Recollections of the 1968 Season

From Bob "Rabbit" Noonan:

The thing I remember about that game (I think it was at Denison) was later that night afer a few libations... Bob Morin, myself, and I think Dan Brouder, were accosted by a Denison campus cop for being a little loud and Morin pulled the officer's clip on tie off of his collar. Not sure how we didn't get arrested, but it was the only positive thing of the weekend. As you may remember, Denison killed us every time we played them. Oh yeah, I also remember Bob Trost watching George of the Jungle cartoons in the Denison dorm the morning before the game. I'm sure the current Irish squad is better behaved. :> Bob Noonan

From Bob Morin:

I remember many of the road trips-
the 9 hour ride to Ohio U, arriving (not sober with Pete Metzger) about 3-4 in the morning before a huge win.
In 68 we played Chicago LC on a Saturday followed by Michigan State on the following Sunday. The Chicago Club had a party someware on Michigan Ave next to the Playboy Mansion. Needless to say most of our team spent the night in Chicago partying and then drove to MSU the next morning. A few guys (can't remember names-maybe a goalie and Ken Lund) arrived at MSU with after pulling an all nighter. needless to say we ran out of gas in the second half. Who was the asshole who scheduled that game? 1968, after the Denison game I sent Saterino out to buy some beers. 10 cases of beer in a dry town, on a dry campus, on the second floor of the PE building with 5 showers on hot and 1 on refrigerate. Guess what happened. I remember getting dates for about 15 of the team and going to a Denison sponsored lax party and winning big time. Didn't see most of the team until the next morning.

From Fred Morrison:

During the 1968 season I was fully occupied with trying to learn the game of lacrosse. Fortunately there were players on the team with pre Notre Dame lacrosse experience who had a good grasp of fundamentals and position skills and were willing to teach and drill those who needed the work. Our team captain Bob Morin and our club president Duncan MacIntosh did a great job of keeping the team in shape (on and off the field). Most players had significant experience playing football or another contact sport in high school and in the case of our team captain with the Notre Dame Football team. As a result of our conditioning and past contact sport experience, the 68 laxers certainly out hit and out hustled most opponents. However, when it came to applying the lacrosse skills many of us were trying to pick, we sometimes fell short. In games the ball often seemed to spend more time on the ground then it did in the air and in players sticks. It was often said that this was because our opponents were afraid to pick the ball up and we couldn't pick the ball up. One phase of the game where this style of play was particularly troubling was the face off. Marty Stoehr was one of our better face off middies. Marty, who hailed from Florida, had good athletic ability and strength and a lot of heart. Near the end of the season we were traveling to Cleveland to play the Cleveland Lacrosse Club. Marty was excited on the trip because he had picked up a book on how to win face offs. As he read through the book Marty would share tricks and techniques he was going to use in the game with his fellow passengers. One of the other players was looking over the Cleveland rooster and happened to ask Marty who wrote the book he was reading. Marty said Joe Horn. That's funny, came the reply, Cleveland has a midfielder named Joe Horn. Marty looked at the author's bio, found out that Joe Horn lived in Ohio, and promptly chucked the book out the window. We lost to Cleveland and Joe Horn demonstrated that he could execute all the moves in his book.