Northwestern Fans, Let Us Become Unreasonably Overconfident

Northwestern will not lose another football game ever again.  They will keep rolling through the competition all the way to Indianapolis, to Pasadena, to the very gates of the ancient capital Moscou. 

Keep going east, men, what could possibly go wrong?

The Wildcats are 5-0 and ranked #24 in the AP Poll with only one win standing between them and a wretched bowl game.  Of course, Northwestern fans are dreaming bigger with the dire state of the Big Ten.  What looked to be a rebuilding year could be a triumph for Pat Fitzgerald and his invincible legions of perfect footballmen.

Meanwhile, the Northwestern trustees have approved a quarter-billion dollar football facility upgrade that will ensure that the team gets all of the triangular weights, vibrating belt machines, and tug of war ropes that they need to keep their competitive edge against other programs.
The facilities should have everything a modern college football program needs to succeed at the 
highest level

RUSH AND ATTACK

Northwestern's offense took off against South Dakota, and exploded for a school-record 704 yards against Indiana.  Kain Colter, Venric Mark, and Mike Trumpy have formed a three-headed rushing monster that has become unstoppable against inept defenses that specialize in mystified flailing (chin up, Hoosiers.  We'll meet one day in the Big Ten Championship game through a combination of bowl bans, a flu that hits every city but Evanston and Bloomington, or a national obsession with Australian Rules football that leaves the two squads as the only rump club teams in the conference).

The 'Cats raced out to a 27-0 lead against Indiana until the third quarter struck and the team decided to momentarily terrify Northwestern fans.

The third quarter triggers a horrifying transformation for Northwestern's defense, 
much like how Lon Chaney transformed from the mild mannered Dr. Jeckyll to 
a guy who just put some Boston on the jukebox and c'mon it's Boston what 
are you you going to do, just sit there huddled in the corner let's go get out 
there, c'mon, I love this one, let's go, alright fine, but the next four plays are 
all going to be Speedwagon

Colter rushed for 161 yards, grabbed another 131 yards receiving, scored four touchdowns, and returned to the multifaceted skill position role he played with Dan Persa last year.  Meanwhile, Siemian connected for more than 300 yards in the air, and Venric Mark continued to do Venric Mark things.  The ability to play Colter and Siemian at the same time should open up some interesting trick plays, including one where Colter disguises himself as an official and fakes an illegal shift flag on himself before running amongst confused defenders for an easy score.

A VALLEY

Things get tougher for Northwestern as they have to do the unthinkable and leave the welcoming confines of Ryan Field for the first time in a month.  Penn State is certainly a program in disarray as the dust from the criminal investigation and NCAA sanctions settles and the wind sweeps away the makeshift Joe Paterno Ozymandii from the tailgate parking lots.  The Nittany Lions are improving after a not entirely shocking slow start against Ohio and Virginia.  They've handily beaten Navy and Temple, and they clobbered an Illinois team that looks bad enough to surrender The Hat to the rightful collective heads of the Northwestern faithful.  Though Northwestern is undefeated and ranked, they will go into Happy Valley as underdogs.

Penn State has been a perpetual obstacle for Northwestern who have beaten the Lions in only three of fifteen tries.  The last Northwestern win came in 2004 and half of 2010.

Dan Persa runs for a touchdown during his glorious return to 
Pennsylvania, where he led the 'Cats to a 21-0 first half lead in 
his home state and then I turned off the game and just assume 
everything went swimmingly from there

Penn State quarterback Matt McGloin has successfully passed for more than 400 yards, six touchdowns, and no interceptions in his two games against Northwestern.  Running back and Dickensian villain Silas Redd, who effortlessly ran through the Wildcat defense last year, has transferred to USC, though he still returns to State College to berate the indigent workers at his iron foundries and get his tophats and pince-nez fitted.

Workers asking for a Christmas goose can expect threats of dismissal, stiff arms, 
and chop blocks

The Northwestern offense will face its stiffest test yet.  Penn State's defense  is currently fourteenth in the country in points allowed (a little over 13) and has given up just 127.8 rushing yards per game (Northwestern is ranked 14th in rushing yards allowed with a stingy 90), and I imagine that Colter and Mark will have a tougher time getting to the edge.  On defense, Northwestern will have to contain Allen Robinson, who already has 32 catches for 439 yards and 5 TDs.  I expect Bill O'Brien to test the Wildcat passing defense early with long passes, play-action, and a diabolical series of riddles delivered to the Northwestern sideline in wax-sealed parchments that will distract the DBs by making them search the Penn State bench for the secret to their defense while being unaware, for example, that the signals are stored on backup quarterback Steve Bench.

