Northwestern University Athletics
Photo by: Stephen J. Carrera
The Skip Report: Illinois Recap
12/1/2015 10:19:00 AM | Football
By Skip Myslenski
NUsports.com Special Contributor
The 'Cats completed their pre-game drills and now, with just over 25 minutes remaining until kickoff, they started streaming toward their locker room. Slowly, inexorably, they disappeared under the stands until only Pat Fitzgerald and his four captains remained in view. They lingered now in a corner of Soldier Field's south end zone, a quintet together in stark tableau, and here the coach went from one to the other, hugging the safety Traveon Henry and the defensive end Deonte Gibson, hugging the wide receiver Christian Jones and the superback Dan Vitale. Then they huddled.
"He does that every game, brings us up, talks about the situation, kind of gives us his last thoughts," Vitale would later recount. "But really, this game, he didn't have much to say. He just said, 'Let's get the hat back.' That's pretty much what it was all about. We all understood the situation and what we had an opportunity to do.
"So he really didn't have to say too much."
The situation on Saturday was as evident as that scene, which is why Fitzgerald didn't have to say much. The 'Cats were facing Illinois, which made this a Rivalry Game. The 'Cats were facing a five-win team, which meant it was desperate for a victory to be bowl-eligible. They 'Cats were going after their tenth win, which only three teams in school history had managed. The 'Cats were looking to stay on track for 11, which would make program history.
Those cross-currents cut through this afternoon as surely as the winds off Lake Michigan, but the game itself was not a matter of any high drama. It was instead a familiar production, the kind that reflected the character of these 'Cats. "We're a Chicago football team," Fitzgerald would say of that.
"We're kinda old school, '95, neck roll, four-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust. To a lot of people, they think that's boring. I could care less about what they think. I call it winning. That's who we are right now. I'd love to put up the Baylor numbers offensively. But they can't shake a stick at our defense. We know who we are and we have to play to who we are."
They are, most of all, a defense as stout as Falstaff and as miserly as Scrooge. On Saturday it would get nicked for a touchdown on Illinois' opening drive, but then it pitched a shutout over the game's last 54 minutes. "Sometimes you try to feel out an opponent, and sometimes it works your way and sometimes it doesn't," Gibson would later say when asked about its slow start. "This was one of those games where you had to attack the opponent and dictate the tempo. At times at the beginning, we were not doing that consistently. I think you saw that on the first touchdown. But after that we woke up and it was our ball game after that."
On offense, in turn, they are more ground chuck than rib eye, a throwback attack constructed around an offensive line clearing the way for running back Justin Jackson. He would end this day with 172 net yards on a career-high 37 carries. "It's just keep pushing, keep pushing, keep pushing, and eventually you'll break one. That's how running the football is, especially against a good defense," he would say after his busy day. "We learned a lot during the game, we learned where we could win up front, and I think our coaches did a good job with the game plan. You kind of saw that in the second half and especially the fourth quarter, where we busted a few runs."
But after Illinois busted out to its early 7-0 lead, it was the arm of quarterback Clayton Thorson that initially rallied the 'Cats. First he found Austin Carr for 48 streaking down the left hash and then, three plays later, he found Vitale on a short out that the superback carried for 19 yards and the tying touchdown. "I knew I had to focus on the catch," he later said. "It was going to be a tough one. Clayton put it where it needed to be, far enough outside to where their guy couldn't undercut me. Luckily I kept my concentration, got in. We just moved forward from there."
On their next possession, after an Illini three-and-out, they moved forward primarily on the ground, Warren Long finally walking in through a yawning hole opened by center Brad North and guards Matt Frazier and Connor Mahoney. Now came another three-and-out for Illinois and another 'Cat drive, this one ending with Jackson going in from three to put them up 14 with just a little over three minutes gone in the second quarter.
Now, suddenly, this one transformed into a tug-a-war, the 'Cat defense dominant, the 'Cat offense struggling, but then--after 26 minutes of stasis--there came an explosion. It came when a Thorson pass was tipped at the line and picked by Illini linebacker Mason Monheim, who returned it 58 yards for the touchdown that pulled them to within seven with 45 seconds remaining in the third. Now, Thorson would later say, "We knew we had to come out and run the football."
They knew that and they did that, Jackson gaining five and 27 and two on consecutive carries. Then, after an incompletion, Long rushed for 18 down to the Illini 16, and four snaps later Jack Mitchell's 39-yard field goal pushed the 'Cats lead back to 10 with 11:27 remaining.
It was still 10 when there was nothing remaining.
The 'Cats, as Fitzgerald had demanded of his captains, had gotten back the hat, The Land of Lincoln trophy that goes to the victor in this Rivalry Game. They had also gotten their 10th win, and kept alive their quest for both a record-setting eleventh and a spot in a New Year's Day Six Bowl. Fitzgerald would be asked about the last, would be asked to make a case for his 16th-ranked 'Cats to be invited to one, and he began by pointing to its schedule, by noting that its two losses were to schools (Michigan and Iowa) with a combined 21-3 record. "That's not an excuse. We shouldn't have lost," he then said, and now came an emotional paean to a group that has already accomplished so much.
"But those are two pretty darn good teams, and the rest of the games we've won," he said here. "We've got the highest graduation rate in the country, if that means anything. It means our guys are about the right things not only on the field, but off the field too. The eyeball test is wins. The other stuff is great for SportsCenter and BTN and for you guys to write about. But we won the games to put us in the conversation.
"I would ask the (selection) committee to take a look at the film. Watch the tape-- especially with that team (ninth-ranked Stanford) we beat earlier in the year. I'm tired of hearing about that it was early in the morning (for a West Coast team playing in the Midwest). I'm tired of it. I'm tired of it not for me. I'm tired of it for those kids that have been through a lot. I just feel we're being disrespected. Pop on the video. We dominated the line of scrimmage. We dominated that football game.
"Obviously we let two get away and that's our fault. That's our fault. But I'm tired hearing about five wins two years in a row, and I'm tired hearing about that game was at nine (PCT). We're a 10-win football team that's played well."
NUsports.com Special Contributor
The 'Cats completed their pre-game drills and now, with just over 25 minutes remaining until kickoff, they started streaming toward their locker room. Slowly, inexorably, they disappeared under the stands until only Pat Fitzgerald and his four captains remained in view. They lingered now in a corner of Soldier Field's south end zone, a quintet together in stark tableau, and here the coach went from one to the other, hugging the safety Traveon Henry and the defensive end Deonte Gibson, hugging the wide receiver Christian Jones and the superback Dan Vitale. Then they huddled.
"He does that every game, brings us up, talks about the situation, kind of gives us his last thoughts," Vitale would later recount. "But really, this game, he didn't have much to say. He just said, 'Let's get the hat back.' That's pretty much what it was all about. We all understood the situation and what we had an opportunity to do.
"So he really didn't have to say too much."
The situation on Saturday was as evident as that scene, which is why Fitzgerald didn't have to say much. The 'Cats were facing Illinois, which made this a Rivalry Game. The 'Cats were facing a five-win team, which meant it was desperate for a victory to be bowl-eligible. They 'Cats were going after their tenth win, which only three teams in school history had managed. The 'Cats were looking to stay on track for 11, which would make program history.
Those cross-currents cut through this afternoon as surely as the winds off Lake Michigan, but the game itself was not a matter of any high drama. It was instead a familiar production, the kind that reflected the character of these 'Cats. "We're a Chicago football team," Fitzgerald would say of that.
"We're kinda old school, '95, neck roll, four-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust. To a lot of people, they think that's boring. I could care less about what they think. I call it winning. That's who we are right now. I'd love to put up the Baylor numbers offensively. But they can't shake a stick at our defense. We know who we are and we have to play to who we are."
