Whenever I return home for vacation or break, there's one question I usually face when someone finds out I go to Notre Dame: "What's the best Irish football game you've ever seen?"

Quite a few choices come to mind. There's Jim Sanson's field goal over Texas freshman year, or upsetting 15th-ranked LSU in '97, or defeating defending champion Michigan at the start of '98.

But it doesn't take long for me to come up with my answer: Notre Dame vs. Rutgers, November 1996.

That answer usually prompts a look of confusion. "A 63-6 romp over a winless opponent?" they say. "Why would THAT be your favorite game?"

Well, in order to understand my reasoning, you'd have to know my grandfather.

Born in 1921, the original William Hart was around for all the Irish national championships (although if you ask him, he doesn't remember much about 1924). Despite never going to Notre Dame, he rooted for the Irish with all his heart, no pun intended.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that everything I ever learned about being a sports fan came from him.

But even though he was a diehard Irish fan, he had never seen a Notre Dame football game in person, home or away. So, when I offered him the chance to see the Irish play the Scarlet Knights, I didn't have to ask twice.

There we were: Three generations of Harts — myself, my father and my grandfather — sitting together in the third-to-last row of the stadium.

Sure, we were on the south end of the stadium and there wasn't any way the goalposts could have blocked the action more.

Sure, it was some of the coldest weather I had ever experienced in Notre Dame Stadium and there was never any doubt as to the outcome.

But I hadn't seen my grandfather that happy since his last granddaughter was born. He cheered as hard as any student I had seen. He did the wave with gusto and booed all the penalties that went against the Irish. He groaned at Sergeant McCarthy's fourth-quarter puns as if he was a veteran of Notre Dame Stadium.

But the moment I realized this was the best Irish football game I'd ever attended came after the game, when we were standing shoulder-to-shoulder, singing the Alma Mater while swaying from side to side.

For college football fans across the country, the last home game for Lou Holtz was the biggest event in the country that weekend. But for me, that was only a side note.

And after my years of reflecting on this moment, I came up with this: Sometimes it isn't which game you're watching but who you're watching it with.

• Simply the best