So starting off this series with Dan Devine’s National Championship 3rd season probably set a pretty unreasonable standard. But the next head coach up brings us back to Earth.
Gerry Faust’s third season as the leader of the Notre Dame football program kicked off in 1983. At this stage, he was 60% through his five-year head coach tenure in South Bend. That team ended the season with seven wins and five losses (0.58). I don’t think I’d get much pushback for saying that was a disappointment, regardless of where it occurred in an Irish head coach’s tenure.