They are supposed to be two of the best. Notre Dame and Michigan have the most wins in college football history. They have two of the best stadiums, fight songs, helmets and traditions. Yet when these two founding fathers of college football meet on Saturday, it will carry less significance on a national scale than the Wisconsin-Fresno State game later that evening.
 
For two straight years, Notre Dame and Michigan have been unranked heading into their matchup, the only two such years since the rivalry was renewed in 1978. Notre Dame has wallowed in mediocrity for much of this decade, and now Michigan has joined the Irish in the unfamiliar territory of former powerhouse.
 
There was a curiosity factor last season, with Michigan coming off embarrassing losses to Appalachian State and Oregon, while Notre Dame was outscored 64-13 in its first two games against Georgia Tech and Penn State. Could Notre Dame and Michigan be this bad? What the heck was going to happen when they played? The rubber-necking of two train-wreck seasons had folks interested -- and then the two produced an uninteresting 38-0 game, with Michigan easily hailing victory.
 
A year later, even the curiosity factor has waned. Michigan is enduring growing pains with first-year coach Rich Rodriguez. There is little doubt that the former West Virginia coach is going to rebuild Michigan once he gets the right style of players to Ann Arbor, but this season will be a trying one for the maize and blue. Notre Dame is wondering, now that Charlie Weis has all his own players, when that 'schematic advantage' Weis promised when he was hired is going to kick in. It certainly didn't appear to be there in a 21-13 home win over San Diego State -- a team that lost to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
 
Remember the late 1980s and early 1990s? Notre Dame-Michigan set the stage for the college football season every September, and the games rarely disappointed. In one seven-year stretch, every game but one was decided by less than a touchdown. From 1989-92, both teams were in the top 10 when they clashed. Rocket Ismail created his legend with two kickoff returns for touchdowns in 1989, helping No. 1 Notre Dame knock off No. 2 Michigan 24-19 at Michigan Stadium. Two years later, in the same stadium, Desmond Howard etched his name in Michigan lore with a diving, fourth-down touchdown catch that iced No. 3 Michigan's 24-14 win over No. 7 Notre Dame. A year later, Lou Holtz and No. 3 Notre Dame settled for a 17-17 tie (remember those?) with No. 6 Michigan -- and both teams ended up finishing the season in the top five. Remy Hamilton won the 1994 game for Michigan with a field goal with two seconds left, and Reggie Ho launched Notre Dame's 1988 national championship with a last-minute field goal to beat Michigan 19-17.
 
The demise of the Notre Dame-Michigan game is a loss for college football. Outside the 2006 matchup, which featured Brady Quinn's No. 2 Irish getting pummeled by 11th-ranked Michigan 47-21, this game hasn't had the buzz befitting these two proud programs in the past decade. Odds are, the rivalry will renew at a high level at some point, but right now Notre Dame-Michigan is merely just another game.