This story appeared in the 2018 College Football Playoff Semifinal at the 83rd Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic Official Game Program

Somewhere between the Notre Dame mystique and the complacency of a football team with an overwhelming lead was the reality of one of the best Cotton Bowl games ever played.
 
Add in some of the most brutal weather conditions Dallas citizens have seen, along with a 23-point, fourth-quarter comeback by the Irish and Notre Dame's 35-34 last-second victory over Houston in the 1979 Cotton Bowl begs to be remembered 40 years later.
 
It had all the dramatic elements: The high temperature was 24 degrees. The 30-mile-per-hour north wind made for a 6-below wind chill. Ice blanketed the already-hard artificial playing surface. Sixty-two of the 69 points were scored in the south end zone.

"There was ice everywhere on the field," Houston quarterback Danny Davis said. "One of our assistant coaches, Don Todd, had us rub our cleats with Clorox Bleach because it was supposed to cut through the ice. I said, 'Whatever…' and did it."
 
• Notre Dame was back for an encore after having won the national title by clobbering Texas, 38-10, in the '78 Cotton Bowl. 

•  Youth was served for Notre Dame. Freshman linebacker Bob Crable had a key fumble recovery. A blocked punt by a freshman (Tony Belden) was returned for a touchdown by a freshman (Steve Cichy). Later, a fourth-down stop by a freshman defensive tackle (Joe Gramke) set the stage for the final heroics.  

• Irish quarterback Joe Montana battled illness and a core body temperature that dipped to 96 degrees. A halftime dose of chicken soup by the team's medical staff got him back on his cleats in time to make the comeback happen.

"I was shaking so hard I just was hoping to get warm enough to stop shaking," Montana said. "I had a choice of beef bouillon, chicken bouillon or coffee. I chose the chicken."

ONE PLAY
The comeback came down to one final play.
 
Two seconds left on the clock. Notre Dame had the ball on the Houston 8-yard line, trailing by six. On the previous play, Montana had receiver Kris Haines open on a quick-out in the end zone, but the pass went wide. Why not try it again?
 
"We worked that play a lot   — the 2-point conversion (to cut Houston's lead to 34-28), a couple other times, and twice at the end," Haines said. "(Houston) had a funny coverage. Their linebacker, David Hodge, would walk out with me. Their defensive back was way back in the back of the end zone. It didn't make sense.
 
"That was just an easy pitch-and-catch play. Joe got flushed from the pocket, he threw it low and outside. I slipped the previous time and didn't get it. We ran the same play."
 
"We were repeating the same play that was called before," Montana said. "It was a simple quick-out that I missed the prior play. They were giving the wideouts so much room – even on the goal line – that I signaled to run the same play and the coaches agreed."
 
The touchdown, and Joe Unis' extra point (that had to be kicked twice because of a penalty), culminated an unlikely but legendary recovery. Without a national title in the balance, the game earned a special place in college football history on its own merit.
 
"To me personally, (the '79 game) meant more than the year before," Haines said. "The year before was about the team – we won a national championship. In '79, we overcame so much adversity and hardship: The score, the weather, everything … And found a way to win.
 
"It's really hard to compare. We showed we could persevere. It was just incredible."

IS MYSTIQUE REAL?
In the days leading up to the game, Notre Dame All-America center Dave Huffman (who died 20 years ago) talked to a Sports Illustrated writer about the mystique that follows the program.
 
"It's there even when you don't want to believe it," Huffman said. "There comes a day when skeptics turn around and, bang!, there it is. Right in front of them. And they know it."
 
Most players are pragmatic when it comes to allowing a mystique to enter into an explanation. That's fan stuff, right? Had to be hard for the Cougars to shrug off the sudden reversal, though.
 
John Scully, Huffman's backup in that game, understood the concept. The former seven-year starter with the Atlanta Falcons used his Notre Dame experiences and musical expertise to write a song "Here Come the Irish" that now is an anthem played liberally at ND athletic events.
 
"That team we had (in 1979) is part of a blend of what I learned," Scully said. "It was an amalgamation of my experiences. The song was more about the people I came to know during my time there.
 
"I could understand Dave Huffman having that sort of perspective. He might have been the most unique teammate I've ever had. He cared about what he wanted to care about. He was a very loyal person. He was very outspoken."
 
Davis, 40 years later, still won't buy into the idea of Notre Dame being other-worldly.

One reason? That's his department now. For the last 25 years, the guy who grew up 15 blocks from Cotton Bowl Stadium – yearning to play there one day ("I'd sit in my elementary school music class and see the stadium out the window. That got me to dreaming," Davis said.) – has been the pastor at Jordan Grove Missionary Church in Houston.
 
"It's a game of desire," Davis said. "You jump ahead (34-12) and get to the fourth quarter – you don't think a team is going to come back.
 
"We felt comfortable and confident. We thought the game was over. 
 
"The starters asked that the young guys get in in the fourth quarter, so they could feel what a bowl game was like. When (Notre Dame) scored (its) second touchdown of the (fourth) quarter, we went back in.
 
"We were too cold to really get back in the flow of the game."
 
ND WARMING UP
And Montana was just getting warmed up. With 7:25 left to play, the Irish scored on the blocked punt and Montana, just back into the game, hit Vagas Ferguson with a 2-point conversion pass.
 