They are, most of all, a defense as stout as Falstaff and as miserly as Scrooge. On Saturday it would get nicked for a touchdown on Illinois' opening drive, but then it pitched a shutout over the game's last 54 minutes. "Sometimes you try to feel out an opponent, and sometimes it works your way and sometimes it doesn't," Gibson would later say when asked about its slow start. "This was one of those games where you had to attack the opponent and dictate the tempo. At times at the beginning, we were not doing that consistently. I think you saw that on the first touchdown. But after that we woke up and it was our ball game after that."
On offense, in turn, they are more ground chuck than rib eye, a throwback attack constructed around an offensive line clearing the way for running back Justin Jackson. He would end this day with 172 net yards on a career-high 37 carries. "It's just keep pushing, keep pushing, keep pushing, and eventually you'll break one. That's how running the football is, especially against a good defense," he would say after his busy day. "We learned a lot during the game, we learned where we could win up front, and I think our coaches did a good job with the game plan. You kind of saw that in the second half and especially the fourth quarter, where we busted a few runs."
But after Illinois busted out to its early 7-0 lead, it was the arm of quarterback Clayton Thorson that initially rallied the 'Cats. First he found Austin Carr for 48 streaking down the left hash and then, three plays later, he found Vitale on a short out that the superback carried for 19 yards and the tying touchdown. "I knew I had to focus on the catch," he later said. "It was going to be a tough one. Clayton put it where it needed to be, far enough outside to where their guy couldn't undercut me. Luckily I kept my concentration, got in. We just moved forward from there."
On their next possession, after an Illini three-and-out, they moved forward primarily on the ground, Warren Long finally walking in through a yawning hole opened by center Brad North and guards Matt Frazier and Connor Mahoney. Now came another three-and-out for Illinois and another 'Cat drive, this one ending with Jackson going in from three to put them up 14 with just a little over three minutes gone in the second quarter.
Now, suddenly, this one transformed into a tug-a-war, the 'Cat defense dominant, the 'Cat offense struggling, but then--after 26 minutes of stasis--there came an explosion. It came when a Thorson pass was tipped at the line and picked by Illini linebacker Mason Monheim, who returned it 58 yards for the touchdown that pulled them to within seven with 45 seconds remaining in the third. Now, Thorson would later say, "We knew we had to come out and run the football."
They knew that and they did that, Jackson gaining five and 27 and two on consecutive carries. Then, after an incompletion, Long rushed for 18 down to the Illini 16, and four snaps later Jack Mitchell's 39-yard field goal pushed the 'Cats lead back to 10 with 11:27 remaining.
It was still 10 when there was nothing remaining.
The 'Cats, as Fitzgerald had demanded of his captains, had gotten back the hat, The Land of Lincoln trophy that goes to the victor in this Rivalry Game. They had also gotten their 10th win, and kept alive their quest for both a record-setting eleventh and a spot in a New Year's Day Six Bowl. Fitzgerald would be asked about the last, would be asked to make a case for his 16th-ranked 'Cats to be invited to one, and he began by pointing to its schedule, by noting that its two losses were to schools (Michigan and Iowa) with a combined 21-3 record. "That's not an excuse. We shouldn't have lost," he then said, and now came an emotional paean to a group that has already accomplished so much.
"But those are two pretty darn good teams, and the rest of the games we've won," he said here. "We've got the highest graduation rate in the country, if that means anything. It means our guys are about the right things not only on the field, but off the field too. The eyeball test is wins. The other stuff is great for SportsCenter and BTN and for you guys to write about. But we won the games to put us in the conversation.
"I would ask the (selection) committee to take a look at the film. Watch the tape-- especially with that team (ninth-ranked Stanford) we beat earlier in the year. I'm tired of hearing about that it was early in the morning (for a West Coast team playing in the Midwest). I'm tired of it. I'm tired of it not for me. I'm tired of it for those kids that have been through a lot. I just feel we're being disrespected. Pop on the video. We dominated the line of scrimmage. We dominated that football game.
"Obviously we let two get away and that's our fault. That's our fault. But I'm tired hearing about five wins two years in a row, and I'm tired hearing about that game was at nine (PCT). We're a 10-win football team that's played well."
••••••
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