Players from Indiana’s 1979 Holiday Bowl team didn’t think Lee Corso, their coach, would be in town for their 45-year reunion. But ESPN College GameDay is in Bloomington for Saturday’s Indiana-Washington game, a coincidence that was “meant to be.”
Over 70 members of the 1979 team plan to be in town for the 45-year reunion of the Holiday Bowl, the program’s first bowl victory. The team has held several reunions over the years, but one key figure has missed the last three – head coach Lee Corso.
When he picked this weekend over the summer, it made sense in that respect. Deal asked his college coach, Corso, to tape a video with a message to his team for the reunion, like he’d done for the last three reunions he couldn't attend. But Tallen and his teammates intended to win that game behind their smash mouth brand of Big Ten football. Tallen recalls Indiana’s first team dinner in San Diego, where Corso ran down the list of rules BYU would be following in the week leading up to the game, “they don’t drink, they don’t smoke, they don’t even drink caffeine, they don’t even eat chocolate, they’ve got a curfew.”
“Tim Clifford led what was one of Indiana’s most exciting offenses at the time,” Tallen said. “Because he was not only a great pocket-passer drop-back passer, Tim also ran the option. … He was a true field general. He was well-respected and loved by his teammates. Tim was a great, great college quarterback. He had a very special season.”
“It’s an oblong ball, but in the Hoosier state it bounced like a basketball,” Deal said. “So it was very apropos, and it bounced like a basketball right into his hands, in stride, and he just split it, just absolutely split it.”The Hoosiers had the lead, but they weren’t quite in the clear yet. BYU drove down the field and had a chance to win the game with a 27-yard field goal attempt with 11 seconds remaining.
“We’ll go down in history, even after we’re long gone, as being the first team,” Johnson said. “It was pretty epic for us as players and the coaching staff, we were just so, so happy. That was very, very special for the university. … To be the first is the best feeling in the world.” Deal remembers Indiana offensive line coach Bob Otolski motivating the Hoosiers before the Holiday Bowl, saying, “We want to be Neil Armstrong. We want to be the first.” A 2013 Indiana Football Hall of Fame inductee, Deal has been part of many Hoosier teams as a player, coach and now administrator. But the Holiday Bowl team will always stand out.
Johnson began his Indiana career on the junior varsity team, common for freshmen at the time. In a meeting after the JV team’s win over Louisville, Corso moved Johnson up to the varsity team, a proud moment. But that excitement didn’t last long. “My roommate said, ‘Coach Corso is testing you to see if you’re gonna quit.’ And when he said that, it registered to me,” Johnson said. “At first, nothing registered to me because I was like, I can’t believe this. It wasn’t my fault. He’s screaming at me. He’s spitting all in my face. He’s grabbing my facemask and telling me I’d never play here.
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