The Lou Holtz Didn’t Just Create A Great Team, He Created Great Men

Lou Holtz left a permanent imprint on football because he was a man who loved the game and knew and respected his players.

Will O'Toole | March 6, 2026

Lou Holtz passed at age 89 this week. With him goes the last Notre Dame coach to win a college football national championship, a feat he accomplished in 1988. That’s an eternity for “Subway Alumni.”

To appreciate Holtz’s contribution to the game, it’s important to understand the emergence of college football on the national sports landscape over the past century and more. The change can be attributed to several factors, but perhaps the most important was Notre Dame’s decision to make the sport one of the college’s major disciplines.

Just about a century ago, Knute Rockne, a Protestant, turned the small all-men’s Catholic school in northern Indiana into a juggernaut in college football and expanded the scope of the school from regional to global. Still, the Irish were denied entry into what is now the Big Ten (plus 14 and counting) because the athletic bureaucrats and administrators had their collective noses bent out of shape with the elements of Notre Dame’s admission standards, player eligibility, and academic requirements, all mixed with a bit of anti-Catholic bias.

The Big Ten’s repeated rejection of Notre Dame turned into a Godsend. The team decided that, if the Midwest didn’t want ’em, they’d go elsewhere. Rockne took his show on the road and expanded the Notre Dame brand nationally through clever marketing, recruiting, and an exciting style of football with the implementation of the forward pass.

Thus, Rockne’s yearly sojourns to the Pacific Coast, beginning in 1926, to play the University of Southern California (USC), turned into an “event” instead of just a game and turned the annual contest into one of college football’s best rivalries.

By the end of the 1970s, Notre Dame administration, faculty, alumni, and its “subway” fan base were yearning for a coach like Holtz. After Dan Devine resigned from the team in 1980 after six seasons and his securing championship number 12, Notre Dame tried something revolutionary: It hired Gerry Faust, an extremely successful high school coach out at Moeller High School in Cincinnati.

That revolutionary move backfired—mightily.

Faust’s particular brand of football, his “philosophy” of the game, didn’t translate well on the college level. Faust, perhaps realizing that his type of coaching was not well-suited for big-time college football, resigned after a full-throttle “take no prisoners” blowout against Miami (FL), 56–7. And that paved the way for Notre Dame’s glory.

Lou Holtz with his Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2020. Public domain.

In 1976, learned that he was not the stuff of which NFL coaches are made when he walked away from the New York Jets, where he was flailing badly.  For Holtz, Notre Dame was a dream job. So, in 1985, when Notre Dame offered him a position, he opted out of his contract with the Minnesota Golden Gophers. His stint at the Gophers, by the way, followed his working for the Arkansas Razorbacks, a team that he’d led to college football glory in 1978. Back then, his Arkansas Razorbacks upset the Oklahoma Sooners at the Orange Bowl.

When Holtz arrived in South Bend, he had his work cut out for him. He knew that he had to win—right away, immediately…like yesterday.

Fortunately, one of the attributes all the best coaches have is an acute intuitive ability to judge player talent. Holtz had it. He knew that his recruits, the ones that would wear the Blessed Mother Blue and Gold, had to be bigger, quicker, faster, stronger, and yes, have a higher football IQ than other teams’ players. Only that way could they compete and win not just a few games, but a championship. Championships, after all, are what all the big boys at schools like Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Alabama, Georgia, USC, and others in the power conferences are aiming for,

Over the years, Holtz showed no prejudice in his pursuit of championships. He sought men of class and distinction of any race, ethnicity, religion, or direction on the compass. Holtz, like Faust before him, wanted young men who were both great players and students that Notre Dame could be proud of as graduates. Holtz just knew better football talent and how to exploit it to its potential.

It took Holtz just three seasons, including a miracle win over Miami in the infamous “Catholics vs. Convicts” game, to return Notre Dame to the promised land, gaining the 13th and last title in school history.

For Holtz, 1988 would be his football shining achievement, as his teams following that undefeated squad would come close (1989, 1993) but never again taste the victory champagne.

In fact, Holtz’s last team, which finished 8–3, didn’t even play in a bowl game, electing not to take an invite after a loss to their rival USC in Los Angeles over the Thanksgiving weekend. That was his only loss to them in his 11 seasons in South Bend (9-1-1).

After a final stop coaching the South Carolina Gamecocks, Holtz became a college football pundit, adding insights on various sports networks. There were some controversies from his on-air performance, such as his referring to Adolf Hitler when describing a coach’s leadership style. That was plain wrong on all accounts. Whether it was ill-conceived or an off-the-cuff remark meant to be humorous, it was uncalled for, and the statement forced Holtz to retract it and apologize on air.

Knocked down and perhaps ashamed, Holtz rallied and became a frequent political voice for conservative points and issues. Indeed, President Trump awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

At the end of the day, maybe Holtz’s candor, his slant, his values were not everyone’s cup of tea, but to his players, he was one of a kind.

One of Holtz’s Notre Dame recruits was Jerome Bettis, who was from a rough and tumble Detroit neighborhood filled with poverty, crime, and drug dealing—something the running back admitted to doing. For Bettis, it was a life-changing experience, for he went on to become an NFL Hall of Famer.

Bettis stated, “The lessons he taught me went far beyond football. His faith, his discipline, his belief in doing things the right way shaped who I became as a man, a father, and a leader.”

In honor of Lou Holtz, “Wake up the echoes.”

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