(MCT) — MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — A big, proud man backed into a tight corner of a grim locker room late Monday night, Louis Nix predictably started with blood-boiled anger at what had just happened to his Notre Dame team before progressing to a more composed resignation.

Even if Alabama hadn’t dominated the BCS championship game — and Nix insisted it hadn’t, despite the 42-14 final and every morsel of evidence to the contrary — the truth was inescapable. The Irish couldn’t do anything about what the Crimson Tide did to them.