Mike Golic Jr. picks Taylor Swift to lead Notre Dame out of the tunnel on game days

After Lil’ Wayne led the Colorado football team out of the tunnel for a rivalry matchup with Colorado State last Saturday, On3’s Andy Staples wanted to know who should lead the home team out in this weekend’s big rivalry matchup: Ohio State at Notre Dame. So he asked former Notre Dame offensive lineman Mike Golic Jr.

And Golic, a noted Swiftie, had an obvious choice were the decision solely up to him: Taylor Swift. He recognized that this might not be a universally lauded choice among Notre Dame faithful.

“Back when I was in college, too, God rest his soul, Avicii was the biggest thing on earth. So when we got the stadium to play ‘Levels’ for the first time as Notre Dame Stadium was kind of growing up late in terms of the in-stadium accolades and accoutrement, the music, the video board, all that. Getting something like that playing would’ve, in 2012, been exactly what we needed. ‘Clarity’ by Zedd was huge back then. But if you’re asking me now, like ‘Shake It Off’ or ‘Bad Blood’ or something like that, being led out by Taylor Swift going into the stadium, would be incredible for me,” Golic said. “In all actuality, I think Garth Brooks has played at Notre Dame like twice. It would probably be like him or Bruce Springsteen or honestly Jon Bon Jovi, whose son Jesse ended up coming and walking on to the football team here for a little while here. Bon Jovi would probably be the one that most fans and older people might say, ‘Yeah.'”

Staples laid it out more plainly.

“That’s where the Olds would be very happy,” Staples said.

But the point Golic raised kicked off a thought for Staples about the evolution of the game day atmosphere at Notre Dame in the last decade-plus.

Golic recalled when the team first got to pick a song to be played in Notre Dame Stadium, which would blare on third downs with the Irish on defense. Golic doesn’t recall how — or why — Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train” was chosen, but he grew to quickly resent it.

By Week 3, it had become more than stale.

“I don’t know what our percentage was on defense, but you just hear that ‘duh-nuh, duh-nuh, duh-nuh’ for like the 40th time in a game, the third game of the season, got old really quickly. So yes, we have grown up a long way since that. We’ve grown up a long way since, I can remember the gold seats, or the rich seats that you’re talking about where all the old timers sit. I can remember looking there in the middle of a big game one time, I’m down on the sideline as a backup and I just turn around and there’s a guy dead ass asleep in his seat. I’m like, ‘C’mon, we can’t be living like this.’ So it is way different and way better now, but we survived some pretty tough years on that front,” Golic said.

Staples suggested “Let’s Go” by Trick Daddy as an alternative. That track samples “Crazy Train” in a hip-hop remix, and has become commonplace in many stadiums across the country.

Golic offered a tongue-in-cheek concern about that at Notre Dame.

“The problem is, I love Notre Dame’s fans, but especially the student body, is a largely white student body. So a lot of times you’ll get the hand nodding in there and there is not a lot of rhythm mixed in to that student section and so we can sometimes look a little bit off beat which is tough on the national TV copy,” Golic said.