The year was 2012, and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team was, pretty surprisingly, 5-0.
The Irish had been unranked to begin coach Brian Kelly’s 3rd season, coming off back-to-back 8-5 campaigns that featured a lot of rough, questionable moments. But now, in the 125th season of Notre Dame football, Kelly had the Irish looking much more formidable than they had in a long time.
The team destroyed the Navy Midshipmen in Ireland to start the season, and narrowly avoided a loss in the home opener against Purdue. With Manti Te’o battling both real and eventually-fake personal losses, ND rallied around him to shock a then-10th-ranked Michigan State Spartans team on the road, and subsequently took down the Michigan Wolverines at home the next weekend.