For this weekend’s game, every fan will have a wristband at their seat to wear for the game. They are much brighter and the technology will allow for some spectacular light effects to be utilized on Saturday night.
A special thank you to Rockne Athletics Fund members Charlie Habic and Nelda Conors, Michael and Colleen Waterbury, and Bill and Kimberly Witchger for making the stadium-wide light show possible.
Now you are probably wondering, where is the historical stuff? I am working on a Miami FL series retrospective that was just not ready to put out today. This might be the week when The 42nd Degree has more than one update.
I do have some housekeeping things to work through as well.
CORRECTIONS
One of the most frustrating, but awesome, parts of working through Notre Dame football history is that if I do make a mistake – it quickly gets pointed out. I make mistakes often, even though my goal is to be as accurate and detailed as I can be. Those mistakes, however, remind me how much the history of the program means to our fans and alumni and motivates me to make sure any error is not repeated.
✅ Our first ‘Who Wore It Best’ went out two weeks ago and one of the candidates considered on the offensive side was Denny Allan. Our all-time roster has had him listed as having wore #1 for as long as I have been at Notre Dame. It didn’t take Paul Strauder (‘80) long to email me and point out that Allan actually wore #22 at Notre Dame. Sure enough, taking a look at the actual roster files from those years Allan did wear #22. That will be corrected in the all-time roster moving forward.
✅ The edition that featured Coley O’Brien and the 1966 Michigan State game had an error that I fixed already in the online archive, but I wanted to acknowledge it here. A couple people pointed out that in 2002 the second fumble return that owns the school record for quickest back-to-back touchdowns was picked up by Lionel Bolen, not Jarvis Edison as I had written. This is me working too quickly and not paying attention to my own research. Bolen’s return was just 0:11 seconds after Gerome Sapp had returned a fumble 54 yards.
Just below that in the record book are two touchdowns that were 0:12 seconds apart. An Autry Denson five-yard rush against Vanderbilt in 1995 and then Jarvis Edison returned a fumble on the following kickoff eight yards for a touchdown. I looked at the wrong line when I was reporting the second play of the 0:11 combination. Thanks to Tim Buckley (Cincinnati, OH) and Mike Tribe (‘00) for pointing out the mistake.
✅ If you found any other mistakes or have feedback, story ideas or just want to critique my writing style - The 42nd Degree feedback form is always available.
WHO WORE IT BEST - #1
The first edition of ‘Who Wore It Best’ was a success, other than my aforementioned mistake with Denny Allan. The early results are in and 81.1% selected Derrick Mayes as the best offensive player to done #1 at Notre Dame. Todd Lyght’s 88.3% was even higher on the defensive side.
The voting won’t ever really end until I get through all 99 numbers, which might be in the year 2039 with as long as I take to do the research on those editions.
The 42nd Degree is written by Alan Wasielewski.
Alan has worked on campus as a member of the athletic communications team and video production unit since his graduation from Notre Dame in 2000.
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