Northwestern’s woes begin with defense
Northwestern will carry a three-game losing streak into Saturday night’s game at Iowa, and the team’s problems are easy to spot.
Besides squandering second-half leads against Illinois and Michigan the past two weeks, the Wildcats rank last in the Big Ten in total defense, giving up 439 yards per game.
“I think the biggest problems we’ve had have all come down to like one-man breakdowns,” said Jack DiNardo, a senior defensive tackle from Hinsdale Central. “You see everybody on defense doing things well. The challenge presents itself when you’re asked to play a four-quarter game and do your job well the entire game.”
The defense can’t really use youth or inexperience as an excuse. The Wildcats start seven seniors and opened the season with seven returning starters, though a couple of those returnees lost their job.
“I think we had a confident attitude coming into the season and never did we anticipate this three-game slide,” DiNardo said. “I think it’s important just to kind of remind ourselves, and I think the coaches have taken the same approach, to remind us, ‘You guys can play. You guys are good players.’ We just need to shore up a few things.”
Pass rush is one area of concern. Michigan quarterback Denard Robinson was not sacked and often had time for his receivers to run complicated deep routes.
As a team, Northwestern has 10 sacks this season. As a comparison, Illinois’ Whitney Mercilus has 8 ½ by himself.
“We’re just going to continue working with those guys,” Fitzgerald said. “That’s why we get paid. We have to work our butts off to help them get better.
“We’ve got to improve fundamentally. We’ve got to execute better. When we’ve done that this year, we’ve been pretty good. When we haven’t, we’ve stunk. We need to stop stinking.”
Wins in Iowa:Northwestern has won five of the last six games against Iowa, winning three times in Iowa City and four times by a touchdown or less.#147;We#146;ve been very fortunate,#148; NU coach Pat Fitzgerald said. #147;All of these games come down to winning the turnover ratio in the second half. Every game I#146;ve been a part of in this series has been close at halftime.#147;For us, it#146;s going to be critical that we start fast. It#146;s going to be a raucous environment. We can#146;t get knocked out in the first round.#148;Freshman surprise:Wide receiver Christian Jones, a true freshman from Houston, moved to the top of the depth chart this week after catching 3 passes for 68 yards against Michigan.#147;It#146;s a production business and he produced on Saturday,#148; coach Pat Fitzgerald said. #147;He had 3 opportunities to make plays and he did. He blocked his fanny off. We#146;re going to reward that, especially when we#146;re looking for guys who can make a difference and help us win.#148;The Wildcats will continue using a variety of receivers. Eight different players caught passes on Saturday, including backup quarterback Kain Colter.