I would dig a home and home, hopefully it will happen at some point. Looks like the flexibility doesn’t really happen until the early Teens. Ugh? 2015? I am getting old.

The two schools playing each other on a home & home basis would be great. ND could get to play in a new 102,000 seat stadium (BDS) while in T-town.

ND is to the North and the Catholic Church what UA is to the South and the Protestants.

I think Saban would definitely enjoy the challenge. We just need ND to get off the pot
of gold and fix that schedule.

Irish can’t make Tide fit in schedule
Saturday, July 14, 2007
IAN R. RAPOPORT
News staff writer

TUSCALOOSA - The chances of Alabama and Notre Dame facing off in a regular-season football game in the foreseeable future appear to be extremely slim.

“It’s not for lack of interest,” said John Heisler, Notre Dame’s senior associate athletics director who is in charge of scheduling. “I just don’t know where we’d put them.”

Two days after Alabama coach Nick Saban proclaimed his interest in upgrading his out-of-conference schedule by adding the Fighting Irish, Heisler told The Birmingham News that a new agreement with the Big East makes finding room for programs like Alabama nearly impossible.

Beginning in 2011, Notre Dame, an independent, has agreed to play three Big East teams per year, a request that was made when Miami and Virginia left the conference in limbo by jumping to the ACC.

“Those commitments will give us more home-and-home games than we know what to do with,” Heisler said. “It doesn’t have anything to do with (not wanting to play) Alabama.”

It was during a speech to the Rotary Club of Birmingham on Wednesday that Saban admitted to being “crazy” because he wants his teams to play one big-time intersectional game each season.

“I’d like to play Notre Dame,” Saban said. “We played them three times at Michigan State and beat them three times. That was a great national game, it creates fan interest and TV will always jump on those games.”

He also named Penn State, Georgia Tech, Oklahoma and North Carolina as teams he’d like to play. The Nittany Lions and the Yellow Jackets are already on future schedules.

The Irish won’t be.

According to Heisler, he intends to schedule seven home games per season, one off-site home game, and four road games. Already in place are long-standing matchups with Michigan, Michigan State and Purdue and some combination of Southern Cal, Stanford and Navy. Throw in the three Big East teams, and there is little flexibility.

He has scheduled SEC teams in the past, such as the Tide and Tennessee, and Georgia has asked to schedule a game. But he hasn’t talked recently with the Tide.

“Unless something changes, it would be pretty tough to do,” said Heisler, who added he wasn’t sure when the Big East agreement would end.

E-mail: irapoport@bhamnews.com

Wouldn’t a Bama/ND be great!? Alabama really wants it to happen - and actually had it scheduled a few years ago - but the ND athletic administration axed the deal. If you will remember, the Alabama AD - Mal Moore coached at ND under Faust - and it was Coach Frank Thomas, the Gipp’s Roommate and QB for Rockne that lead Bama to National Championships #4 and #5. There’s a lot of tradition and connections between the two programs, and I for one, would love to come to South Bend for a game - and I’d love for all the Domers to head to Tuscaloosa.

Ya’ll keep pleading the case up there - and let’s make this happen.

I am TIRED of the join a conference comment, tell me this: why the hell WOULD we? We’d have to be morons. Or Alabamans.

When I capitalize words like that can you tell I’m being sarcastic?