As the tired cliché goes “you can only play the opponents in front of you.” Building off that, you can’t control who is in your league, and how strong or weak they are. Another shopworn platitude “a win’s a win” is certainly true, especially in cases where the sample size, the opportunities for wins, losses and draws were significant.
These lessons certainly applied to Manchester United in 2016-17, the first year Jose Mourinho was in charge and they achieved a sorta kinda “plastic treble.” You can’t really describe that team as good, or bad, but you must give them kudos for being “achieved.” The current Northwestern football team is quite similar, not actually good, nor bad either though, and just kind of mediocre.
And by the time the regular season ends, you will be able to describe them as accomplished.
In order to explain this, you’ll just have to bare with me if you’re a.) a college football fan who doesn’t follow English football or b.) an English football supporter who doesn’t pay attention to American college football.
I’ll be listing out basic facts pertaining to your sport that the follower of the other sport just doesn’t know.
You’ll be educated here at times, bored at other times. Let’s start with the British soccer team.
2016-17 Manchester United
United began the first season under Jose Mourinho by beating Leicester City in the Community Shield, a glorified friendly that pits the winners of the previous season’s FA Cup tournament (United) and Premier League title (Leicester). It is a trophy game, so it does count for something, even though it’s still mainly just a preseason tilt.
Later in the year, on February 26, they beat Southampton in the EFL Cup a.k.a. the League Cup, a tournament so less than prestigious, it changes its title sponsor almost every year. The League Cup is something that doesn’t really need to exist, because it’s a poor man’s FA Cup.
United weren’t even in the Champions League (think European NCAA Tournament) because they finished one spot shy of qualification the year before.
The Champions League does have a NIT though and it’s called the Europa League. United actually won that competition, for the first time in the illustrious club’s history, and they did it just a couple days after the terrorist bombing of Manchester Arena during an Ariana Grande concert.
Winning this competition earned them a ticket to the following year’s Champions League, and this is an idea the NCAA MUST PICK UP ON!
Think about it- no one cares about the NIT at all, but if that bracket’s winner got an auto bid to the next year’s big dance- way more people would be interested. In the Premier League, United finished a dreadful sixth.
However, they won two minor trophies, some would say two and a half trophies; Jose Mourinho would even say three. In short, they were a very mediocre team that actually accomplished something.
2018 Northwestern Football
First off, maybe you heard the announcer on ESPN say this during Northwestern’s 31-21 loss to Notre Dame on Saturday night:
https://twitter.com/PaulMBanks/status/1059455406064484352
That’s a pretty low bar for “magic” as NU is currently 5-4 (5-1 in conference play). It’s been so long since they went winless in non-conference play that the referenced is from Gary Barnett’s first year, and two seasons before the Year 1 BCE of modern NU football- 1995.
Northwestern is projected to finish 7-5, with a 7-2 record in league play.
They have won 10 games three times in the past six years, so 7-5 is not a magical season, but thanks ESPN dude for trying to hype up the game and make more people watch.
But hey an ESPN college football talking head discussing something other than the playoff rankings! That almost never happens!
However, there is actually something very special and unique about this year for NU. It’s kind of like 2012 Wisconsin, who went to the Big Ten title game, and DEMOLISHED Nebraska despite having just a 7-5 record. The two teams ahead of them in their division, Penn State and Ohio State couldn’t go due to sanctions.
Or it’s like the 2014 Carolina Panthers who won the AFC South division title and went to the NFL playoffs despite a 7-8-1 record.
All Northwestern has to do now to qualify for the Big Ten title game is win two of their last three games.
After the trip to Iowa on Saturday, their last two are at Minnesota (1-5 in the league, -104 in point differential for conference play) and home to Illinois (2-4 in league play with a -92).
That is just how it works sometimes- a given team really flourishes in one type of competition, but flounders in another, and the strength of the opposition in those competitions doesn’t entirely predict results. This Northwestern is a lot like that United in this regard.
Regardless of what happens at Iowa on Saturday, the Cats still control their own destiny and the task in front of them is very very doable. Plus, a team that lost to both Duke and Akron at home reaching the conference title game says oh so much about the disparity in strength between the Big Ten’s two divisions.
And any time a team not named Wisconsin reaches the conference title game from the Badgers’ division, it is interesting and exciting to some extent.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, regularly appears as a guest pundit on WGN CLTV and co-hosts the “Let’s Get Weird, Sports” podcast on SB Nation.
He also contributes sociopolitical essays to Lineups.com and Chicago Now. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram. The content of his cat’s Instagram account is unquestionably superior to his.