THANK GOODNESS THE BASEBALL SEASON IS OVER

The success of Northwestern has fortunately overshadowed a dark baseball time for Chicago.  The White Sox surprised everyone by challenging Detroit for the AL Central title, but sputtered in their final few weeks.  The Cubs, on the other hand, were out of it on April 2.  They barnstormed to 101 losses as they train-hopped from city to city bringing opposing fans joy with their ineptitude on the mound, in the field, and in the batters' box.  The pitching struggles could be partially explained by the inexperienced bullpen and loss of three top starting pitchers to trades and injury; no term better explains the Cubs in the second half than "staff ace Jeff Samardzija."  They also finished close to the bottom in runs scored and tied the Astros for dead last in OPB with a paltry .302.  The only chance Cubs fans will have to see the ivy turn brown on TV for the next several years will involve a deranged White Sox fan poisoning it and then calling in a radio show before signing off with "Let's go, go-go damn Sox."

The Cubs' futility was expected this season as Epstein and Hoyer are committing to a scorched-earth rebuilding program.  They seem to have found a first baseman in Anthony Rizzo.  Starlin Castro may inspire heated debates in mustard-soaked Cub fan antechambers, but he has become an elite league leader in making outs.  Other prospects may take awhile to arrive.  Neither Josh Vitters nor Brett Jackson seemed ready in their limited debuts; Jackson struck out in nearly 40% of his at-bats and was last seen with a shopping bag full of Jobu dolls.

The 2012 campaign has taken a toll on Theo Epstein, who plans to spend the 
winter meetings ranting about those damn trains and gumming things


I expect the Cubs to make the playoffs when Bud Selig or any Future Bud Selig equivalents decide to do the right thing and allow all teams to make the playoffs, although the first round will be one game where teams rotate pitching, batting, and fielding and are eliminated on an inning-by-inning basis and then they have to flee from robotic tigers or a professional scythe-wielding bounty hunter named The Rt. Hon. Justice of the Scythe in order to escape because we all know that future sports immediately turn into horrifying post-apocalyptic death sports with elaborate betting systems for some reason.

Until then, we can be nothing but patient as the Cubs stave off triple digit losing seasons, failed prospects, nincompoopical base running, and all of the other hallmarks of hopeless baseball.  In other words, it's basically reverting to pretty much every year of the Cubs, so you might as well stock up on overpriced bleacher tickets and t-shirts about drinking beer and try to inadvertently injure someone in a drunken high-five gone awry as Cubs fans have for generations. 

THE UNDEFEATABLISTS

Northwestern has gotten to 5-0 with a string of narrow and occasionally harrowing victories over opponents who do not exactly bring to mind Notre Dame's Four Horsemen.  The Penn State came may well be a sobering preview of a difficult end of the season.  While no Big Ten team has looked like world beaters, it also means that they will be unlikely to take the Wildcats lightly as they will also be scrapping for every conference win they can get in order to get a chance to be publicly humiliated in the Rose Bowl.  A win at Penn State, however, does a lot to show that Northwestern's record is not a scheduling fluke.  I expect the Wildcats to go up 65-0 in the first half, then allow seven consecutive Penn State touchdowns before tackling Robinson three inches from the goal line as time expires and then Pat Fitzgerald explodes on the field leaving a pile of oakleys, crew cuts, and headphones.

AHAHAHAHAHAHA

The post's title is the maniacal cackling we let out after another close shave from the Wildcats in their wild opener against Syracuse.  A few more like that, I fear, will cause a fan to finally crack; after watching Northwestern squander a 35 point then come back to win a quadruple overtime game on a play where the ball bounces off of no less than four defenders before nestling in the arms of a Wildcat receiver in the endzone, he or she will don a purple bodysuit and terrorize the neighborhood by knocking balls, kites, and birds out of the air, acting as a demented vigilante defensive back.  Football is back and I could not be more excited.

Northwestern's traditionally crack offenses and generous defenses have made for thrilling come from behind wins and shattering collapses, sometimes in the same quarter.  The "Cardiac 'Cats" image may be just the thing the school needs to gain fans.  Instead of attempting to appeal to Chicago (which does nothing but bring the wrath of Martez Wilson upon us), why not embrace the reputation as the football team most likely to cause heart conditions?  Ads can depict a guy in a purple shirt yawning as he bungee jumps, base jumps, hang glides, lion tames, and participates in various late 90s Mountain Dew commercials until he finally keels over while watching the Wildcats hold a six point lead with less than five minutes remaining. 

Later billboards will show Fitz intensely loading fans into cannons, scaling the Petronas towers, and 
hunting the ultimate prey: man

Fans certainly have cause for alarm.  Last year's vulnerabilities against the pass look like they've returned.  Trevor Siemian replaced Kain Colter, as the sideline reporter conjured tales of quarterback intrigue (Colter revealed this week that he sustained injuries and asked for Siemian to step in a gentlemanly display).  The Carrier Dome remains an airless death trap filled with misery, despair, and the pervasive stench of armpits.  Yet, the 'Cats remain undefeated as they head to their home opener against their SEC equivalent.

VANDERBILT II

This may shock you, but the last time Northwestern played Vanderbilt, they withstood a harrowing near comeback to hold onto victory.  At that point, the Commodores' head coach had retired just before the beginning of the season, and they sputtered to a 2-10 record.  Last year, new head coach James Franklin led Vandy to the Liberty Bowl.  They may be Northwestern's toughest non-conference opponent.

