Looking back at Notre Dame’s 1981 win over the LSU Tigers

Some games are remembered for the score. Others are remembered for what they begin.

When Notre Dame opened the 1981 season, the anticipation wasn’t just about returning starters, preseason rankings, or national title dreams still lingering from 1980. It was about a new face on the sideline, a new voice in the locker room, and a dream decades in the making finally coming true. Gerry Faust’s debut as head coach carried with it equal parts hope, skepticism, emotion, and expectation — and by the time the Irish ran out of the tunnel against LSU, Notre Dame Stadium was ready to erupt.

This week’s Throwback Thursday takes us back to that sunlit afternoon in South Bend, when belief was loud, rosaries were plentiful, and the first chapter of a new era was written.

The below excerpt comes from the March 1st, 1982 issue of the Irish Eye Magazine (Vol. 2, No. 1), written by Gary Grassey.

A Dream-Come-True Debut

By Gary Grassey

It was the best of times.

The excitement and expectations surrounding the opening of the 1981 Notre Dame football season had reached their peak.

The return of most of the starters from the 1980 Irish squad that had made such a strong run at national championship honors provided the legions of Notre Dame fanatics with hope for similar fortunes in 1981.

But it was the presence of one dynamic, ebullient man, whose storied past had been told and retold around the nation for the past nine months, that brought the emotional buildup to Notre Dame’s home opener with Louisiana State close to frenzy.

Gerry Faust, the architect of one of the most successful high school football programs in the country (his teams at Cincinnati Moeller lost a grand total of 17 games in Faust’s 18-year tenure), whose fondest dream had always been to coach at Notre Dame, was making his debut as head coach of the Fighting Irish. And all of Faust’s supporters and critics—those who felt high school coaches had no business jumping into a Division I program the caliber of a Notre Dame—and even his players and coaches were about to learn for the first time under game conditions what football under Faust was all about.

Almost everything went off according to plan.

At the traditional pep rally Friday night before the game, the arrival of more than 10,000 Irish rooters forced the festivities outside Stepan Center on the Notre Dame campus onto an adjacent set of basketball courts. The overflow gathering made more noise than the campus had heard in years on anything but game day.

The next morning, just a few hours before kickoff, Faust stepped into the bright South Bend sunshine for an unannounced tour of football festivities at Notre Dame, to shake a few more hands and to see firsthand what it was like on campus the day of a home game.

Finally, just before 1:30 p.m., Faust led his newly attired blue and gold squad through the tunnel and most of the student body onto the field in Notre Dame Stadium for his first game as head coach.

About 25 or 30 rosaries later—“I must have said one every five minutes out there,” Faust later recalled—third-ranked Notre Dame walked away with a 27-9 victory over Jerry Stovall’s LSU Tigers. While far from flawless, the win was as satisfying as it was relieving to Faust and the Irish, whose first hurdle was now complete.

LSU took the opening kickoff and promptly marched nowhere in three plays from its own 23 before quarterback Alan Risher was hit by Irish linebacker Joe Rudzinski. That collision caused a fumble that was recovered by defensive tackle Kevin Griffith at the Tiger 20.

Five plays and 1:27 later, Faust’s brand-new motion offense, complete with a wingback and two quarterbacks, rolled into the end zone on a seven-yard pass from sophomore quarterback Blair Kiel to fullback Larry Moriarty. The touchdown pass was the first ever for Kiel, the youngster who had helped lead the Irish to success as a freshman under former coach Dan Devine by starting the last nine games of the 9-2-1 1980 season. Harry Oliver, one of ten Moeller High School alumni (nine of them on the Irish roster) to dress for the ballgame, converted the extra point to give Notre Dame a 7-0 lead less than three minutes into the contest.

The Tigers made little headway on their next possession after the kickoff and were forced to punt. Kiel and the Irish took over on their own 28 and unleashed Faust’s offense with the execution, deception, and lightning-quick precision everyone had hoped to see.

Wingback Tony Hunter, a junior from Moeller, raced around left end for 13 yards. Kiel hit tight end Dean Masztak on a rollout for 10 more yards at the Tiger 49. Sophomore tailback Greg Bell smashed through the line and sprinted 41 yards down the left sideline. Hunter took a pitch to the right for seven yards to the LSU one-yard line where junior co-captain Phil Carter banged in for the score on the next play. Oliver’s conversion made it 14-0 with 7:43 left in the first quarter.