"When Notre Dame blocked that punt, I just looked over at (fellow reporter) Joe Doyle and rolled my eyes," said John Fineran, who covered the game for the South Bend (Ind.) Tribune. "Something was happening…"
 
"(Getting back into the flow of the game was) no different than any other return to the field after halftime," Montana said, "except it was freezing."
 
Montana hit a couple big-time passes – a 30-yarder to Jerome Heavens and a 21-yarder to Haines – on the next two scoring drives. The Irish overcame a Montana fumble with a solid defensive stop climaxed by Gramke.
 
"That turned out to be my last competitive game (an NFL career never panned out)," said Heavens. "I've talked about how great a game it was; great comeback. But I've never talked about what I did (16 carries, 71 yards; 4 receptions, 60 yards).
 
"Late in the game, (as ND was driving for its fourth touchdown) I caught a (30-yard) pass along the sideline. I dropped that exact same pass (in the regular-season finale) against Southern Cal, when we lost (27-25) on a last-second field goal.
 
"I wonder what would have happened if I wouldn't have caught that one. I didn't want to see us seniors lose our last game at Notre Dame."
 
SECOND-GUESSING
Second-guessing is one of the great things about college football. So much strategy. So many critical decisions. What if …?
 
Houston coach Bill Yeoman had a biggie. Fourth-and-one on his own 29 with about 30 seconds to play. Cougars led, 34-28. Stiff wind blowing in punter Jay Wyatt's face. Remember, one was blocked already.
 
Go for it. Enter Gramke. No gain.
 
"I say that's my fault," said Davis, who was the master of Houston's veer. "I should have given the ball to Randy Love rather than Emmett King. Emmett ran straight up. Randy was lower. It was a 7-dive (play to King) or a 3-dive (to Love). No option was involved.
"Notre Dame stepped up and made a play when it had to."

"We were trained to be in the right place at the right time," said Irish defensive lineman Bob Golic.

Golic earned Cotton Bowl stardom in '78 when he contained Texas bruiser Earl Campbell, holding him to 116 yards on 29 carries to earn the game's outstanding defensive player honor. He was restricted with a gimpy knee in '79.

"We used the 'mirror defense' against the veer," Golic said. "It proved its worth against Texas."
 
"At that time and now, I think (going for the first down rather than punting) made sense to me," Fineran said. "It didn't surprise me. The Houston veer was very good. That wind was a factor."
 
"After we stopped them on fourth-and-one (on the Houston 29-yard line with 35 seconds left) we rushed out onto the field," Haines said. "Houston's defense wasn't ready. They were disoriented. Nobody was on me.
 
"I looked over to Joe, and he knew what I meant. We got set and he got the ball out to me as fast as he could. That got us down to the 8. It was a broken play, but it was just a gimme."
 
That set up the game-winner.
 
"I was a four-year starter, but I never took anything for granted," Heavens said. "We got to the point where we were always expecting things to fall our way. We had great days and we had bad days, but we always seemed to show our character.
 
"It would have been easy to say, 'To heck with it. See ya back in South Bend.' But that wasn't us. We weren't giving up."

FINDING PERSPECTIVE
A game like this means so much to so many.
 
Davis still bristles – jokingly, for the most part – at the mention of Joe Montana.
Heavens looks at his elbows. Haines peeks at his trophy case. Scully just laughs.
 
"We thought we were prepared for everything," Heavens said. "God sent some elements down from South Bend with us. The game was almost postponed. All hell broke loose.
 
"I look at my elbows now, 40 years later. I still see the scars from that game. The Astroturf was hard. Then, they sprinkled salt on the Astroturf (to melt the ice). You get tackled and you get a cut – then the salt gets in the cut. It hurt."
 
"I remember, we just brought our mesh gear," Scully said with a chuckle. "We were going south, right? We had to send someone out to a store to buy gloves right away. That's the coldest I've ever been in my life.
 
"I bent down to stretch during the game and felt my hamstrings tingle when I started."
"Late in the game, I was on the sidelines and (Cotton Bowl officials) were getting ready to name me Most Valuable Player," Davis said. "Then, all of a sudden, it was 'Wait a minute.' That really got to me."
 
The honor went to Montana instead.
 
"People still talk about that game," said Davis. "It's a historic game. (Davis and his teammates) don't, but everyone else still has something to say about it. We still like to talk about beating Texas, (Texas) A&M and Arkansas.
 
"After we won the (Southwest) Conference, we made a list of teams we wanted to play. Oklahoma was on the top of the list. They ran the wishbone. We ran the veer. We wanted to prove our option was better.
 
"Nobody paid any attention to Notre Dame."
 
The last-second heroics allowed Haines (4 receptions, 31 yards, 2-point conversion and game-winning TD) to be selected to the Cotton Bowl Hall of Fame. Montana and Golic also are enshrined.

"I didn't find out 'til later that only quarterbacks got chicken soup," Golic said laughing. "I was hurt in the second half (against Houston). Standing there on the sidelines, I could have used something."
 
"Forty years can put things in perspective," Haines said. "It was my last college game; my last college play. I was just fortunate to make a lucky catch.
 
"Getting into the (Cotton Bowl) Hall of Fame is all about Joe. He's the one who got me there.
 
"It's funny to look down the list of guys in that Hall. Those were all guys I looked up to growing up. They're All-Americans, guys who were legends. Then they get to me: 'Hey, who's this guy?'"
 
The Cougars know. As do Irish fans.
 
He's part of the mystique.