Poll: Is Pitt-Notre Dame a Real Rivalry Game?

Pitt-Notre Dame have faced off against each other 71 times since 1909, which has featured some great matchups between two storied college football programs.

The Fighting Irish have a 49-21-1 lead in the series overall, which includes three straight wins since 2015. They have the longest win-streak in the series, with 11 consecutive victories from 1964-74, but have also had win streaks of eight games from 1943-1951 and again from 1988-97.

The Panthers have never had a winning streak longer than three against the Fighting Irish. This has occurred three times, from 1932-34, 1958-60 and 1983-87.

The two will face off again on Saturday in South Bend, Ind. for the first time since 2020, when Notre Dame demolished Pitt 45-3 at Heinz Field in one of the biggest blowouts in the series.

Most of the games recently for the Pitt-Notre Dame series have been much closer in score. Prior to the 2020 matchup, no win by either team was more than 12 points from 2008-2018, in which the teams faced each other eight times. This also saw important wins for Pitt in South Bend with a 41-38 victory in 2004 and a 36-33 four overtime win in 2008.

There is also a sizable fan base for Notre Dame in Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania as a whole. With a long history of Irish Catholic immigrants in the area, many have supported the Fighting Irish for generations and will continue to do so. This is a fact that unnerves some Pitt fans, who see the connection between people in the area more to a school that a French Catholic priest established more so than the school in their local area.

When it comes to determining if this series is a true rivalry, it’s difficult to say whether it is or it isn’t. Both Pitt and Notre Dame have programs they dislike much more than each other. For Pitt fans, they see the Backyard Brawl against West Virginia as the most important rivalry, then Penn State, are the two most hated rivals for the fan base. For Notre Dame, USC is their main rival, while other schools like Michigan, Michigan State and Navy feature as the schools their fan base dislikes the most.

The argument for a rivalry for Pitt-Notre Dame is the fact that they are two programs that have faced each other for more than 100 years. Each side has also had Pro Football Hall of Famers and numerous College Football Hall of Famers, have won National Championships and have faced each other in many classic games over recent years.

The argument against calling it a rivalry is that neither is their main rivalry or even most hated amongst the fan bases. Many would say that Pitt-Notre Dame is more of a long-standing series, rather than a true rivalry. Pitt has played Syracuse every year since 1955, but due to the imbalance of when both teams have been good in the series, both fan bases would say it is a long-standing series, not a true rivalry game.

So, the question is, do you think Pitt-Notre Dame is a true college football rivalry?

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