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From Tutorial to Triumph: The Birth of the Fighting Irish · Sports History Network

• 0:47
  Welcome back to Pigskin Dispatch your portal deposit of football history.
• 0:50
  I'm your host, Darren Hayes.
• 0:51
  And in late November 1887, a group of student athletes from the University of Michigan stepped off a train in South Bend, Indiana.
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  They didn't just come to play a game.
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  They literally had to teach young men from the University of Notre Dame the basic rules and strategies of early American football right before the kickoff.
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  Now, Michigan handed out a friendly eight to nothing lesson that afternoon.
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  But two decades later, in November 1909, the a pupil did the unthinkable.
• 1:16
  Notre Dame stunned Fielding at yoast.
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  Mighty Wolverines 11 3.
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  That upset didn't just rattle the Western Conference, it birthed the legend, spawned the nickname the Fighting Irish, and triggered a boycott by Fielding Yost that froze the rivalry for 33 years.
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  Today, with the help of historians Dr.
• 1:30
  John Behe and Timothy Brown, we're digging into the roots of the Michigan Notre Dame clash, the evolution of Fielding Yost and how Newt Rockney's world was shaped by the fallout.
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  To understand how intense this rivalry became, we have to look back to November 23, 1887.
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  Notre Dame didn't just have a varsity team.
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  Michigan, on the other hand, was on their way to play.
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  Chicago made a scheduled stop in South Bend.
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  They held a walk through explaining the line scrums, downs and tackling, and then played a scrimmage.
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  For the next decade, Michigan dominated the every encounter.
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  By 1901, Michigan had hired a fiery, brilliant coach out of West Virginia.
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  Folks fielding, hurry up.
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  Yost teams weren't just winning, they were blittering opponents by a point a minute era.
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  Now, to give us some insight into Yost's fearless nature and relentless mindset, here's Dr.
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  John Behe, author of Cocchiost Michigan, the tradition maker.
• 2:24
  When I look at the guy's character as I studied his football teams and his coaching techniques, he was fearless.
• 2:33
  Dr.
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  Behe's book tells us that he was born in 1870.
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  In those early coaching years, Joost never felt it was his job to stop his team from performing there at their peak.
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  It was his opponent's job.
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  He pushed every advantage he had.
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  An unmatched intensity.
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  Under Yost, Michigan ran up scores and took pride in relentless execution.
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  But tactically, football at the turn of the century was a bruising, dangerous affair.
• 2:55
  Here's Timothy Brown explaining what the pre1906 gridiron landscape looked like before the game.
• 3:01
  Opened up the early days of what we now think of as gridiron North American football, U.S.
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  and Canada.
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  It was rugby and you know, when they started the game, they made some minor tweaks, but it was rugby.
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  So the game remained very much rugby esque until, say, 1890.
• 3:22
  And they made some real changes that, including allowing tackling below the waist and things like that that made it harder to do the outside, wide open running of rugby.
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  And so the game started steering towards this, what ultimately became mass and momentum football.
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  So mass meaning, you know, it was basically like playing goal line football.
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  You know, a goal line offensive goal against goal line defense, all 110 yards of the field at the time.
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  By 1909, the landscape had been shifting.
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  The forward pass had been legalized in 1906, yet many powerhouse coaches still relied on sheer muscle.
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  Notre Dame, coached by Frank Shorty Longman, a standout fullback under Yost at Michigan, came to Ann Arbor with his team on November 6, 1909.
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  Michigan was heavily favored, but Longman knew yo said some inside and out.
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  Notre Dame punched back with ferocious tackling and sharp execution, handed Michigan an 113 defeat.
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  It was Notre Dame's first ever victory over their former teachers.
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  The Detroit newspapers took notice.
• 4:26
  Writing at the Detroit Free Press, legendary sports writer E.A.
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  Bachelor described the resilient grit of South Bend squad, declaring, quote, eleven fighting Irishmen wrecked the Yos machine yesterday afternoon.
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  End quote.
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  That headline gave birth to the moniker that defines the Golden Domers to this day.
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  A young student named Newt Rockney would arrive in South Bend a year later in the fall of 1910.
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  And Rockney grew up in Chicago idolizing Walter Ersall, the University of Chicago quarterback whose boot famously snapped Michigan's 56 game win streak in 1905.
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  Rockne absorbed the belief that brains and innovation could topple the gridiron giants.
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  A rematch was scheduled for the very next year in November 1910, and Michigan was eager for revenge.
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  Notre Dame wanted to prove 1909 was no fluke.
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  But just days before the game, Fielding Yost challenged the eligibility of two Notre Dame stars, George Philbrook and Ralph Dimick, claiming they had exceeded collegiate eligibility limits under Western Conference rules.
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  And Notre Dame stood by its players.
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  Now Yos came back and he canceled the 1910 game.
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  And he didn't stop there.
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  Yoast used his considerate power and influence to ban Notre Dame from playing anyone in the Western Conference, which is now the Big Ten, effectively blackballing Notre Dame from the conference schedule altogether.
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  Now remember where Notre Dame is and the teams that play around them and where the Big Ten is.
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  Ironically, as Dr.
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  Behe notes in his biography, Yost lived by the public model.
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  If you lose.
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  Don't find excuses.
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  Just congratulate the winners and move on.
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  Yeah, when it came to Notre Dame, Yost never scheduled them.
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  He never again during his entire coaching career as an athletic director tenure either.
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  Now that freeze forced Notre Dame to look elsewhere for opponents.
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  Instead of staying in the regional midwestern schools, Notre Dame traveled to the west coast to face army and USC and some of those big teams out there.
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  And where would we be without those, you know, West Point fate Playing against Notre Dame in 1913 and use the forward pass with Gus Dorius and Newt Rock need to become a national brand.
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  Michigan and Notre Dame would not meet again on the gridiron until 1942, the World War II era.
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  And it's amazing when you think about that.
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  These two fluent influential coaches, Newt Rockne who brought Notre Dame to power in their glory and by far their their pinnacle of coaching fielding H yos is probably that same man for Michigan.
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  Those hurry up offenses and you know, bringing that team, it's national championships and probably the top tier coach in the Michigan's history.
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  Debatable I'm sure.
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  But those two coaches didn't like each other.
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  Their schools didn't like each other.
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  But they never played a game opposing each other.
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  That 1910 game never was played.
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  And Newt Rockne came on the scene as a player in Notre Dame in 1910.
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  So kind of amazing and ironic there.
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  So what began on that chilly November afternoon in 1887 as an informal tutorial ended up creating one of the most intense rivalries in American sports.
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  Now Michigan taught Notre Dame how to play football.
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  And Notre Dame learned a lesson well enough to beat its master.
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  And the ripple effects shaped the modern game today.
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  And that rivalry really gelled that big.
• 8:24
  Thank you to our guest, Dr.
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  John Behe.
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  Make sure you check out his book Coach Yost, Michigan's tradition maker@behe.com b e h e.com and Timothy P.
• 8:37
  Brown at footworkarchaeology.com find their books on Amazon as well.
• 8:43
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• 8:48
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• 8:50
  Until next time, keep your helmets high and your eyes on the gridiron.
• 8:54
  I'm your host, Darren Hayes.
• 8:55
  Have a great gridiron day.
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• 10:12
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• 10:15
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