The 1988 Notre Dame versus Miami game is one of the most famous college football games of all time. The Catholics vs Convicts game pitched the supposedly good and honorable Notre Dame Fighting Irish against the supposedly bad and deplorable Miami Hurricanes. It was the classic good versus evil, or so it was said.
Hurricane rival Florida State opened the season ranked number one. They also made a video called the Seminole Rap, which portrayed them as super confident and maybe a little arrogant. Florida State’s first game came against the 8th ranked Miami Hurricanes and the Canes were big underdogs, even though they were the defending national champions. A very fired up Miami took on the visiting Seminoles and just crushed them, 31-0.
Michigan came into the 1988 season ranked 9th and promptly lost their opening game at 13th ranked Notre Dame, 17-19.
After humiliating rival Florida State, the very confident Hurricanes came into Ann Arbor, Michigan
as the top ranked team in the country. The host Michigan Wolverines, after their loss in South Bend, were now ranked 15th.
Maybe they were fired up, but the Wolverines came out ready to play on September 17th, 1988.
Miami quarterback Vinnie Testaverde won the Heisman Trophy in 1986, and he was the first player chosen in the 1987 NFL Draft. But, he never could lead the Canes to a national title. When he left for the NFL, Minnesota native Steve Walsh took over and led the Canes to the 1987 national championship.
Walsh was back and he was unbeaten as a starter, but there was a lot of other talent on this powerful Hurricane roster.
This team had a lot of confidence, which the world took as cockiness, and it all started with head coach Jimmy Johnson.
Not a hair ever out of place, Jimmy Johnson talked the talk. But, he also walked the walk, with his perfectly in place, even. Johnson is an interesting story, graduating from high school with singer Janis Joplin. After playing on the last Arkansas national championship team in 1964, Johnson got into coaching. His time in college football was too brief, but his 52-9 five year record at Miami speaks for itself. Most of those losses came in his first year, in 1984.
Jimmy Johnson was one of the nation’s premier coaches at the time.
On the other sideline, Bo Schembechler was as old school as they came. He was chiseled out of the same stone as coaches such as Bear Bryant, Woody Hayes, Darrell Royal and others of that generation. He liked to run the ball and play great defense, and they did it very well.
Bo posted a rather impressive 234-65-8 record at Miami of Ohio and Michigan with 15 conference titles. But, he never won a national title.
It was the new up and coming coach against the old school, and for the vast majority of the game it appeared as if the old school would prevail.
Hurricane quarterback Steve Walsh got all the newspaper clippings, but it was Wolverine unknown quarterback Michael Taylor that put on a show, at least for the first 3 1/2 quarters.
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Instead of Miami running away with it, the Michigan Wolverines took control of the game and scored 24 straight points to go up 30-14.
With just over 5 minutes remaining in the game, Miami’s number one ranking and their 13 game win streak was on the line.
16 points down with a little over 5 minutes left on the clock? No problem for the 1988 Miami Hurricanes.
Quarterback Steve Walsh gave his team a little talk and they went out on the field and Walsh
completed a short 7 yard touchdown pass to tight end Rob Chudzinski. Johnson elected to go for 2 and Walsh hit wide receiver Dale Dawkins to close the gap to 30-22.
Michigan coach Bo Schembechler thought he could run the clock out with super tailback Tony Boles and fullback Leroy Hoard, but the Miami defense stepped up and stopped them.
Miami got the ball back and after driving down the field with mixed plays, Walsh hit tailback Cleveland Gary for a 48 yard touchdown pass. If there was an unsung hero for the day it was Gary who had 3 touchdowns.
There was 2:58 left on the clock, and being down 30-28, Jimmy Johnson decided to go for 2 again and at least they could have a tie instead of a loss in worst case scenarios.
This time, they didn’t make it.
Down by 2 points, with a little under 3 minutes on the clock, Miami chose to kick the onside kick and miraculously it worked. Miami’s defensive back Bobby Harden recovered the onside kick at the Michigan 47.
Miami took their time and got in walk-on kicker Carlos Huerta’s field goal range. Huerta connected on a 29 yarder to give Miami the lead 30-31 with 43 seconds left.
Michigan would call it more of a curse than a miracle, but Miami held on to win.
Miami beat Wisconsin and then Missouri to stay unbeaten, thus setting up one of the most famous games of all times.
The Catholics vs. Convicts game ended with the same score, but Notre Dame came out on top in controversial game.
Just a break here, or there, against the Michigan Wolverines and the famous game between the two bitter enemies never would have happened.