'66 Ferocious Battle, Unsatisfying Result

RECORD: 9-0-1 ALL-AMERICAS: NICK EDDY, HB; JIM LYNCH, LB; TOM REGNER, G. DESPITE THE TIE WITH THE SPARTANS, NOTRE DAME WON ITS FIRST TITLE IN 17 YEARS

OLD NOTRE DAME will tie over all. Sing it out, guys. That is not exactly what the march says, of course, but that is how the game ends every time you replay it. The brutes of Michigan State and Notre Dame pounded each other into enough mistakes to settle a dozen games between lesser teams, but the 10-10 tie that destiny seemed to be demanding had a strange, noble quality to it. And then it did not have that anymore. Suddenly all it had was an enormous emptiness.

Forget everything that came before--all that ferocious thudding in the line that was mostly responsible for five fumbles, four interceptions, 25 other incompletions, a total of 20 rushing plays that either lost yardage or gained none--and forget the few good plays. Put the No. 1 team, Notre Dame, on its own 30-yard line with time for at least four passing plays to break the tie. A No. 1 team will try something, won't it, to stay that way?

Notre Dame did not.

Ara Parseghian made the decision to end the so-called "game of the century" 10-10. "We'd fought hard to come back and tie it up," Ara argued. "After all that, I didn't want to risk giving it to them cheap."

The game was marked by all of the brutality that you somehow knew it would have. Early in the first quarter Michigan State's Bubba Smith drilled Notre Dame quarterback Terry Hanratty, separating Hanratty's shoulder and knocking him from the game. But substitute Coley O'Brien did marvelously well, hitting Bob Gladieux with a 34-yard pass on a deep pattern straight to the goalpost, narrowing the Irish deficit to 10-7 at halftime.

Then, late in the third quarter, Joe Azzaro came on to kick the 28-yard field goal that tied the game. Instantly the play that should have settled the game did in fact happen. Notre Dame safety Tom Schoen picked off a wild Jimmy Raye pass and skittered back with it 31 yards to the Spartans' 18. Anyone who thought the Irish would pull something besides three straight Larry Conjar plunges and a field goal was in a closed ward somewhere.

Conjar did run on first down. He dug out two yards. But now what's this? Here's halfback Dave Haley going wide to the left on second down, and here's lineman Phil Hoag knifing through with Smith to crack him for an eight-yard loss! The ball isn't on the 16 anymore; it is back on the 24. Now O'Brien fails with a frantic pass and it is fourth down. Azzaro's field goal from 42 yards out is a couple of feet off to the right, and the swoon of relief in Spartan Stadium makes the structure lean a little.

"That Haley play," said Parseghian, a total wreck in the locker room after the game. "We blew an assignment." He stared down at the floor. "Damn," he said.

And back outside the Notre Dame door, a pretty Michigan State student going through the tunnel looked blankly at her boyfriend. "Damn," she said. "Damn, damn, damn."