Franklin prefers the sideline karate chop to the fist pump, making him and 
Fitzgerald ideological enemies

Northwestern has a tall task ahead of them after last week's adventure.  But let's not forget that they looked dominant for much of the first half.  Venric Mark had a spectacular game returning punts, running, and shaking loose for a touchdown reception.  Chi Chi Ariguzo changed the game on defense.  The Wildcats refused to give in after a demoralizing collapse. Northwestern needs a big home win.  Northwestern and Vanderbilt have a kinship as small schools in power conferences that have traditionally been dragged around the football field like a dead bull in the Plaza Del Toros.  There is one key difference.  Northwestern was far better at sucking at football than Vanderbilt.  In fact, in its heyday, there was no school in the country better at losing football games than Northwestern.  Now that both Vandy and NU are scrapping for fringe bowl appearances, it is time to get unnecessarily riled up about beating them and giving them something to think about should we ever meet again in Pizza City.   

THE WORLD'S SHORTEST NFL PREVIEW

Professional football is here, and expectations for the Bears could not possibly be higher.  Brandon Marshall gives Cutler his best receiver alongside rookie Alshon Jeffery.  The aging defense hopes to eke out another creaky season, assuming Urlacher makes it to the end of the year without his knees eroding into stumps and forcing him to haul himself around on a plank of wood like the "hand me down a whiskey" guy from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.  A healthy Matt Forte is one of the best backs in the NFL.  And they tell us that the offensive line should be somewhat better for some reason.

Bears fans are expecting a playoff berth and dreaming of a Superbowl.  They face a difficult path.  The NFC North is one of the toughest divisions in football.  Their three best players are coming off injuries.  Brandon Marshall is on the team.  The NFL has been turned over to replacement referees who will official like so many counterfeit Enrico Palazzos.  Everyone is waiting to exult in Jay Cutler failures because of an instantaneous and visceral reaction to his face. 
 
The only way for Cutler to catch on with the fanbase is to market himself as 
"The Sultan of Surl," a fearless circus man who performs acts of derring-do 
such as high-wire, wing walking, and standing behind J'Marcus Webb on a 
third and long situation.  Of course, he cannot do this without a mustache

The Bears will also be going into the season with additional Wildcats.  They traded for cornerback Sherrick McMannis, who will join Bears stalwarts Nick Roach and Corry Wootton.  They still remain outnumbered by Commodores-- Cutler, D.J. Moore, Earl Bennett, and Chris Williams all hail from Vanderbilt.  I would be shocked if the Bears ever had this many combined alumns from Northwestern and an opponent on the roster at the same time, a vital statistic of mainstream interest that I expect to hear about on both Northwestern and Bears telecasts.

THROWN OBJECTS

There has been a lot of talk of stunts, acts, and daredevilmanship this week as Northwestern football promises another season seat-gripping intensity.  Naturally, I've been boning up on my knowledge of what Wikipedia refers to as the "impalement arts," the practice of hurling pointy things at another person for the delight and amusement of spectators.  These acts include the "Wheel of Death," "The Devil's Door," "The Double Ladder of Death," and "Bending Over on the Orient Express to Tie Your Shoe and Then You Look Up and There Is a Knife Wobbling Where Your Head Was Which Means You've Been Drawn Into a Web of International Intrigue Except This is On Purpose."  Nonetheless, I owe thanks to the heroic anonymous author(s) of this Wikipedia article for including the following sentences:

"There is a trick behind this stunt and budding impalement artists are warned not to attempt it unless coached by an experienced professional."

"For example, organising bodies for competitive archery prohibit activity that involves deliberate shooting in the general direction of a human being."

Most contemporary knife throwers are rank amateurs compared to Lon Chaney's character in The Unknown because they have arms.  In The Unknown, a 1927 Tod Browning silent film, Chaney plays an armless circus performers who delights the crowd by shooting firearms and throwing knives at Joan Crawford with his feet.  Chaney's dark secret is that he actually has arms, but prefers to hide them presumably because the prehensile foot act is more lucrative and throwing knives with your feet while wasting perfectly good hands seems unsporting to discerning 1920s circus audiences.  He is determined to protect his secret at all costs, and anyone who sees his arms ultimately dies by them.  Having hidden arms must be a tremendous tactical advantage and I am surprised that more professional boxers have not considered it.  Here is a clip that not only shows Chaney's act but also shows the comeuppance of an impertinent mustachioed strongman.


HOME OPENER

Northwestern hopes to keep up its winning ways against an equally hungry Vanderbilt squad at home.  As someone unlikely to take up skydiving or jousting or attempting to get the jump on Lon Chaney anytime soon, I'll gladly let the thrill of watching the football team attempt to score more points than the other team substitute.  There's nothing else to do but strap ourselves in and yell about football in the privacy of our own homes or football stadiums.  Five more wins and all roads lead to the Pizza City.