Days after George Gipp, Notre Dame’s first All-American, led the Irish to a win over Northwestern, he lay in a hospital bed with a throat infection. When Knute Rockne visited Gipp, the halfback turned to his coach and uttered his famous speech:

"I've got to go, Rock. It's all right. I'm not afraid. Some time, Rock, when the team is up against it, when things are wrong and the breaks are beating the boys, ask them to go in there with all they've got and win just one for the Gipper. I don't know where I'll be then, Rock. But I'll know about it, and I'll be happy."

Rockne used the story of Gipp, along with this deathbed line, to rally his team to an underdog victory over an undefeated Army team at Yankee Stadium in 1928.