QUESTION: Why do you say kuh-NOOT and not NOOT like knight, knife or Knute Rockne?
ANSWER: Because knute isn't an English word. It's an old Scandinavian word that means knot or puzzle and occasionally it's a masculine name. Norwegian American football coach Knute Rockne was actually kuh-NOOT, not NOOT. He also worked as a chemist before developing the forward pass at Notre Dame, but that's besides the point. Here's a video of a Norwegian making fishing knots and saying the word knute:
