Three years ago, almost 40,000 US visitors had made arrangements to come to Dublin for the season-opening college football game between Notre Dame's 'Fighting Irish' and Navy at the Aviva Stadium.
The Aer Lingus College Football Classic had been due to take place on 29 August of that year but ultimately never came to pass due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic - as did a subsequent attempt to stage another college game here the following year.
However, this Saturday will finally see the two rival teams battling it out by Lansdowne Road and a host of spectators will be crossing to this side of the Atlantic.
It will be the third time that the fixture will have been held in Dublin, the first coming in 1996 at Croke Park before they returned again in 2012 at the Aviva.
But for Irish spectators who weren't at either of those previous occasions or aren't acquainted with Notre Dame nor the rivalry with Navy, what can they expect in and around game day?
RTÉ Sport caught up with Len Clark, who as well as having taught multimedia journalism at Notre Dame, regularly reports on the South Bend, Indiana-based football team's fortunes for Irish Illustrated and has put together an eGuide to Dublin for visiting fans from the US.
"Notre Dame has had a long connection with Ireland. It's a French name. (The university) was founded in 1842 by Father Edward Sorin but what a lot of people don't know is that when he travelled up from southern Indiana, he had seven brothers of the Order of St Joseph with him, some of whom were Irish," Clark explained.
While the university's connection to Ireland might go back to its founding, why the football team adopted the 'Fighting Irish' moniker is a much more contested part of its history and a number of theories exist.
"When Notre Dame started playing football back in 1887, they didn't have a nickname," said Clark of the version he stands by.
"But then when they tried to become a national school, they were sending letters out all over the eastern side of the United States saying, 'Hey, play us in a game'. And the breakthrough came when the United States Army at West Point reached out to Notre Dame and said, 'We'll play you but you've got to play us here'.
"So they were called the 'Ramblers' because they weren't playing at home and played all over the place. But in 1913 Notre Dame beat the Army team using the forward pass and that kind of put Notre Dame on the map.
"They endeared themselves to the immigrants, the Irish and the Italians, the Catholics who found out about this small school in Indiana with Catholic roots that was beating the big elite teams of the east.
"And so these people, not knowing where the school was located or never having set foot on the campus, they just became in love with it, probably due to radio because these games were being picked up and broadcast all over the country.
"Notre Dame was beating all these teams and they were playing Northwestern (University) up at Evanston (in Illinois) and there was a derogatory term saying, 'Ah, they're a bunch of fighting Irish', even though at the time, the roster included Polish guys, Czechoslovakian, Greek, Italian or whatever.
"And the students embraced (the nickname) and said, 'That's what we're going to be known as.'"
What is not contested is that Notre Dame have enjoyed plenty of success within the upper echelons of US college football and thus rivalries have sprung up, Navy among them.
However, on the field, that is a particularly one-sided rivalry with the 'Fighting Irish' having won 79 of the 95 games since it was first played in 1927.
Coming into the upcoming Aviva Stadium fixture, Notre Dame are on a streak of five wins over Navy's Midshipmen and they will be favourites again on the 26th.
But amid a cacophony of marching bands, school anthems and traditions, events off the field are almost of greater importance from a cultural standpoint within the cordial relationships between the two 'rivals', according to Clark.
"During World War II, Notre Dame lost a lot of its male population to the draft and then going off to war, Notre Dame almost had to shut its doors and shutter the school," he said.
"Navy came in with a V-12 programme to train officers. If it wasn't for the Navy, Notre Dame wouldn't be in existence today.
"I love (the game) because of the pageantry and usually when they play at Notre Dame stadium, you might have the Blue Angels fly over or a Notre Dame graduate who is in the navy will do a fly-over.
"It's something exciting and I'm hoping they might do it here at the Aviva Stadium. When I was here in 2012, they brought in one of the navy ships into Dublin port and when you saw the Mids (mishipmen) walking around Temple Bar, it just makes you proud to be an American."
Both teams will perform their alma mater song at Aviva Stadium as per tradition, with both teams showing mutual respect by lining up behind their opponents as they sing.
"They're going to go between the white lines and they're going to fight but at the end of the game, they're brothers in arms," Clark said.
"It's like the Army v Navy game, they hate each other and play hard but after the game they've got each other's backs if they have to go to war."
With this being the third occasion that Notre Dame are playing this match-up on Irish soil, Clark says the idea of taking games abroad is a type of outreach to grow the university's global footprint, especially given this year falls into what would have been an away game for the 'Fighting Irish' that won't impact the colossal revenue generated from home games in South Bend.
"As Notre Dame continues to grow and become more global, Dublin and this game is a public relations vehicle for the 'Fighting Irish,'" he said, adding that it's also an opportunity for some spotllight to be reflected onto the university's GAA teams.
But Clark, who regularly spends time in Ireland, is keen for any cultural exchange to also go the other way in terms of ensuring that the expected 40,000 visitors from the US learn more about what this island has to offer, hence why he has put together an e-Guide which recommends historical walks and cultural experiences.
"I wanted to share my experiences so that people who come over here and maximise their time and that they don't waste a second, just to give them a guide to go out and do little things and just try to do as many of those as possible - and then go enjoy the game," he said.
