Football: Illini Week

I thought some might like to once again see the above picture as we head into this weekend's matchup. I'd also like to say that should anybody (say, the NU Athletic Department) have video of the 4th quater of "The Comeback" they need to post it right now!

Big In-State Weekend Coming Up For NU Sports

Thanks to some solid defense and for the first time this season a couple breaks Northwestern pulled an epic upset on Saturday afternoon in Iowa City by beating the #4 ranked Hawkeyes 17-10. In a game which for a large part was a battle of backup quarterbacks, Northwestern got just enough offense from Dan Persa to score the only offensive touchdown in the final 59 minutes of the game. Iowa actually had 41 more total yards than Northwestern, but the Wildcats capitalized with 14 points off turnovers to secure bowl eligibility for the third straight year. Despite not getting invited to a bowl in 2007 and not yet officially clinching a birth for this year—this is a huge accomplishment for the program and for Pat Fitzgerald as head coach. Now the ‘Cats are on a mission to post enough wins to enough wins to avoid spending the Holiday season in Detroit at the Motor City Bowl. Can NU do so? Well, that will be a challenge that starts this weekend at Illinois and is just one of two major events for Wildcat Nation this weekend in the state.

Before the ‘Cats march down to Champaign to take on the Illini, Northern Illinois’s men’s basketball squad will march into Welsh-Ryan Arena to take on Coach Bill Carmody’s team. With the NU hoops squad getting loads of national media attention already this year, the hoop squad’s game against NIU will be just as important as the football game against the Illini. Considering the fickle nature of the media and NU fans, a loss to NIU in basketball would be a very poor way to start the season. Much of the good will Coach Carmody’s ‘Cats have going into this year will evaporate if the ‘Cats fail to show up versus a talented, but inferior foe in NIU. That would be very bad as NU’s next basketball game is home against #10 Butler and the ‘Cats will need solid fan support in Welsh-Ryan to pull that upset.

On the other side of things, NU’s football squad and ‘Cat fans obviously want the win versus U of I in football, and I think we can agree Illinois isn’t looking like the pushover they were early in the year anymore. Also, you have to consider that today NU won against Iowa with an injured Mike Kafka and Dan Persa got hurt in the game as well. If Persa is out for the Ilini and Kafka isn’t healthy enough to run (as he wasn’t today), that’ll mean NU is super one dimensional against Illinois unless a special package is installed for WR Jeremy Ebert as the ‘Cats running QB. NU can beat the Illini even if they don’t have a mobile QB, but it’ll really help the ‘Cats if Kafka is 100% or Persa is able to both pass and throw as he looked like he was before his injury today.

Bottom line for NU fans, both these games are important and both will be tough. Let’s get out and support both teams. I’d love to see Welsh-Ryan Arena get at least 4,500-5,000 fans on Friday night and I assume that, as always, a nice NU crowd will travel to Memorial Stadium on Saturday. A win on Friday would be a great start to the 2009-10 basketball season and a win on Saturday would put the 2009 football season in a position to end in a very special way. With as tight as the middle of the Big Ten is this year a number of bowls have to at least be considering the ‘Cats and getting to 7 wins would help. Basketball wise, many have talked about how NU needs a strong RPI to make the NCAA tournament and that’s true. Along the same lines, the other thing NU needs is to avoid bad losses such as dropping a home game to NIU.

Football: Northwestern, 17 Iowa, 10

We own Iowa! Thoughts on why this victory makes for a great upcoming weekend in Wildcat sports coming later. For now, Go Cats!.

Why 3 NU Dunks Matter

I imagine fans of other teams who visit this site or Wildcatreport.com are probably a little confused at the excitement over NU having three dunks in a game. They probably don’t understand why we’re all talking with great joy over three two point shots in an exhibition game. The fact is though those shots mean more than just six points. They show this Northwestern team has a deeper level of athletic skill than most NU teams past—maybe all NU teams in the past. This is going to be a potentially huge advantage for NU when they start the Big Ten season. Yes, NU will still be less athletic than some opponents, but getting closer in status to the athletic skills of an Ohio State or Michigan will help NU pull some upsets. Face it, NU was just as good as Michigan last year, but couldn’t stop a one man show by Manny Harris. The same was true of Ohio State, but they had Evan Turner.

You see, it’s not that NU had players dunk that has fans excited, it’s that those dunks show NU has athletic players. One nice thing about the Princeton Offense is it neutralizes some athletic advantages of opponents, but it doesn’t take care of them all. I remember several past games where NU was in the game for a long while, but eventually the other team locked down on defense because they were more athletic. I also remember many games were talented Wildcat players got to the hoop and put themselves in position to score only to have their shot blocked away by athletic big men. It’s a lot harder to block a dunk. I think that might even be a lesson Drew Crawford learned last night as he had some early attempts blocked and then threw down a dunk later. I hope his teammates learn this lesson as well. I still worry every time Jeff Ryan tries to finger roll in a layup in traffic.

This greater NU athletic ability also translated to a huge rebound advantage last night. In the past even NU’s biggest guys were so athletically limited that rebounding was a big problem. That cost NU big time as teams got a ton of second chance points. At times it even seemed the opposing squad’s offense was to miss threes and get rebounds. Indiana even admitted this was a strategy against NU once. Now, NU has a guard in Crawford that I think can realistically get in the neighborhood of five rebounds a game on average and probably many more against weaker competition. With John Shurna, an excellent rebounder, and Kevin Coble in the front court this will sure help the ‘Cats. NU should also get some rebounding presence once Kyle Rowley comes back. He’s not a super athlete, but at 7-0 280 pounds just his size is enough to help NU control the paint. The Big Ten has big centers and it’s nice to see NU with one as well. I’m also interested to see how NU uses Ivan Peljusic in the front court. As seen last night he’s very athletic, but a little small when compared to Luka Mirkovic and Davide Curletti. What role will all three have? We’ll have to wait and see. We’ll also have to see about Mike Capocci who is clearly NU’s best pure athlete, but sometimes seems to struggle with more nuanced basketball skill. Still, Jeremy Nash made great strides going for athletic guy to regular contributor last year and Capocci might be able to do the same.

NU Exhibits Solid Offense and Defense in 78-49 Exhibition Victory

Exhibition games are always kind of tricky to get the sense of a team. Sometimes they do mean a lot, but sometimes they mean nothing at all. If you’re Syracuse you’re hoping for category two. If you’re Northwestern you’re probably hoping for category one (with some understanding that you’ve still got work to do). The Wildcats did some nice things tonight, but I don’t think we totally saw the same game plan from Coach Carmody which we will see in 9 days against Northern Illinois. For example, Carmody played 12 different players in the first half. Unless he’s been replaced by a body double I don’t see that being a common place thing.

What that predilection to substitute tonight did seem to show was that after the ‘Cats top eight players (including the five starters plus Nash, Ryan, and Rowley) the best players NU has are probably reserve big men Ivan Peljusic and Davide Curletti. Peljusic didn’t shoot all that well, but showed his usual energy with a fast break dunk and scored at the rim a few times late in the game and hit a three at the buzzer. Curletti got some shots in the second half and didn’t really look that great shooting either, but word is that he can knock down the long shots enough to keep defenses honest. He also was pretty good on defense which I’ll get to in a moment.

One item which is probably worth mentioning is that aside from Peljusic, NU also got dunks from Mike Capocci and Drew Crawford. I don’t think NU is exactly going to be known as a high-flying team, but it does show this version of the ‘Cats has a few more athletes than past squads. The fact is dunks only count two points, but it’s a lot harder to block a dunk than a soft layup and NU can’t afford to allow so many blocked shots.

I really liked seeing how NU played defense tonight. They seemed to play mostly the 2-3 zone, but showed nice active hands and extended the zone a bit. One area where Curletti seems to standout is that he does do a really nice job fighting for position in the post and making it hard for opposing big men to get good position. I don’t know if that’ll be enough to get him a ton of minutes (especially when Rowley comes back), but it certainly works in his favor. Jeff Ryan also looked good defensively and really stands out to me on the few occasions NU plays man-to-man. I think NU has the potential to be a man-to-man team at times this year depending on who the opposition is on any given night. I wouldn’t man Ohio State, but NU might have a decent shot go man-to-man against some non-conference foes and Big Ten teams who have a similar type athletes.

The most impressive NU player tonight was probably sophomore John Shurna who displayed both a nice three point jumper and the ability to scrape for rebounds. Early in the game I thought Shurna might have ten boards by halftime at the rate he was pulling in loose balls. NU’s two top players Kevin Coble and Michael “Juice” Thompson each had strong moments, but actually got a nice rest in the second half of the game. This might be one of the few times all year they get such a chance so I take that as a positive.

Overall, I’m happy with what I saw from NU tonight. I’m not ready to declare them ready for the NCAA Tournament just yet, but they do look like they’re ready for what will be a surprisingly talented NIU team that arrives in Evanston on November 13th.

Big Ten Network Web Streaming Delayed Start Upsets Fans

I don’t want to turn this into a massive complaint about the Big Ten Network, but as I know many readers had this issue I think it is worth mentioning. Tonight many Wildcat fans around the nation went to their computers to watch the start of what many assume is THE year. What they saw was the Big Ten Network logo and a clock counting upwards. Even as the Wildcats took on RMU in the first half this didn’t change. Obviously, technical difficulties can occur in any situation with technology, but the BTN didn’t do itself any favors winning over fans tonight. The positive is that the BTN was willing to quickly refund money and did get the web steam working in the second half, but it certainly wasn’t in HD quality as promoted.

The question I think many fans asked themselves as they stared at the blank screen was, “Did the BTN test this web thingy from Welsh-Ryan?” I don’t know. That’s a good question, though. Especially when past streams from W-R have had issues. If BTN is going to continue to use this type of service they will need to get more consistent in their service.

Preview: Robert Morris University @ Northwestern

The Match up: Robert Morris University @ Northwestern

When: Wednesday November 4^th

Location: Welsh-Ryan Arena (Evanston, IL.)

Broadcast Information: Big Ten Network On Demand at http://www.bigtennetwork.com/ for $2.99

Fun Fact: Last time Northwestern played Robert Morris University they were known as Robert Morris College.

The Game: As opposed to analyzing whether Northwestern has a shot to beat Robert Morris University, because last year proves it really doesn’t matter, I have instead decided to highlight some of what we can look for to see if NU has a shot to live up to the hype the team has for this year.

First, I want to see how NU scores points from behind the three point line without Craig Moore. Michael Thompson is NU’s best returning percentage shooter and Kevin Coble can of course knock down treys, but Moore was the guy with the quick release who was always the go to guy when NU ran a set play out of a timeout. Who will Coach Carmody call on in those situations now? I suspect the answer is Thompson, but I’d love to see freshman guard Alex Marcotullio get a shot. Apparently in AAU his coaches would yell, “layup” whenever he took a three since he was so reliable. If it’s the same at NU, I suggest the student section do the same.

Second, and probably most obviously, I want to see the starting lineup. Moore and Kyle Rowley started most of NU’s games last year. With Moore graduated and Rowley hurt, it will be interesting to see who NU’s starting five are tomorrow night. I suspect NU will go with the veteran lineup of Thompson, Jeremy Nash, Coble, John Shurna, and Luka Mirkovic, but you never know.

Third, I want to see Drew Crawford play. Crawford arrives in Evanston with a lot of hype and a lot of expectation. Can he live up to that hype? Well, the good news is unlike previously hyped NU recruits, he isn’t being forced to come in and take the team on his shoulders. He will be used as a nice backcourt compliment to Thompson.

Fourth, what defense does NU play? RMU has some solid wing scorers. With the 1-3-1 vulnerable to the wing three this game might provide NU an excuse to work on man-to-man. With Crawford now on the roster, I do think NU is getting closer to having solid man-to-man defenders at every spot.

Fifth, who is in the rotation? As we learned last year not every exhibition features the real rotation, but I’m curious how (or if) guys like Mike Capocci, Ivan Peljusic, and Jeff Ryan will be used. They have Big Ten talent, but it kind of looks as if they might have been passed by when looking at NU’s last two recruiting classes.

Finally, did the ‘Cats make any noticeable strides in the weight room which will lead to better rebounding. Word is that Shurna and Coble have added muscle. It would be nice if NU were at least a little closer to their opponents when it comes rebound margin this season.