Stonebreaker and Brooks come to mind.

And in 1990, the Rocket missed all of the Stanford game and 1/2 the PSU game (both losses). Actually - if ND had won just the PSU game they would have played for the national title.

The only drawback to 1990 was Darnell (who crashed and burned somewhere before the Florida Sugar Bowl the next year).

As an aside - put those suspended guys are the 1989 team and they might have won in Miami. But wow, suspend those guys and still go 12-1 against that 1989 schedule - what an amazing amount of talent on those teams.

got a little too conservative on offense in the second half.

Our defense gave up a ton of yards against Stanford in that game. We still should have won.

The only time since 1990 PSU that we hosted a game while #1 is 1993 BC. Unfortunately, I was at both of those games. Both games ended with a game-winning FG by the other team.

right before halftime & sat out the 2nd half. Earlier in the season they were up 24-7 against Stanford. Two muffed punts gave the Cardinal great field position. They capitalized on both I think. Derek Brown had that pass in his hands which would have won the game.

If Brown somehow caught that ball - would we have beaten Miami?

Notre Dame was getting lucky in pulling out victories - the Michigan State game ("immaculate deflection") was a case in point - but even the Michigan game (ND was down 24-14 and Michigan was driving - then Grbac got picked off in the end zone, another ND 40 yard play was on a lucky deflection).

And again - the Stanford loss didn't matter - we were back to #1 - just win out (PSU, USC, bowl game) and we will 1990 NC.

And lastly - we had 3 losses that year and finished #6 in both polls. How many losses did we have this year and finished where?

IIRC, Lou drew up the play in the grass on sideline during the timeout.