Northwestern post-mortem (with a side of ILL)

When I cover a football game, I use a spreadsheet-style chart and try to keep copious notes. In addition to tracking the play and the yardage, I’ll note if somebody missed a tackle, made a great block, etc.

As an example, I made sure to jot down that fullback Mark Woodsum shoved Minnesota CB Marcus Sherels all the way from the 3-yard line into the end zone on Arby Fields' touchdown run in the second quarter on Saturday.

But here's my point: If I had written down every missed tackle by Northwestern today, I wouldn’t have had enough pens to finish tracking Minnesota’s 35-24 victory at Ryan Field. I believe every Wildcats starter missed at least one tackle and several guys were repeat offenders. I’ll let the Northwestern coaches pore over the tape and determine how many of the Gophers’ 352 total yards came after initial contact, but a conservative guess would be one-third of the yards.

“Awful! Awful!” shouted NU coach Pat Fitzgerald when asked about his team’s tackling. “Completely out of our character. I’ve got to give the credit to Minnesota. I guess they either put grease on their pants and their jerseys – or we just decided not to tackle with our chests and run our feet and play Big Ten football. That’s something we’ll address and we’ll fix immediately.”

But here’s the problem. Since halftime of the Eastern Michigan game on Sept. 12, Northwestern’s defense has surrendered 12 touchdowns in 10 quarters. A few of them have come on short fields (such as the 3-yard touchdown “drive” that clinched today’s game with 1:43 to go), but most of them have been long marches that chew up yards in chunks big and small.

Or, they’ve been medium marches that would have been long marches if not for poor special teams coverage. Let’s look at Minnesota’s first four TD drives today.

Minny’s opening drive:
--37-yard kick return to UM’s 42.
--Then 5 plays, 58 yards, TD.

Minny’s fourth drive:
--22-yard punt return to the 50.
--Then 4 plays, 50 yards, TD.
(On the third play of this drive, senior safety Brendan Smith, senior CB Sherrick McManis and junior MLB Nate Williams all missed tackles on TE Nick Tow-Arnett’s 16-yard reception. The 190-pound McManis ran into the 250-pounder as if expecting him to fall down from the blow.)

Minny’s first second-half possession:
--Fair catch.
--Then 12 plays, 78 yards, TD.
(On six of these plays, I recorded either a missed tackle or a defensive lineman flattened on his back. That included DE Corey Wootton getting pancaked by 248-pound tight end Curtis Hughes).

Minny’s third second-half possession:
--Short kick return because Charles Brown sold out and tackled Troy Stoudermire at the Minny 17.
--13 plays, 87 yards, TD. The Gophers,who entered the day averaging 85.7 rushing yards per game, carried 9 times for 46 yards on the drive. They finished with 166 rushing yards and 3 TDs (all by Duane Bennett).

This brings up another tangent. This Northwestern defense that features eight returning starters from last year’s Alamo Bowl team forced just 1 turnover (Sherrick McManis’ diving interception). They had 1 sack (Corbin Bryant’s 8-yard play in the first quarter). They had just 1 other tackle for loss (when backup DT Adam Hahn and SLB Ben Johnson sniffed out a Wildcat run that went for minus-1 yard). That’s not nearly enough big plays to win a Big Ten game.

McManis lamented the fact that he dropped a second-quarter interception in Minnesota territory.
“Every play counts,” he said. “Every play.”

Wootton, who smacked the Ryan Field grass after failing to make one play, declared, “upfront, we definitely have to get some more pressure.”

At some point, Northwestern will need to make the plays instead of vowing to fix the problems in practice.

A FEW QUICK INJURY NOTES:
--Left guard Desmond Taylor sat out the first half and part of the second half due to the flu. Keegan Grant started in his place. True freshman Patrick Ward played the second series at LG, but I didn’t see him return.
--Brad Phillips (multiple injuries), Jeravin Matthews (ankle), Bryce McNaul (knee) and Corey Wootton (cramps) all spent time on the sidelines. Wootton missed Minnesota’s go-ahead drive in the fourth quarter because he was in the locker room getting an IV.

AND IN COLUMBUS:
I watched the middle quarters and listened to the fourth on the radio. Between the dumb penalties (safety Supo Sanni tackling OSU QB Terrelle Pryor five yards out of bounds) and the plentiful turnovers (Juice Williams and Rejus Benn were lucky not to lose fumbles inside Illinois' 20), it's clear things are really wrong in Illini-land.

I think the 30-0 loss at Ohio State might have been a kind score for the Illini. They got to OSU's 24-yard line on their first drive, but committed a 12-men-on-the-field penalty and then Juice threw an interception. After that, the Illini never got beyond OSU's 30 (at which point they promptly committed an illegal-formation penalty that put them behind the chains on first down). Then the Illini committed a holding penalty and took a delay of game to wind up back at the 50. Sheesh.

Juice Williams was on the field for all but three possessions of Illinois' games against Missouri and Ohio State. The offense has accounted for 1 field goal and 1 touchdown in those roughly 110 minutes of action.

LW