College Football Hall of Fame

Jim Crowley: Notre Dame’s Legendary Four Horsemen Star

By Pigskin Dispatch September 10, 2026 5 min read

Jim Crowley carved his name into college football history as a vital, playmaking force within Notre Dame’s iconic Four Horsemen backfield.

Football Bio

September 10, 1902 – Jim Crowley, one of the legendary Four Horsemen of Notre Dame, was born in Chicago. Early in his life, his family moved to Green Bay, Wisconsin. Crowley attended the town’s East High School, where he played football and basketball.

During the 1919 East football season, Jim’s head coach was the legendary Curly Lambeau. After high school, Jim was accepted into the University of Notre Dame, where he joined the football program. One can’t always use their first impression as good judgment, as Notre Dame’s head coach, Knute Rockne, soon found out.

Coach Rockne, as he was walking down, looking at his 1922 football team, saw Jim Crowley and tabbed him with the nickname, “Sleepy Jim.” In a comment to an aide of Rockne’s, he said, “Except for a nimble wit, Crowley shows nothing.”

That was his first impression of Jim Crowley, who moved with a relaxed, smooth motion during drills and practice. When it was game time, though, this smooth gait was decisive and direct, even violent, and it gave opposing defenses fits. It wouldn’t take long for Coach Rockne to change his mind on Jim Crowley’s football demeanor, as he described the player as “the nerviest back I’ve ever known.” This reference likely came from the way Sleepy Jim threw his body at rushing defenders.

Crowley is best known in Notre Dame history as one of the Four Horsemen of Notre Dame, the Fighting Irish teams of 1922 through 1924. Rockne’s publicist, George Strickler, gave the quartet a notorious nickname, and New York Herald Tribune writer Grantland Rice later recorded it eloquently in print. The legend of the Horsemen arose out of Strickler walking into a conversation in a press box during the halftime of the October 18, 1924 Irish game against the Army Black Knights. [National Football Foundation]

Grantland Rice was spearheading a chat among other big-time news writers about the dominance the Irish offense was showing against Army. George Strickler interjected a reference to a recent Rudolph Valentino movie he had watched when he said, “Yeah, just like the Four Horsemen.” The men of the press somewhat ignored the comment. Still, as the second half wore on and the relentless rapid succession of plays kept Army’s defense off balance, Strickler’s images of the Horsemen resonated in Grantland Rice’s mind.

Rice sat by his typewriter after the 13-7 Notre Dame victory and wrote what may be one of the most famous lines ever in college football journalism:

“Outlined against a blue-gray October sky, the Four Horsemen rode again. In dramatic lore they are known as Famine, Pestilence, Destruction and Death. These are only aliases. Their real names are Stuhldreher, Miller, Crowley and Layden. They formed the crest of the South Bend cyclone before which another fighting Army football team was swept over the precipice at the Polo Grounds yesterday afternoon as 55,000 spectators peered down on the bewildering panorama spread on the green plain below.”

The Four Horsemen reference was, of course, a biblical reference to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The moniker stuck, and the quartet is still well remembered today. The football writers and broadcasters composed an all-time Notre Dame team in 1962, and Jim Crowley was the only one among the Four Horsemen to make it on the squad.

The College Football Hall of Fame inducted him into their collection of legends in 1966. Jim tried his hand at professional football, but only played three NFL games total, with stints with the Green Bay Packers and the Providence Steam Roller. In 1925, the Waterbury Blues signed two of the Horsemen, Crowley and Stuhldreher, against a team from Adams, Massachusetts. Sleepy Jim scored three touchdowns in the 34-0 romp over Adams, collected his check after the game, and left the team to go to his other job of coaching at the University of Georgia.

Crowley went on to coach at Michigan State for four years, then was lured away to take over the powerful Fordham University program. His collegiate coaching record was a very respectable 86 wins, 23 losses, and 11 ties. As head of the 1939 Fordham team, he coached in the very first televised football game.

Jim served in the Navy during World War II, and there he coached a military team, the North Carolina Pre-Flight School Cloudbusters. He later tried his hand in the professional ranks: he was once commissioner of the All-America Football Conference and became part owner and coach of the league’s worst team, the Chicago Rockets.

Needless to say, Crowley’s success in the college ranks didn’t carry over to the AAFC, as the Rockets finished with a 9-4-7 record, prompting him to step away from the team before the 1948 season. Crowley then moved to Pennsylvania, held a few odd jobs, before landing the position of chairman of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission for nine years.

Jim Crowley cemented his legacy far beyond his spectacular days in a Notre Dame uniform. He translated his on-field brilliance into a pioneering coaching career, elevating programs across the country and leaving an indelible mark on early gridiron history.

Accolades and Football Accomplishments

College Football Hall of Fame: Inducted in 1966 as a player.
National Champion: Helped lead Notre Dame to the 1924 National Championship.
Consensus All-American: Earned first-team honors in 1924.
The Four Horsemen: Immortalized as one of the four legendary backfield players under Knute Rockne.
All-Time Notre Dame Team (1962): The only member of the Four Horsemen selected by writers and broadcasters for the all-time squad.
Collegiate Coaching Record: Compiled an 86–23–11 overall record across stints at Georgia (assistant), Michigan State, and Fordham.
Television Pioneer: Head coach of Fordham University during the first-ever televised football game in 1939.
Professional Executive: Served as the first commissioner of the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) in 1946.