 14-year pro career with the Dolphins, winning a pair of Super Bowls and making 6 Pro Bowls.

Finally, we have running back Rocky Bleier, this year's 3rd-leading rusher with 282 yards and 4 touchdowns, and 17 catches for 209 yards and a touchdown. He did not win awards in college, but went on to a famed 11-year career as a fullback for the Pittsburgh Steelers, winning 4 Super Bowls.

Notre Dame's Season

Game of the Century

This "Game of the Century" was not as historic a matchup as the 1946 edition that featured Notre Dame and Army, but it was the best college football matchup since that game, and featured a dizzying array of All Americans, Hall of Famers, and future NFL stars. People were looking forward to this game for weeks, and when both teams did their part to come into it with perfect records, well, it may not have actually been the "Game of the Century," but it was certainly the Game of the Decade (sorry, Texas-Arkansas 1969, but you are not even close).

Notre Dame's best back, Heisman candidate Nick Eddy, injured his shoulder getting off the train in East Lansing, and was unable to play. On top of that, they lost their starting center to injury on the game's first series, and quarterback Terry Hanratty was knocked out of the game in the first quarter on a sack by Hall of Fame defensive end Bubba Smith. This was a very hard-hitting game, and Notre Dame also lost a starting end and the halfback who replaced Eddy to injuries, leaving Rocky Bleier to do most of the running.



Michigan State lost a fumble at their own 4 yard line in the opening quarter, but Notre Dame was unable to cash the opportunity for any points. The Spartans got rolling late in the quarter on a 42 yard pass from quarterback Jimmy Raye to Hall of Fame end Gene Washington (pictured below), and then they ran the ball into the middle 9 straight times, scoring a touchdown early in the 2nd quarter. Raye got loose for a 30 yard run the next time MSU had the ball, setting up a 47 yard field goal by barefoot kicker Dick Kenney. Notre Dame quarterback Coley O' Brien struggled in place of Hanratty, completing just 7 of 19 passes for 102 yards, but after a 38 yard kickoff return, he hit 3 passes, the last for a 24 yard touchdown to Nick Eddy's replacement, Bob Gladieux, and the Irish closed the gap to 10-7 at the half.



Notre Dame drove 70 yards, then tied the score on a short field goal early in the 4th quarter (pictured below), but after that Coley O' Brien missed on 6 straight passes, and neither team could generate any offense the rest of the game. Still, Notre Dame had a golden opportunity late when safety Tom Schoen intercepted a pass and returned it to the MSU 18 yard line. But they took an 8 yard loss, then just missed on a 41 yard field goal attempt with 4:39 left. They next got the ball on their own 30 with 1:24 left, and here Ara Parseghian infamously elected to just run out the clock and take the 10-10 tie.



This decision caused an eruption of disgust nationwide, and antipathy for Parseghian persisted for decades afterward. But Parseghian's line worked out well: Notre Dame held on to #1 by a slim 3 poll points over Michigan State in the next AP poll, and they would finish #1 in the final poll. Almost 20 years later, Nebraska coach Tom Osborne was lauded as a hero for going for 2 and the win in the 1984 Orange Bowl, but what did he have to show for it? Certainly not a national championship.

Big Finish

Michigan State's season was over, but Notre Dame had to travel to archrival Southern Cal, then 7-2 and ranked #10, the next week, and with all the negative publicity over taking the tie, Ara Parseghian knew that a big showing was required to stave off Michigan State and Alabama in the AP poll. Well, he didn't get a big showing, he got a humongous, mind-blowing showing, a 51-0 decimation that was Southern Cal's worst loss ever.



Coley O' Brien hit 21 of 31 passes for 255 yards and 3 touchdowns, and Jim Seymour caught 11 of them for 150 yards and 2 touchdowns (one touchdown pictured below), while Southern Cal totaled just 188 yards of offense. Notre Dame returned 2 interceptions for touchdowns. Southern Cal went on to lose the Rose Bowl to #5 Purdue, finishing the Trojans at 7-4, but I still have them ranked #10 for 1966. USC lost to #5 Purdue by 1 point, to #6 UCLA (9-1) by 7 points, and to #8 Miami-Florida by 3 points, so you can see how monumental that 51-0 stomping of them was.



Ara Parseghian stumped for AP poll votes in the locker room after the game, proclaiming that the Irish had proven they were #1, and moreover that Notre Dame was "by far the best college football team I've ever had and it's the best college team I've ever seen." Notre Dame was a landslide winner in the final AP poll, with 41 first place votes to 8 for #2 Michigan State and 7 for #3 Alabama.

Michigan State 1966

Michigan State's Season

Michigan State's season held only a bit more drama than Notre Dame's did, due to one poor outing at Ohio State (4-5) in mid-October that cost them the #1 slot in the AP poll (the game pictured above). This game was played in a rainstorm, and Ohio State led 2-0 at halftime thanks to a bad MSU punt snap that resulted in a safety. Michigan State kicked a field goal in the 3rd quarter to take a 3-2 lead, but Ohio State came back with a 47 yard touchdown pass early in the 4th quarter to go ahead 8-3. Michigan State answered with an 84 yard touchdown drive, Jimmy Raye connecting on 4 passes and fullback Bob Apisa scoring on 4th down from the 1, and a successful 2-point conversion made the final score 11-8.

