They Didn’t Know They Were Watching History: Notre Dame vs. Wisconsin, 1964

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My dad has been reminiscing a lot this week. With Notre Dame and Wisconsin preparing to meet again this weekend, his thoughts have gone back 62 years, to the first football game of his senior year at Notre Dame.

On September 26, 1964, Dad and a group of his friends piled into a car and road-tripped to Madison, Wisconsin, to watch the Fighting Irish take on the Badgers. At the time, it was probably just what college football road trips are supposed to be: friends, football and the excitement of beginning one last year together at Notre Dame. What Dad couldn’t have known was that he was about to witness the beginning of one of the most important eras in Notre Dame football history.

A New Beginning for Notre Dame

There wasn’t a lot of reason for optimism surrounding Notre Dame football as the 1964 season began. The Irish had stumbled to a 2-7 record in 1963, and Hugh Devore, who had served as interim head coach following Joe Kuharich’s resignation, was replaced by a 40-year-old coach Notre Dame lured away from Northwestern. His name was Ara Parseghian.

Today, we hear Parseghian’s name and know exactly what came next: national championships, undefeated seasons, legendary games and a place among the greatest coaches in Notre Dame history. But on September 26, 1964, none of that had happened yet. Parseghian hadn’t won a single game at Notre Dame, and neither my dad nor the thousands of other Notre Dame students who made their way to Madison that Saturday could possibly have known what they were about to witness. They were simply there to get their first look at the 1964 Fighting Irish.

They got quite a show.

Unveiling the “Bomb”

A sellout crowd of nearly 64,400 packed Camp Randall Stadium despite the wind and rain. The Notre Dame Scholastic Football Review would later title its account of the game “Unveiling the ‘Bomb,’” and the weapon being unveiled was the combination of quarterback John Huarte and receiver Jack Snow.

Huarte was hardly a household name entering the season. The senior quarterback had played just 46 minutes the previous year, but against Wisconsin he looked nothing like an inexperienced quarterback making his debut in a new offense.

Notre Dame struck first late in the opening quarter when Tony Carey intercepted a Wisconsin pass and returned it to the Badgers’ 33-yard line. The Irish couldn’t turn the opportunity into a touchdown, but Ken Ivan connected on a 31-yard field goal with six seconds remaining in the quarter to give Notre Dame a 3-0 lead. Carey intercepted another pass just five plays later, although this time the Irish came away empty-handed after a 56-yard field goal attempt failed.

Wisconsin responded by driving from its own 20-yard line all the way to the Notre Dame 12, but the Irish defense held and the Badgers missed a field goal attempt. Notre Dame took possession, teased Wisconsin with two running plays and then, as the Scholastic account described it, unleashed its new weapon.

Snow bolted from the line and outran his defender. Huarte went deep, connecting with Snow for a 61-yard touchdown. Just like that, Notre Dame led 10-0.

Huarte continued throwing on Notre Dame’s next possession, moving the Irish 56 yards in five plays before the Wisconsin defense stiffened near the goal line. Ivan added his second field goal with just 18 seconds remaining in the half, sending Notre Dame to the locker room with a 13-0 lead.

Wisconsin Makes Its Move

The game wasn’t over yet. A little more than four minutes into the third quarter, Wisconsin quarterback Harold Brandt found Jimmy Jones for a 45-yard touchdown, cutting Notre Dame’s lead to 13-7. The Badgers threatened again later in the quarter, but this time the Irish defense took over.

Brandt was tackled for eight-yard losses on consecutive plays, stopping the Wisconsin drive and forcing the Badgers to punt. The punt gave the Irish excellent field position at the Wisconsin 29-yard line, and Notre Dame quickly took advantage. On the first play of the fourth quarter, Joe Kantor scored to extend the Irish lead to 19-7.

After Wisconsin went three-and-out, Notre Dame drove 45 yards, with Bill Wolski scoring from the two-yard line. Then Huarte and Snow delivered one more exclamation point. The Irish marched 87 yards before Huarte connected with Snow for a 42-yard touchdown, their second long scoring connection of the afternoon. With 3:12 remaining, Notre Dame had turned what had briefly been a six-point game into a 31-7 rout.

A Glimpse of What Was Coming

By the time the final whistle sounded, Notre Dame fans had learned quite a bit about Ara Parseghian’s first team. Huarte completed 15 of 24 passes with two touchdowns, while Snow caught nine passes for 217 yards, breaking Jim Morse’s Notre Dame receiving record of 208 yards set against USC in 1955.

The Notre Dame defense was equally impressive. Wisconsin finished the afternoon with minus-51 rushing yards, while the Irish intercepted four Badger passes. Carey grabbed two of them himself, and Notre Dame’s defensive front harassed Wisconsin’s quarterbacks throughout the rainy afternoon.

The final score was Notre Dame 31, Wisconsin 7, but nobody in Camp Randall that afternoon could have fully understood what that victory represented. Huarte, the previously unheralded quarterback who had barely seen the field the year before, would go on to win the Heisman Trophy. Notre Dame, 2-7 the previous season, would win its first nine games under Parseghian and rise all the way to No. 1 in the country before a heartbreaking 20-17 loss to USC in the season finale.

And Parseghian was just getting started. The victory over Wisconsin was Game No. 1 of what we now know simply as the Era of Ara.

The Road Back to South Bend

My favorite part of the contemporary account of the game actually comes at the very end. The Notre Dame Scholastic Football Review noted that Notre Dame students had “swarmed into Madison” to get their first glimpse of the 1964 squad.

My dad was one of those students.

The article goes on to say that some of those students returned to South Bend yelling, “We’re number one.” Maybe it was simply youthful optimism after watching a team that had won only two games the year before suddenly dismantle Wisconsin. As it turned out, they weren’t too far off.

Sixty-two years later, Dad still remembers that road trip with his friends during his senior year at Notre Dame. The young men in that car couldn’t have known where life would take them after graduation, what Ara Parseghian would come to mean to Notre Dame or that John Huarte would soon be holding the Heisman Trophy. They certainly couldn’t have known that more than six decades later, one of them would be sitting down to watch Notre Dame and Wisconsin play again, remembering the afternoon when he saw it all begin.

That’s one of the things I love most about college football. The scores eventually become numbers in a record book. Players’ names become part of history, and seasons turn into statistics. But sometimes a game becomes something more. It becomes a road trip with your friends, the first game of your senior year and a story you still tell 62 years later.

And this weekend, when Notre Dame and Wisconsin take the field again, I know exactly which game my dad will be thinking about: September 26, 1964 — Notre Dame 31, Wisconsin 7 — the day the Era of Ara began.

Go Irish! Beat Badgers!

(Research gathered from The Scholastic: Notre Dame Football Review 1964, and the New York Times).

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