Arizona State University is not the University of Notre Dame.
In a “state the obvious” contest, that statement probably ranks up there with “LeBron James didn’t handle ‘The Decision’ well” and “Lindsay Lohan has a drug problem.”
Yet, just like Lohan, we’re having trouble accepting the truth.
This past weekend, a group of ASU student leaders and faculty visited Notre Dame to learn about tradition and how to improve school spirit — a trip culminating with watching the Fighting Irish play at Notre Dame Stadium. Questions concerning whether or not the trip was a responsible use of money aside, what were they really hoping to learn from the most storied football program in all the land?
Tradition — especially of the college football variety — can’t be learned. It’s something that develops over years and decades, with close calls, great plays and excellence. It’s something ASU, as the New American University, shouldn’t be attempting to learn from someone else.
Instead of looking at what other schools do to bolster and maintain school spirit, we need to be separating ourselves from other universities and make the experience of being a Sun Devil an entirely unique and worthwhile one for all 70,000-plus of our students.
And as far as football goes, we can’t put the cart before the horse. To have great tradition, we need to have a great program and establish a precedent for winning first.
Notre Dame is Notre Dame for a reason. Its football team has 11 national championships and seven Heisman trophy winners to its name. It holds ownership over legendary names like “Rockne,” “Parseghian” and “the Four Horsemen.”
Notre Dame essentially invented the forward pass in 1913.
The Fighting Irish had Daniel “Rudy” Ruettiger, the little guy who inspired a classic movie about fulfilling your dreams and never giving up.
We had Rudy Carpenter.
Notre Dame’s best quarterback was Joe Montana. Our best quarterback is a guy whose nickname in the NFL was “The Mistake.”
Okay, so the ways we don’t compare are endless. (We both were honored by commencement addresses from President Barack Obama during his first year in office, however.)
The point is, even though Notre Dame has fallen on tough times as of late, it has such a revered history and tradition that its football team could go without victory and still sell out every game. Because it’s Notre Dame.
Let’s face reality. We Sun Devils tend to lack tradition and loyalty to our football program. We tend to be fair-weather fans that leave at halftime even when our team is winning, but, hey, it’s hot in that claustrophobic student section, right?
ASU is set to play Notre Dame in October of 2013 — just three years from now. The neutral-field game is slated to be in Texas at the Dallas Cowboys’ new $1 billion stadium. If this sounds like an appealing match-up to you, you’re not alone. Pitting the most storied program in college football against the largest university in the country in the most luxurious of stadiums in all the land is a recipe that probably has Lee Corso already salivating.
But let’s not pretend the contest will be anything more than what it is: the most storied program in football going up against a school still struggling to forge its own tradition.
We’re not Notre Dame, but we shouldn’t want to be. We’re Arizona State University, and we need to forge our own tradition.
Oh, how do we do that? Hint: Erecting a “Touchdown Sparky” in the vein of “Touchdown Jesus” isn’t going to do the trick.
But a winning season would be a good start.
Dustin admits he is a big Irish fan but hopes to see ASU become an elite program someday, too. Discuss tradition with him at dustin.volz@asu.edu
