The Northwestern Wildcats were again in position get their first Big Ten victory and end the current losing skid. For the fifth week in a row, however, the Wildcats failed to produce in the second half, falling to Penn State 34-24 at home, extending the current losing streak to five games.
It seemed to be a different chapter in the same story for the Wildcats early, as the offense was rolling while the defense appeared confused and out of position. Penn State put up 27 points in the first half while racking up 293 total yards. The ‘Cats stayed in the game – again – because the offense was able to keep up. NU tallied 24 points in the first 30 minutes on 281 yards of total offense.
“We haven’t had a problem with [missed tackles] up to this game,” senior safety Brian Peters said. “Myself included, I missed a few tackles in the first half that were pretty big. Missed tackles don’t win you games; missed tackles don’t get the ball back in the hands of…our offense. The more we can get off the field, the more they have a chance to put points on the board and that’s something we didn’t do in the first half.”
In the second half, however, the Northwestern defense flipped the script. The ‘Cats defense gave up just 88 yards and seven points after halftime, arguably the best the unit has played all season.
“Once they settled down, the guys got into the locker room, looked each other in the eye and said, `We are going to do something about it,’ and I thought they responded pretty boldly,” head coach Pat Fitzgerald said. “That is the defense we need to see for the rest of the year.”
Consistency, however, was still lacking. The Northwestern offense sputtered to a halt after halftime, gaining just 106 yards while being held scoreless. Mistakes and self-inflicted wounds hurt the offense significantly.
Among those mistakes was a dropped pass by Jeremy Ebert that would have been a touchdown, an interception thrown by Dan Persa, and back-to-back costly sacks taken by Kain Colter.
“We didn’t execute when we needed to,” Ebert said. “We made some mistakes. Big players make big plays when they need to and we didn’t do that tonight.”
Mistakes have hurt the ‘Cats all season, with coaches and players alike consistently saying the team feels as though they are beating themselves. Having been outscored 35-0 in the second half in the two home Big Ten games thus far, that fact is difficult to dispute.
“Our performance tonight was a tale of `what ifs,’” Fitzgerald said. “We had plenty of opportunities, especially in the second half, to do the things that winners do, but unfortunately, we were not able to accomplish that.”
Northwestern now sits at 2-5 on the season and 0-4 in Big Ten play. The ‘Cats are in serious jeopardy of seeing the bowl appearance streak – currently at three and the hallmark of the Fitzgerald era – come to an end this season.
“The season’s not over, we’ve got five games,” Peters said. “You win five games, you go to a bowl game if I’m not mistaken. That’s our goal and we’re taking it one game at a time.”
NU has games remaining at Indiana and Nebraska, and at home against Minnesota, Rice, and Michigan State. Sitting at 2-5, the ‘Cats will need to win four of those remaining to make a fourth straight bowl. At Nebraska and at home against a rolling MSU team will prove tough. And given NU’s standard for playing down to opponents (read: Army) the other three games are by no mean’s certain victories.
In other words, Northwestern’s bowl hopes are in serious jeopardy.
“Everyone is extremely frustrated. When you’re losing games, no one is going to be happy,” Peters said. “But we have to turn that frustration into motivation. We have to start making things happen for 60 minutes…. No one has a secret recipe for it. You just have to go back to the grindstone, put in the work and fix what is going on. If you keep working at it, it’s going to happen and that’s what we have to do.”
-Jamie Arkin
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