In retrospect, it's not hard to see how Davie could've turned this into, say, a 3-4 team. The Purdue game was probably the worst N.D. has played this year, certainly it was at least close to its worst offensive showing, and when Purdue rallied to make it a 17-17 game, N.D. could've gone into the tank, but the Irish didn't, and Duff came up with one of the biggest plays of the year. The Michigan game was war and N.D. could've fallen apart after any one of its 4 turnovers, particularly the kickoff fumble that let Michigan back into the game and ultimately allowed them to take a 17-16 lead, but the Irish responded immediately with a huge T.D. drive. Up 14-3 on the road to M.S.U., Holiday got hurt and the newly inspired Spartans saw their chance and took the lead 17-14 on the back of some unbelievable individual plays by Rogers. But behind Dillingham's remarkably composed play, here was another huge moment: a 60-yard slant route touchdown to Battle and N.D. was in the winner's circle again.

Down 7-3 against Stanford at the half it could've been "here we go again", but the Irish came out with a feeding frenzy of four touchdowns (2 defensive and 2 offensive) and won going away. N.D. could've lost its footing against Pitt when the Panthers moved the ball, but held on to limit them to field goals and made the most of the Irish offensive opportunities. Turnovers could've been the melting point for Irish against Air Force, particularly the fumble to open the second half that allowed the Falcons to tie it at 14, but here came the Irish, again, with another answering T.D. drive.

The 1993 N.D. team was composed in the Florida St. game. The F.S.U. fans, players and media were openly dismissive of the Irish. The only thing that could stop the Seminoles was weather, they said, and when a mild day arrived in South Bend, the F.S.U. fans seemed sure that destiny was theirs. The game was certain to be a physical mismatch said the Seminoles. They were right about that, but it was the Irish who dominated. Most concluded that the N.D. running backs, particularly Becton, were too slow to do any damage against the vaunted Seminole defense, but they soon learned that beating Becton and his mates in a footrace was not exactly the same thing as tackling them. Down 7-0, the Irish answered with probably the best 30 or so minutes of football played under Holtz. The Irish took the lead 24-7, but F.S.U. found its footing and closed the gap to 24-17. The Irish answered -- as the 2002 team has done so often -- with a gut check drive into the wind to give the Irish the touchdown they needed to ultimately win the game 31-24.

The two Florida St. games after that proved not to be mismatches physically as Holtz's weakest team ever at N.D. (1994) tied the game late but lost by a touchdown. The 1995 team led by two scores late, but lost its composure and let the Seminoles snatch the prize.

It's said that football games are won and lost between the hashmarks, but the N.D.-F.S.U. games have been won and lost between the ears. As Holtz started to lose his focus in those last three years, N.D. lost its composure and it never really ever had it under Davie.

But this year, this N.D. team has its composure back, and in a big way. Oddly enough, it has been the opposite problem for F.S.U. Apparently in control of the Iowa St. game, the Seminoles made unforced errors and were suddenly unable to tackle and only a very close call that marked Wallace out at the one saved them from a trip to overtime. Their one trip to overtime was among the most quickly resolved in the history of college football, as Louisville intercepted Rix's first pass in OT and then ran 25 yard for a touchdown on its first offensive play. A Clemson team unable to score on N.C. State except for a fluky kickoff return scored 31 against F.S.U. and hung around all night. Apparently on the way to an upset over struggling and mistake-prone Miami, more defensive lapses by F.S.U. let the Hurricanes snatch the lead 28-27 and then a disorganized effort at getting the F.S.U. kicking team onto the field led to a missed field goal at the end.

Do the Irish have the composure to fend off the Seminoles? Yes they do, and they will.