We see Michigan was beginning to improve as USC’s performance (both in general and against ND) declined. The above chart of win percentage makes it hard to see – for which I apologize – but from 2010 – 2014, Michigan’s five year win pct against ND was 80%, 80%, 60%, 80%, and 60%. We would lose to Michigan in bizarre and horrible ways (defining moments), and in 2009 at the Big House we were on the wrong end of two of the worst referee / review calls I’ve seen watching ND (unfairness). Michigan is just down the road (geography) and another historical peer – #1 and #2 in win percentages.
But then 2014 happened. 31-0 (37-0!) happened. The failure of Brady Hoke made it clear that Michigan was stuck in neutral, and their five year win percentage began to fall, and with the failures of Hoke’s latter seasons, the perception of recent parity disappeared. Most importantly, we suddenly stopped playing Michigan every year – the frequency of the competition disappeared. As of this year, they have beaten us zero times in the last five years… and we’ve only played them twice.
The rivalry I felt toward Michigan has faded. Sure, I’m sure I experience the same sense of schadenfreude about their losses that most of us do – and more so for Michigan than for programs we have played less frequently in recent times, like Florida State. But I don’t compare Notre Dame to Michigan anywhere near as much as I used to, and when we stop playing them (I hope forever, because the game really brings us zero benefits as a team) after 2019, I expect the difference to be even more noticeable.
[Side note: I think the rivalry with Michigan for me was much more about dealing with Michigan fans. Two of my best friends are UM fans and incredibly classy about Michigan’s wins and losses. But the rest of the Michigan fans I know are among the least gracious fans on the planet. So it was highly important to me that ND win those games. Losses to USC never brought the day to day misery that losses to Michigan did.]
Now we get to Stanford, who I’ll say that no Notre Dame fan ever hated until very recently. I didn’t even think about them at all until 2010, when I found myself thinking: “Darn, these guys look good!” By 2011, I was experiencing frustration about our losses to them. Stanford is very well explained by Tyler and Cobbs’s research. We weren’t even playing them until 2007 (this is why their five year win pct against ND is missing for the first several years of the chart above), so until recently there has been zero competition. Now they’ve got a five year win percentage against us of .6 (which will stay that way even if we win again this year) and their 5 year winning percentage has been above ours since 2010. We are most definitely competing with them for personnel, in large part because they are the one D1 football program where the academic standards (at least for entry) are higher than Notre Dame. For me, this constitutes cultural similarity – at least relative to other D1 schools.
I’ve been on Stanford death watch for five years. Credit to David Shaw: I’ve been wrong every year. But this year I’m not alone. I’m hoping that the forecasts of Bill Connelly, ESPN, sundry college football gamblers, and our own Brendan Reilly come to pass and that Stanford has another year of under-performance. They were supposed to have a gangbusters offense in 2018 and they did not; this year the veteran offensive line (and almost all their skill positions except QB and one WR) are gone. Their recruiting has slowly declined in recent years and they’ve had a lot of coaching attrition.
