Hotlz was the savior - I nearly jumped out of my car when I heard on WCCO that he had been hired by Paul Giel. Holtz had been at several schools and was a big success at Arkansas, where he went 61-20, six bowls, and a big upset of Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl that got a lot of national publicity. Unfortunately, he didn't get along well with the AD, Frank Broyles (previously a coach there), so they parted company. Arriving at Minnesota, he got national publicity, with articles in Sports Illustrated and other national magazines. He was Mr. Excitement, immediately reviving interest in the program, which had gone 1-10 the year before. there was so much hype by and about Holtz that the Spring game in the Dome drew 40,000. He went 4-7 his first year (1984), but two of the wins were over Wisconsin and Iowa, which made fans happy. He was 7-38 at Lincoln (Nebraska then #1 in nation), but the year before Nebraska beat down the Gophers 84-13 in the Dome. Most fans were happy with the season and looking ahead. In '85, the Gophers nearly beat #3 Oklahoma on national TV in their third game. Rickey Foggie and the Gophers had the ball in the red zone with minutes left, but couldn't score, and we lost 7-13. By comparison, Texas lost to Oklahoma 7-14. The Sooners went 11-1 that year and beat Penn State in the Orange Bowl. The Gophers opened 5-1, then lost to #9 Ohio State, 19-23 (they were ranked #20 themselves). But about that time, Notre Dame was collapsing (it had hired a high school coach, who was in his second year, and failing badly) and rumors began to swirl that Holtz was in line for the job. The Gophers went 1-3 after that as Foggie missed a game with injuries and it became obvious that Holtz was leaving. He didn't stick around for the bowl game, in which the DC, John Gutekunst, coached the Gophers to a win over Clemson (which had been national champs a few years earlier). In his third year at Notre Dame, Holtz won a national title, with a QB, Tony Rice, he had recruited to Minnesota. The enormous emotional hype of Holtz's arrival was matched by the collapse of the enthusiasm balloon when he left. Fans wanted a big name coach and Giel went after Maryland's Bobby Ross, who was a .66 winner there but wanted better facilities. Ross was interested, as he liked the Dome, but his campus visit was marred by an anti-Giel movement to retain Gutekunst ('the players' choice"), organized by a UM athletic bureaucrat (forget his name) and Ross felt unwanted. He went to Georgia Tech, where he won a national championship a few year later. Gutey was dull compared to Holtz, went 29-36 over seven seasons and was fired. Had he been fired two years earlier, we would have had a real shot at Barry Alvarez, who was DC with Holtz at Notre Dame and had been told he could "win big" at Minnesota. Instead we got Jim Wacker, who went 16-39 over five years. Many claimed later that when Giel hired Holtz there was a contract stipulation that he could leave only for Notre Dame, which Holtz later denied. So the entire saga, from Holtz arriving to Wacker departing, was a kind of era that was mostly bad - and many still resent Holtz and regard him as a traitor and an opportunist.
