This Merits Call to Colors for the Irish
“OK, Hennessy, it’s OK to tootle the flute. Go ahead, McCarthy, thump the old bassoon, while I the pipes do play. Give MacNamara a drink and ask him does he know Galway Bay.
“It’s OK to wear green. It’s OK to be Irish this day.
“Things are just fine in Glocca Morra. Tell Danny Boy, the pipes, the pipes are playing, all right.
“Give us a chorus of Where the River Shannon Flows, piano player, get around the keyboard, we’ll have a chorus of Mother Machree, I’ll Take You Back, Kathleen, to where your heart has ever been. Get your shawl, Macushla, we’ll be after having a jig this night.
“Up Sligo! Up Clare! Up Roscommon! Let’s hear it for dear old Donegal.
“Was there ever a grander game? Could you write one for Hollywood that would sell out the Music Hall quicker?
“Is there a part here for the President? Would Paddy O’Brien win an Oscar?
“In the lilt of Irish laughter, can you hear the angels sing?
“Was there ever a happier ending--38-37 with the clock running out and the lads all running to the line of scrimmage in their gold helmets with the grace of God purring in their hearts?
“Break out the potcheen. Light a candle. Pass the stew. Put a bit of corned beef in the cabbage. Who cares if there’s overhauls in the chowder?
“Drink up and have another! Innkeeper, a bottle of your very best! God bless all here and the horse they rode in on.
“Oh, to sit beside a turf fire in a cabin and watch the sun go down on Galway Bay this day will do your heart good.
“Make a bouquet of those shamrocks. We’ll hae no hay fever this day. Get a John McCormack tune on the gramophone.
“Rockne must be smiling some place today. Gipp. The Four Horsemen.
“The luck of the Irish?! Bah! It was all bad this day. At the end of the rainbow was a pot of--well, it wasn’t gold.
“Imagine rolling up yards by the bushel and finding yourself down, 30-12, in the third period, thanks to a--get this!--60-yard field goal and an interception brought back 58 yards for a touchdown. Would you be tempted to put weed-killers on the shamrocks and stamp them for any leprechauns beneath? For this, you have to kiss the Blarney Stone? This kind of luck you can get kissing your dog.
“The lads never win these heart-in-the-mouth things. The heathens do.
“Come with me to the fall day in 1931. This is Rockne’s last team. The great coach is dead, but this is a team he has put together and it is undefeated and playing the team he knocked out of the national championship the year before, 27-0. Irish eyes are smiling this day, Irish hearts are happy and Irish players are leading, 14-0, going into the third quarter. Suddenly, it is 14-13 and Johnny Baker is booting through a winning field. The poor, benighted Irish lose the first game they have lost since 1928.
“Come with me to 1964. Notre Dame has a new coach and a new spirit and is undefeated and No. 1 in all the polls and is leading USC, 17-0, at the half. A desperate lunging catch in the last seconds by a flanker named Rod Sherman, and another season is in ruins.
“But 1974 makes these look like St. Patrick’s Day in a brewery by comparison. On this black day, the Irish are leading, 24-0, with a minute to play in the half when suddenly it begins to rain touchdowns--Trojan touchdowns. It is the most unbelievable day in Notre Dame history, maybe in football history. It is like the sack of Rome--55-24.
“The lads came here this year with no songs singing, no bells ringing, no polls glowing. It is not a team, it’s a hoodoo. It has played the toughest schedule in the country and has lost to two teams by 1 point, one game by 2 points and four games by 5 points, including one to the team that is to be ranked No.1 or No. 2 in the country before it’s over. This is no team to get next to in a thunderstorm. This is a team to get into the next lifeboat from them if you can.
“The coach is, for Notre Dame, quite a specimen. He looks like Woody Allen, talks like Gracie and he paces the sidelines like a caged cougar. He looks dyspeptic, neurasthenic, he wears bifocals and is so skinny that if he turns sideways he disappears. If he came to your doorstep, you would tell him you weren’t having any today, you already had a vacuum cleaner.
“These are no Four Horsemen, no George Gipps, no South Bend cyclones outlined against a blue-gray October (or November) sky. These are a bunch of guys who have been turning up deuces in their hole cards all season. They’re big but they’re slow, spirited but inexperienced.
“They push the Trojans all over the field every time they the ball, they roll up 490 yards and 28 first downs, but every time they look up the Trojans are taking one of their passes in the end zone or kicking a field goal from one area code to another. When they edge close, as they do, 23-12, in the third quarter, and are about to get the ball on a punt, an overeager player, the son of the coach, no less, runs into the kicker, a gaffe the Trojans quickly turn into a touchdown and a 30-12 lead with only 18 minutes left to play.
“It is our turn in the barrel again, lads, right? We pay for our sins again, yes?
“Come with me to the closing moments. The score is Trojans 37, Irish 35. There are eight seconds left to play. The ball needs to be moved to the center of the field for the victorious field goal, but if the runner hesitates, or is chased backward, we will know once again what Custer felt like. We need a quick pileup. We need an ace on the last card dealt.
“God has forgiven us. The runner manages to hit the ground, and they get the timeout called, the last one, with two seconds left. As the gun goes off, the ball sails through the uprights.
“Ah, let’s hear it for the lads! It is a great day for the Irish. It is, take that Johnny Baker! How do you like this, Anthony Davis and your six touchdowns! It is Erin Go Bragh and not Us-Again-Huh-Lord?
“All right, professor, a little traveling music, if you please. Chord, if you don’t know the notes. All together, now!
“ ‘Sure, the shamrocks were growing on Broadway!
“ ‘Every girl was an Irish colleen!
“ ‘Oh, ‘twas only an I-r-i-s-h-m-a-n’s dream!’ ”