Gerry Faust, former Notre Dame football coach, dies at 89

SOUTH BEND — Gerry Faust, Notre Dame football coach for five seasons in the early 1980s, died Monday.

He was 89.

“It is with tremendous sorrow that we announce the passing of Gerry Faust,” his family said in a statement, “loving husband, father, grandfather and coach who dedicated his life to his family, his faith and the teams and players he coached.”

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Bracketed by national championship coaches in Dan Devine and Lou Holtz, the Faust era at Notre Dame (1981-85) was marked by disappointment and a steep learning curve. Hired at age 45 after a highly successful run at Cincinnati’s Archbishop Moeller High School, Faust went 30-26-1 (.535) during his Irish tenure.

His first and final teams went 5-6, the first losing seasons for Notre Dame since 1963, but in between the Irish managed winning records and a pair of lesser bowl trips. They scored a 19-18 upset of 13th-ranked Boston College and future Heisman Trophy winner Doug Flutie in the 1983 Liberty Bowl but lost the following year to 10th-ranked Southern Methodist (27-20) in the Aloha Bowl.

Notre Dame entered all five of Faust’s seasons in the preseason Associated Press rankings, including three Top 10 designations, but ended each year outside the rankings.

Faust and Bob Davie (1999 and 2001) are the only Notre Dame football coaches to preside over multiple losing seasons.

“What I say about Coach Faust is you won’t find a guy who loved a school more, wanted to win more,” former running back Allen Pinkett told the South Bend Tribune in June of 2023. “He just didn’t know how to do it, and it was kind of unfair to him to bring him straight from high school. The thing was, we had so much talent, but…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/gerry-faust-former-notre-dame-034545942.html

Author : South Bend Tribune

Publish date : 2024-11-12 03:45:45

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