USC-Notre Dame, revisited

The The Irish Trojan, a look back on one of the great days in college football, and one of the great games in the history of the sport.

34-31, USC. Even now . . . wow. What I wrote to Brendan:

Historically, the only parallel I can think of is Borg v. McEnroe, Wimbledon men’s singles championship, 1980. This match–almost certainly the greatest tennis match in history–reached its moment of sublimity in the fourth-set tiebreaker, when Borg forced McEnroe to seven Champonship Points, only to see Johnny Mac impossibily, improbably, fight them all off, then win the tiebreaker, and hence the set, 18-16.

Honest to God, I was thinking of Borg a year ago today, of what Borg later revealed he’d been thinking as he took his place for the fifth set. Here was a man who hadn’t lost at Wimbledon in five years, who had walked astride the grounds as a colossus, but–by his own account–all he could say to himself as he took his place was, “Oh my God, I’m going to lose. Oh my God, I’m going to lose.”

But, of course, he did not lose, but instead pulled out the fifth set an impossible 8-6.

I go back to this because this was how I was in my den a year ago today, staring at fourth-and-nine and–I see where you come from, Brendan–almost at peace with the presumptive outcome, and yet saying to myself, “Oh my God, they’re going to lose. Oh my God, they’re going to lose.”

And then Leinart saw Jarrett in man coverage.