Notre Dame Rallies Past Stanford

Notre Dame needed every last yard and every defensive stop to become eligible for its first bowl championship series berth in five years.

Darius Walker ran six yards for the winning touchdown with 55 seconds remaining and took a direct snap in for the two-point conversion for the sixth-ranked Fighting Irish, who became all but assured of playing in one of the four marquee bowl games with a 38-31 victory over Stanford on Saturday night.

Brady Quinn passed for 432 yards and three touchdowns but two of his passes were intercepted, and Notre Dame survived a wild final few minutes for its fifth consecutive victory since a 34-31 loss to No. 1 USC on Oct. 15. Walker ran for 186 yards in 37 carries.

The Irish (9-2) won seven of their final eight games under first-year Coach Charlie Weis, who made a key decision to switch kickers in the fourth quarter, then gave his team a major scare when he switched back to starter D.J. Fitzpatrick.

Fitzpatrick missed a 29-yard field goal wide left with 2:15 to play after his earlier extra-point attempt missed off the left upright and his 42-yard field-goal attempt on Notre Dame’s next possession went wide left.

The Cardinal (5-6), which will miss a bowl game in Coach Walt Harris’ first year, went ahead, 31-30, with 1:46 left after backup quarterback T.C. Ostrander’s four-yard touchdown pass to Matt Traverso.

Ostrander set up the score with a 76-yard completion to Mark Bradford.

Jeff Samardzija caught two touchdown passes to increase his school-record season mark to 15 and finished with nine catches for a career-high 216 yards. Maurice Stovall had seven catches for 136 yards and a touchdown.