There is a lot to get to today as I squeeze in three days of work and this blog between a trip to Chicago and traveling for the holiday – so I will get right to it.
First off, I think I speak for the majority of NU fans (and Illini fans, obviously) when I say that I had an absolute blast on Saturday. Regardless of the fingerpointing, the national publicity, the brutal run defense, etc., from a fan standpoint, this was a complete success. Whether this truly was once in a lifetime, or whether this becomes the stepping stone for future events, it is certainly memorable for all who attended.
I sat behind a dad who had four young boys with him. They were all old enough to understand football and will certainly always remember this moment. They could go to dozens of Cubs games during their childhood. They will always remember the NU-Wrigley Game.
The game, itself, was memorable for a number of reasons. The first quarter was absolutely crazy. I remarked at the end of it that it reminded me of the fourth quarter of the Outback Bowl. Something was always happening. Five touchdowns, four turnovers, a missed field goal, and a touchdown in the forbidden end zone. While the pace of the game certainly settled down after that, the stadium was electric for the entire first hour.
The obvious criticism of the Cats was the run defense. To say that this was a poor effort was an understatement – the Cats missed 31 tackles. I was sitting in the “good” end zone and watched the majority of the game throguh binoculars. It seemed like every play for Illinois a big hole opened up and suddenly Lushoure came marching through.
So what happened? A unit by unit look explains a lot. The Defensive Line accounted for six of the team’s seven tackles for loss. So it is hard to say that they were not being aggressive and getting off blocks – in fact, a large amount of the missed tackles were DL tackles in the backfield. But perhaps they were being too aggressive and allowing the holes to be opened. Basically each play then became a crapshoot, where the Illini back was either going to get hit in the backfield or open up a big gain, because…
The Linebackers were nowhere to be found. NU’s linebackers only recorded one tackle for loss and were consistantly out of position the entire game. The Illini OC said that they noticed that the NU linebackers were overpersuing at the snap, which was opening up cutback lanes. And that’s what they did all day: handoff to Lushoure, two steps left, cut back right, run through the gaping hole. On the option runs, NU often only had one man covering two. And when two backers were covering the play, they did not contain the pitch man.
Of all the ways that NU could have lost this game, the lack of a run defense was the last thing that I would have ever considered to be the reason. And the pass defense, while not really needed, played more than effectively. Illinios ran 14 pass plays, completing sic, with two interceptions, three passes broken up, and three QB hurries. Clearly the Illinois spreak offense had an effect on this as NU consistantly had to play three corners and two safeties, leaving only six big men to cover the run. Maybe putting a safety on a receiver and adding a LB would have helped – but we will never know.
In the end, on the defensive side, Illinois ran 84 plays to NU’s 48 and had the ball for almost 42 minutes. As one fan said in the concourse after the game, “Dan Persa don’t play defense.” Even Danny boy could not have helped the Cats out of this one.
The Offensive, under the circumstances, was not horrible. And the running game was actually quite effective. Mike Trumpy had the longest NU run since 1983. But he also averaged more than four yards per carry on his other 12 runs. Adonis Smith avergaged 6.7 yards. After you take out the three sacks, Watkins scrambled four times for 31 yards. And Kain Colter ran three times, two for first downs. While 48 plays is hardly enough time to develop an offense, NU only ran 25 true running plays (i.e., not counting sacks). But, taking out the long Trumpy run, the Cats averaged 4.95 yards per carry on the other 24 runs. But the Cats only ran the ball three plays in a row once in the entire game – on the second drive of the game. Everyone expected that NU would need to run the ball well in order to stay in the game. The problem was that they did run the ball well, but never got a chance to stay in control.
The passing game was about what we could have expected out of the situation. Once Evan Watkins go the nerves out of his system he played pretty well, demonstrating a nice arm at times. The first five pass plays were knocked-down pass, sack/fumble, 13 yard game, incompletion, interception. After that, Watkins was 9 for 16 for 119 yards, one TD, no picks. This would be good first half statistics. Unfortunately, the Cats did not run enough plays to see this play out. Watkins demonstrated that the Cats have something a little different to look forward to in 2012. My early prediction is that Evan develops quite well in December and comes out poised and ready to lead the team in its bowl game.
A few notes on the special teams. We finally got a chance to see Venric Mark really run – and even though you cannot like the fumble on the play, he broke tackles and made people miss – and almost scored in the forbidden zone. Demos looked pretty solid, but could not get a good kickoff into the steady east-west wind.
The gametime atmosphere was hard to describe. Gameday got NU students out of bed and into Wrigleyville by 5:00 a.m. Sheffield transformed into a portable Wildcat Alley. The bars and restaurants were packed and house parties popped up all over the neighborhood. It was, as Jim Phillips described his vision, a Bowl game in Chicago.
So what is the effect? NU stated that the goal of this game is to increase ticket sales in Evanston. This plan has been criticized because most outsiders assume that this means that NU hopes to convert fans. I believe that this is not the case. The point is to motivate existing fans.
Case in point, the most highly attended non-conference game since 1995 was the 1998 game against Duke, where NU lost 44-10. The game drew more than 41,000. This fact alone disproves a number of the myths about Northwestern attendance. It was a game in September on, by all accounts and my memory, a nice day; it was a non-conference game; it was against a bad opponent; it was an opponent that was not close enough to bring a large contingent of its own, and it was a bad NU team. My point being is that there are NU fans out there. The Athletic Department does not need to create new fans, it needs to motivate the existing fan base.
So did this work? Time will tell, and I can only speak from my own observations. I saw college friends who live in the Chicago area who I do not normally see at games. But more importantly, in addition to my trip from Canton, Ohio, I had friends in from New York City, Traverse City, MI, Nashville, TN, Austin, TX, St. Paul, MN, and Las Vegas. So to the extent that was the goal – I would say that it was a success.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone, enjoy the turkey and the football and check back on Friday for what will probably be a depressing preview of the Wisconsin game.
Go Cats!
No comments:
Post a Comment