The "4 for 40" Quandary
I’m not sure who started “4 for 40” at Notre Dame or if it even originated there, but for a very long time now it has been used as a recruiting tool for the football program. The thinking is that a degree from Notre Dame can set a student-athlete up for life and that is tough to compete against for most schools (if a recruit puts a great value on their education).
It’s not the only school that offers a great education and a chance to play big time football, though. That might have been the case previously, but recently things have changed with some Power 5 programs who have an academic reputation that is a comparable to Notre Dame.
Stanford, Northwestern, Duke, and Vanderbilt were anywhere from putrid to mediocre on the football field for years. Academics were always used as an excuse for their lack of success as they spent time in the basement of their respective conferences.
It turns out all they needed was to hire the right coach.
Northwestern had a short taste of success under Gary Barnett when they went to the Rose Bowl after the 1995 season. That year they won 10 games and the only other time the program did so before then was back in 1903. But things have been trending up recently under Barnett’s former star player Pat Fitzgerald.
They’ve won 10 games three times since 2012. No one would call them a legitimate threat to win the Big Ten every year, but they’ve been to a bowl game in eight of the last ten seasons under Fitzgerald.
Duke was the laughing stock of the ACC for decades. Before David Cutcliffe arrived, they went winless in three of the previous ten seasons. Not just winless in the conference. They couldn’t beat anybody.
Cutcliffe built the program from the ground up and they have played in a bowl in five of the last six years. They hadn’t been to a bowl game since 1994 until Cutcliffe arrived.
Vanderbilt was the doormat of the SEC in football. They found success in other sports, but they couldn’t claim any success on the gridiron. Then James Franklin came in and energized the program.
He won 9 games two years in a row before leaving for Penn State, but he made a bowl game in all three of his seasons. They have taken a step back under Derek Mason, but still managed to make at least one bowl game in the past four seasons. He might as well be Nick Saban at Alabama compared to what was there before Franklin. They managed only two wins in a season seven out of thirteen years prior to that.
It’s not necessary to go into all of Stanford’s success since Jim Harbaugh and David Shaw resurrected the program. Notre Dame fans are very much aware of what they've done. But to put it into perspective, they’ve won 10 games or more six times between the two coaches. Other than Bill Walsh winning 10 in 1992, they hadn’t had won 10 games in a season since 1940.
If a prospect was looking at these schools ten years ago, then their perception would be much different than it is now. Sure, they would have a valuable educational opportunity if they chose those schools, but winning football games would not be something they would expect to experience often.
Their recruiting reflected that. From 2006-2012, Northwestern signed zero 4 recruits. They’ve signed six since then. From 2005-2014, Duke signed three 4-star recruits. They’ve signed seven in the last four cycles. From 2002-2010, Vanderbilt signed two 4-stars. They’ve signed fourteen since 2011. Stanford signed 7.3 4 or 5-star prospects per year since 2009. The five cycles before that they signed nine total.
Winning has had an obvious effect on their recruiting success when it comes to signing blue-chip prospects. Those programs no longer being near the bottom of the Power 5 pile has hurt Notre Dame’s recruiting as well even though Notre Dame is still recruiting at a fairly high level.
Stanford has won several recruiting battles for top prospects against the Irish in recent years. (It’s too long of a list to go through) Those other programs have taken away some players the Irish either offered or would have offered at some point as well. It’s not like every single blue-chip recruit that chose those schools would have gone to Notre Dame instead, but they now at least have more options on the table to get a great education and experience some success on the field. They used to only be able to offer the latter.
None of those programs will ever match the Irish when it comes to tradition or general fan interest. Notre Dame will always have an edge in that department. Duke, Northwestern, and Vanderbilt have not won as many games in the last eight years as Notre Dame has even with those teams becoming respectable. (Stanford is a different story that has been talked about to death already) But they are all legitimate alternatives to Notre Dame now in their own way.
That means the program has to distinguish itself far enough away from those schools to be a notch above. Other than hoping they tumble back down to the bottom of the Power 5 again, the only way to do so would be for the Irish to dominate on the field.
They play Vanderbilt, Stanford, and Northwestern this fall. A good start would be beating all three of them. (Getting a nice run going against Stanford over the next few years wouldn’t be too shabby either.) They play Duke in 2019. The Blue Devils beat Notre Dame the last time they played each other. It goes without saying that a convincing win would be beneficial to the Irish.
Above all that, Notre Dame’s football program was and is supposed to be at a different level on the field. Being consistently in the Playoff or National Championship conversation is important when it comes to recruiting against national powers and it’s also important when competing against programs with similar student-athlete experiences. Nothing else can separate Notre Dame football from them like that could.
“4 for 40” is always going to resonate with certain players. It’s a great pitch to go along with the other elements of what makes the school and football program unique. But “4 for 40” isn’t just something that Notre Dame can sell. They’ll need more than that to consistently have an edge against their competition on the recruiting trail.