Northwestern University Athletics
The Skip Report: Duke Upon Further Review
9/11/2017 3:50:00 PM | Football
By Skip Myslenski
NUsports.com Special Contributor
UPON FURTHER REVIEW...
THE ENVELOPE, PLEASE: Each week the Northwestern coaches select, among others, an Offensive Player of the Game, a Defensive Player of the Game, an Offensive Big Playmaker of the Game and a Defensive Big Playmaker of the Game. This week, after they got smoked by 24 at Duke, they chose to not hand out any of those awards.
But, fittingly, they did give Special Teams Player of the Game honors to Hunter Niswander, who averaged 49.7 yards on his seven punts against the Blue Devils.
SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS: Safety Kyle Queiro and defensive tackle Tyler Lancaster, two of the Wildcats' leaders, were among those available at Monday's traditional presser. They were very simply asked, "What happened?"
"We started out well, we came out with a lot of energy," said Lancaster. "But I think what it comes down to is getting off the field. They put together 10-play, 15-play drives. That tired us down. We couldn't get off the field, then we're back on quickly after that. If we can get off on third down, I think that changes the game."
"To add to that, doing a better job on first and second down. That encompasses defense as a whole," Queiro then said. "Fitting better on our tackles. There was a lot of hidden yardage missed that wasn't touched on, but that I just noticed. Looking at the game we contact the guy and he may fall forward for an extra four, five yards. That makes a difference on the play calling and the situation we're facing on third down. With that they were able to get into a lot of third-and-ones-or-twos, which contributed to their high success rate on third down."
JUST THE FACTS, JACK: Here are the numbers that testify to the acuity of Queiro's observation. On its 22 third downs, Duke needed one yard four times; two yards two times; three yards once; four yards twice; and five yards four times. That's a total of 13 very-manageable situations. In stark contrast, on just one of their 10 third downs did the 'Cats need less than six yards.
MORE ANSWERS: Earlier, shortly after opening his presser, Pat Fitzgerald said, "Looking back, I thought we came with the right mindset, I thought we started the right way. We had an opportunity to seize some momentum. Even though we had given up some plays, we had an opportunity to seize some momentum (and) we get the targeting call. That was a big swing in the first half. But then we got momentum backing going into halftime, got a big stop. Not to seize that in the third quarter was the turning point of the game. Credit Duke. I thought they played outstanding."
MORE FACTS, JACK: The 'Cats led 3-0 late in the first quarter when safety Jared McGee was penalized for targeting and ejected from the game. This call negated an interception by Godwin Igwebuike and, two plays later, the Blue Devils put up their first touchdown of the day. Now the NU offense went three-and-out; Duke drove for another touchdown; Superback Cameron Green turned the ball over on the third play of their next possession; and Duke converted all three of their third-down opportunities on its way to the score that put it up 21-3.
It was still that when Queiro forced a fumble with less than two minutes remaining until the half, and here the Wildats' offense roused itself and drove 54 yards in just over a minute to close the gap to 11. The momentum was theirs, then, as they headed to the locker room. But, in the third quarter, that offense held the ball just 3:49, ran just a dozen plays, and netted a mere 18 yards. Duke, in these 15 minutes, built its lead to 21.
THE AFTERMATH: Later, after the estimable Justin Jackson had carried just seven times for a mere 18 yards, Fitzgerald announced that the running back was a bit banged up. Was that the bigger issue against Duke, or was it bad blocking that resulted in the 'Cats netting just 22 rushing yards?
"I'm not ever going to make excuses," Fitzgerald said. "But we had a couple of opportunities there where I think we were trying to do too much."
"You go back and you watch the tape, it's never as good as you think and it's never as bad as you think. When you lose, you lose. You could nitpick this and that. But when you look at where some seams were early, I think we missed some. We're pulling and we trip and fall over a guy. If we get around the corner, we have a big play. We're really close, and that's with nine guys in the box. We've got to be able to win the one-on-ones on the outside. We went 0-for on Saturday pretty much. When we were able to get that going against Nevada, obviously the game opened up."
AND NOW: There were, with good reason, questions on Monday about the 'Cats mood in the wake of their beatdown.
"Anytime you get your fanny whipped, you've got to look at yourself in the mirror first," said Fitzgerald. "I'm a big fan of the poem The Man In the Glass. It starts and ends with me, and you look to create solutions. We've presented those to the guys this morning. There were ample opportunities for us to win the game on Saturday. It got away from us a little bit at the end because our defense ran out of gas. Credit Duke for that. But at the end of the day, there are areas that are right there for us to make plays in. We've got to go make them happen. All three phases. All three phases. So what's the mood? The mood is let's go get better. Let's improve. Let's get back on the practice field and get things going."
"We're in a state of heightened urgency," Kyle Queiro added minutes later. "Many teams that are put in this situation could be in a state of panic. But it's just doing what we do, but doing it better. And harder. This is going to really be a testament to the kind of football team we are, this opportunity to be able to respond. Being able to respond is one of the best indicators of the maturity level of a team. You're going to have your answer pretty soon."
"We've definitely put in the work. We've definitely done all the right things in the off-season coming into the season," Tyler Lancaster finally said. "I think the energy inside, the attitude, that needs to get up. Physically we can change things. We can fix things on the practice field. But internally we need to set a fire under us. Spark us up."
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