Michigan State fell to #2, but the next week they got back in stride, plastering #9 Purdue at home 41-20. Purdue finished 9-2, their only other loss coming to Notre Dame. They defeated Southern Cal (#10) in the Rose Bowl, and I have the Boilermakers ranked #5 for 1966. That was the only ranked team MSU played aside from Notre Dame in their finale (that game described in the Notre Dame section above).

Alabama 1966

Alabama's Season

Alabama had the top scoring defense this year at 3.7 points per game, but that bumped up to 4.0 after their bowl game, behind Notre Dame's 3.8 (Notre Dame also led the nation in scoring offense). Alabama was ranked #1 in the preseason, but they started their season late, playing minor team Louisiana Tech September 24, and their first real game, against Mississippi in Jackson, wasn't until October, by which time Alabama had dropped to #3.

Alabama led Ole Miss 7-0 at halftime, and in the 3rd quarter Ken Stabler threw a 28 yard touchdown pass to Ray Perkins to make it 14-0. Mississippi drove 92 yards for a touchdown in the 4th quarter, but Alabama clinched the game with a short field goal, winning 17-7. Tide defensive back Dick Thompson snagged 3 interceptions, Stabler was good on 16 of 19 passes, and Ray Perkins caught 9 of them. Mississippi finished 8-3, and I have them ranked #17 for 1966, but Alabama's performance against them left voters unimpressed, and Alabama dropped to #4 in the next AP poll.

After routing Clemson (6-4) 26-0, Alabama rose back to #3 in the AP poll, but not for long. Their next game was at Tennessee, where they turned in their one truly poor performance of the season, and on the same day Michigan State had their one poor game. This game was played in the rain, which apparently suited Tennessee just fine, as they jumped out to a 10-0 lead in the opening quarter, and carried that margin into the 4th quarter.



Alabama scored a touchdown early in the 4th quarter, and Stabler tossed a vital 2-point conversion that closed the gap to 10-8. Later, Stabler completed a couple of passes and ran for 10 yards and a first down to drive Alabama 74 yards to a short field goal, giving them an 11-10 lead with 3:23 left in the game. Out of timeouts, Tennessee drove all the way to the Alabama 3 yard line, but they missed the chip-shot field goal with 18 seconds left, and Alabama was off the hook. Sort of. They dropped to #4 again in the AP poll, and after this game, the rest of their schedule would afford them no real shot at #1.

Tennessee went on to finish 8-3, and I have them ranked #18 for 1966. The rest of Alabama's regular season was a yawnfest. They turned in another lackluster performance 2 weeks later, a 27-14 home win over Mississippi State (4-6), outgaining them just 307 yards to 284, but there was no real drama until the Sugar Bowl, and very little there.

The Sugar Bowl

When Alabama and Nebraska agreed to play in the Sugar Bowl, both had perfect records and were ranked #3 and #4. #1 Notre Dame and #2 Michigan State were not playing in bowl games, so this was by far the best bowl matchup, and Alabama and Nebraska both hoped that the winner would be awarded the Grantland Rice Trophy by the Football Writers Association, which voted after the bowl games. Alas, those hopes were dashed, for both teams, when Nebraska lost their regular season finale 10-9 at Oklahoma (6-4, #15).

Suddenly, Nebraska looked rather unimpressive for a 9-1 team. They had just 1 win over a rated opponent, 7-3 Colorado (#14), and they had barely beaten a pair of 2-win teams, TCU and Iowa State. Alabama was a 9-point favorite in this game, but 9 points wasn't going to do it. Their plan, naturally, was to win by as much as possible, and they were very impressive, though not quite 51-0 impressive.

They started on pace for that, zipping to a 17-0 lead in the opening quarter, but slowed down to 24-0 at half, and a 34-7 final. Ken Stabler was 12 of 18 for 218 yards and a touchdown, and Ray Perkins caught 7 passes for a huge 178 yards and the touchdown, scoring it from 45 yards out in the 4th quarter. Alabama outgained Nebraska 436 yards to 297, and the Huskers had 7 turnovers, including 5 interceptions. Tide defensive back Bobby Johns snagged 3 of them.

After the game, as he had after beating 4-6 Auburn 31-0 to end the regular season, Bama coach Bear Bryant went to work campaigning for votes, this time for the Grantland Rice Trophy rather than for the AP poll. Bryant declared, echoing Parseghian's remarks after Notre Dame had whipped Southern Cal, that Alabama was the greatest team he had ever seen, and he maintained for years that this was the best team he ever coached. However, the Football Writers Association, Helms Foundation, National Championship Foundation, and College Football Researchers Association, all of which took bowl games into account, joined the AP and coaches polls in thinking that they had all seen a better team play this season, let alone in their lifetimes. And they had.

Notre Dame vs. Michigan State vs. Alabama

The Missing Ring

Awards Ceremony

Grading the Selectors