Current:Home > Contact-usGerry Faust, the former head football coach at Notre Dame, has died at 89-DB Wealth Institute B2 Expert Reviews
Gerry Faust, the former head football coach at Notre Dame, has died at 89
View Date:2024-12-23 11:14:18
The AP Top 25 college football poll is back every week throughout the season!
Get the poll delivered straight to your inbox with AP Top 25 Poll Alerts. Sign up here.
AKRON, Ohio (AP) — Gerry Faust, the gravel-voiced Cincinnati high school coach who lived a dream by becoming the coach at Notre Dame, has died. He was 89.
Notre Dame said in an email to The Associated Press on Tuesday that the family confirmed Faust’s death. No details were immediately provided.
Faust guided the Fighting Irish from 1981 through 1985, compiling a record of 30-26-1. He succeeded Dan Devine as coach of Notre Dame and preceded Lou Holtz.
“I have always loved Notre Dame and still do,” he said after he was fired following the 1985 season.
He spent the next nine seasons as the head coach at the University of Akron, bringing the program from Division II to major-college status. His record was 43-53-3 with the Zips.
He remained at Akron after his coaching days, working as a fundraiser and in the development office before retiring in 2001.
It was as a high school coach that Faust first stepped into the spotlight.
After graduating in 1958 from the University of Dayton with a degree in marketing and management, Faust accepted his first coaching position as an assistant at his high school alma mater, Dayton Chaminade. His father, Gerry Sr., had coached at Chaminade for 49 years.
Two seasons later, Faust accepted an offer to build a football program at a new high school, Archbishop Moeller, in suburban Cincinnati.
He spent three years constructing the foundation of what would become a legendary program in high school athletics.
In 1963, Moeller’s first varsity team surprised many with a 9-1 record.
In the next 17 years, Faust’s Moeller teams posted nine undefeated seasons, won 10 city championships, eight regional titles and five big-school state championships.
Four times Faust teams were awarded mythical national championships, each following unbeaten and untied seasons in 1976, ’77, ’79 and ’80.
The 1980 team completed a 13-0 season and capped Faust’s high school coaching record at a remarkable 174-17-2, a success rate of nearly 91%.
There was a public outcry when Faust was selected to take over at Notre Dame in the spring of 1981. The school’s administrators were admonished for elevating a high school coach to the most revered position in college coaching.
Faust’s first team in South Bend went 5-6 and he followed that with marks of 6-4, 7-5, 7-5 and 5-6.
His first Akron team in 1986 went 7-4, but his teams — playing a difficult Division I-AA schedule and, eventually, some of the top teams in I-A — never reached that level again.
___
Rusty Miller, a longtime Associated Press journalist, was the principal writer of this obituary.
___
Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football
veryGood! (3)
Related
- Hurricane-damaged Tropicana Field can be fixed for about $55M in time for 2026 season, per report
- Rafael Nadal beats Márton Fucsovics, to face Novak Djokovic next at Olympics
- Evy Leibfarth 'confident' for other Paris Olympics events after mistakes in kayak slalom
- Danielle Collins is retiring from tennis after this year, but she's soaking up Olympics
- Shaun White Reveals How He and Fiancée Nina Dobrev Overcome Struggles in Their Relationship
- Watch this driver uncover the source of a mysterious noise under her car hood
- This Weekend Only! Shop Anthropologie’s Extra 40% off Sale & Score Cute Dresses & Tops Starting at $17
- 3 dead, 2 critically injured after 25-foot pontoon boat capsizes on Lake Powell in northern Arizona
- COINIXIAI Introduce
- Team USA's Haley Batten takes silver medal in women's mountain biking at Paris Olympics
Ranking
- 'The Penguin' spoilers! Colin Farrell spills on that 'dark' finale episode
- Body found in Phoenix warehouse 3 days after a storm partially collapsed the roof
- Equestrian scandal leaves niche sport flat-footed in addressing it at Olympics
- Video shows flaming object streaking across sky in Mexico, could be remnants of rocket
- Messi breaks silence on Inter Miami's playoff exit. What's next for his time in the US?
- USA vs. New Zealand live updates: Score, time, TV for Olympic soccer games today
- Céline Dion's dazzling Olympics performance renders Kelly Clarkson speechless
- After years of fighting Iowa’s strict abortion law, clinics also prepared to follow it
Recommendation
-
Will Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul end in KO? Boxers handle question differently
-
Why are more adults not having children? New study may have an explanation.
-
Peyton Manning, Kelly Clarkson should have been benched as opening ceremony co-hosts
-
Packers QB Jordan Love ties record for NFL's highest-paid player with massive contract
-
Beyoncé has released lots of new products. Here's a Beyhive gift guide for the holidays
-
Honda’s Motocompacto all-electric bike is the ultimate affordable pit scooter
-
Senate candidate Bernie Moreno campaigns as an outsider. His wealthy family is politically connected
-
Allegations left US fencers pitted against each other weeks before the Olympics