Stovall’s team might have folded up for a slaughter right there. But like the previous week, when the Tigers battled Alabama for 60 minutes despite an early deficit before succumbing, LSU bounced back. With Risher running the option for good yardage and with the help of an Irish personal foul, the Tigers moved to Notre Dame’s 32-yard line. Wideout Orlando McDaniel took a reverse 17 yards around the right side and LSU was in scoring range.

Two plays later, though, the Irish defense, reminiscent of a year ago, stopped the drive as cornerback Stacey Toran picked off Risher’s throw to McDaniel in the end zone for a touchback.

After an exchange of possessions, Notre Dame took a Tiger punt on its own 31 and began to move. With quarterback Tim Koegel, another Moeller alumnus, at the helm, Faust’s strategy clicked again. Koegel hit Hunter twice for big gains on pass plays and Hunter showed he could run the ball as well, carrying once for 13 yards and pounding across the goal line from a yard out midway through the second quarter for a 20-0 Irish lead. Thanks to a heavy rush, Oliver’s placement was wide right.

Kiel returned to action when Notre Dame got the ball back. But an errant pass to Hunter was picked off by freshman safety Jeffrey Dale at the Irish 42. After a sack, Risher scrambled out of trouble and hit Lester Dunn at the 12 for a 37-yard gain. Three runs and a face-mask penalty left the Tigers with fourth down and less than a yard to go for a first down at the Irish two.

But All-America middle linebacker Bob Crable, perhaps the finest player ever to come from Moeller, made his third consecutive stop by breaking up a pitch from Risher to halfback Jesse Myles to give the ball back to Notre Dame.

“You get down inside the twenty or around the twenty-yard line and you can’t score—that’s frustrating,” moaned Risher after the game concerning the Tigers’ offensive failures. “There was never any doubt we could get back in the game. But we made big mistakes.”

LSU’s mistakes cost dearly in the second half. Kiel was picked off on the second play of the third quarter by James Britt at the Irish 22. Britt’s return gave the ball to LSU at the Irish nine, but Risher muffed a snap from center and overthrew a receiver on third down, forcing the Tigers to settle for a Mark Johnston field goal from 23 yards. The Irish led 20-3.

The Tiger defense quickly stopped the Irish on three plays and got the ball back for the offense at the LSU 30. On third and 10, Risher was intercepted by Toran for the second time at midfield.

Two runs by Carter netted 16 yards. Koegel hit Bell and fullback John Sweeney for first downs. From the LSU six-yard line, Koegel then rolled left and found another old high school buddy, senior Dave Condeni, on a diving catch in the back of the end zone for the touchdown that put the Tigers to rest. Oliver’s extra point made it 27-3.

For the rest of the afternoon, Faust used most of his bench, including three more quarterbacks, and ball-control football to wind down the clock. The Tigers got a meaningless touchdown on a 26-yard sweep by Eric Martin with 23 seconds to play to account for the final score.

“I feel a little bit more… relieved,” said Faust after the game. “It was a great thrill running out of the tunnel into Notre Dame Stadium. It’s the greatest feeling in the world.”

His dream had come true and any words about the game itself were hard to come by in the post-game interviews because of all the emotions that surrounded the spectacle of his first afternoon on the sidelines.

“I had a great time today,” Faust said. “I found out you can’t get away with some things in college you did in high school. I thought the defense played excellent. Kiel and Koegel both played very well. They executed beautifully considering the fact that they are playing under a new offensive system.”

Emotion ran high among the players as well.

“This one was like a Southern Cal game,” said Crable. “Coach Faust is a very excitable man. Everybody knows that. He’s so dynamic that the excitement rubs off on the whole team. He gets the players, the coaches and the fans excited, but the thing that helped us the most today was our preparation.”

Tony Hunter, another Faust donation from Moeller, saw things another way.

“I think I saw coach crying five times today,” said the junior wingback. “He is living a dream. As a sophomore at Moeller he told me how much he wanted to coach at Notre Dame someday. I’ll do anything for him. I have faith that whatever he wants me to do—run, catch—will be the best thing for the team.”

By the final whistle, the scoreboard told one story — a 27–9 Notre Dame victory — but the afternoon itself told a much bigger one.

It was a day when preparation met opportunity, when players fed off the energy of a coach living his lifelong dream, and when Notre Dame fans caught a glimpse of what football under Gerry Faust might look like. The execution wasn’t perfect, but the emotion was unmistakable. The Irish didn’t just win a season opener — they cleared the first hurdle of an era defined by belief, excitement, and possibility.

More than four decades later, that 1981 opener still resonates, not because it answered every question, but because it reminded everyone what makes Notre Dame special: tradition, trust, and the unshakable feeling that something meaningful is unfolding right in front of you.

Cheers & GO IRISH!