GO TO PREVIOUS SECTION: November 9 to November 15
PART VI, continued
November 16th to November 22nd
November 21, 2005
One of the best aspects of following a team is that while everybody else in the country only sees them once they’ve Made It, the true fans get to witness the entire arc, from lousy to decent to competitive to A Few Pieces Away to championship contender. We get to see all of the key games, the statement games, the games in which their up-and-coming club gives a glimpse into the future. Those are the ones that linger in a fan’s memory, year after year, the games that people point to when their team is poised to play in the playoffs or a title game for the first time in forever. Those are the games when a fan says to himself, “Ah, now that’s a winning team.”
We’ve seen that a lot over the past year.
We saw it on December 1st when the Fighting Illini dismantled top ranked Wake Forest by 18. We saw it on January 12th when the Bulls clamped down on the 76ers by 32. And we saw it again in October, this time during the first round of the American League playoffs, when the White Sox hosted the defending champion Boston Red Sox.
All season long, the Sox had been the best team in the American League, and for most of the year they were the best team in baseball. They tore out of the gate, the first team to hit the 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70 win marks. Yet even with those milestones, the word on the White Sox was still “Wait and see.” Then came the stumble, a 15-game division lead dropped to a game and a half. The national critics, along with some of the locals, pointed to this collapse as proof that they were right, that the Sox were just a bunch of impressive numbers that didn’t equal an impressive team.
But the real fans knew better. They always do. So what if it took the sweep of Boston for the rest of the country to come around? Getting there first is half the fun.
Yesterday, it was the Bears.
GODDAMN-is-this-exciting! This is what I missed most with the Bulls last season. The local feel. The growth of The Mood. Ever since the Bears won three straight last season with a ferocious, turnover-producing de-fense, we’ve known this D was going places. But in 2004 their performance was up and down. This season, it’s been up, though without being spectacular.
Having won five in a row, the Bears stood at 6-3 yesterday. They were alone in first place. Their defense was playing well. They were winning. And yet, what was this team? Rookie QB. Solid run game. No passing attack. The secondary was hyped during the preseason, but they hadn’t played well. The Bears were 6-3, sure, but who had they beaten? Now the Carolina Panthers were coming to town, the team most people thought would win the NFC, the team that would prove the Bears had been beating up on patsies.
This was all we heard from the national media.
But I knew. We knew.
The real fans always I know.
Carolina came into Soldier Field as the favorite in the NFC. They left bruised and beaten, proof of the Bears’ defensive dominance.
I said Goddamn! It was beautiful. Our defense attacked Jake Delhomme all day, stuffed Carolina’s run, kicked their ass up and down the field. Kyle Orton looked great, the passing attack looked sharp, but back we go to the defense, again and again, a defense that looked like it was playing a video game out there.
The Bears sacked Delhomme eight times, all eight coming from the D-line, a line that also contributed two forced fumbles and pressured Delhomme into two interceptions which the offense turned into ten points. Of the eight sacks, five came from the Ogunleye/Brown tandem. They were playing the way we do in Super Tec, or any other game in which we’ve figured out how to get to the quarterback on every play.
The Bears put everything together yesterday, and by the end of the contest there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that if the Bears win the NFC North, it will be because they won it, and not because they were simply the best of four lousy teams. When this Bears team develops into a championship-caliber club, be it later this year or in the next two years, they will be putting together this kind of game every Sunday.
******
“Isn’t it great rooting for a football team that’s winning?”
That wasn’t so much a question from Ben as it was a revelation. Watching the Bears is always exciting—sixteen games a year…that’s all I get—and when they’re winning it’s an enormous bonus. The 2001 team was fun, and exciting, but there was that feeling of luck that we just could not shake. I mean, as much as I denied it at the time, Mike Brown in back-to-back weeks…
So now we’ve got an exciting Bears team, and even with the success that the Bulls, Illini, and White Sox have had this year, there’s still nothing like good Bears football.
The Bears are the team that brings the whole city together in a way that none of the others do, or can, and nothing brings me more happiness than to see them playing well and adding to the great legacy of this Chicago football club.
So football is great, and my birthday was great, and Mom’s birthday is today, which is also great, and all of that means Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, is approaching. Meghan and I will be going home tomorrow, and by Wednesday all of my best friends from home will be in Evanston. Nothing makes me happier.
FIRST AND TEN NORTHWESTERN!
The 1995 Rose Bowl Wildcats
What always made Northwestern football special was the access. The stadium was left open during the week, and my friends and I would go there and play pick-up games on the turf. Sometimes we would just walk there after school and hang out on the benches, enjoying the feeling of being in the stadium of our favorite local team. When we couldn’t go to the games, we could listen to the loud speaker from our houses while we played our own game of tackle or two-hand touch. I rarely had actual tickets, but a lot of my friends did, and on game days we could usually get two of us in on one ticket, or on one stub during the second half. When they weren’t letting us in for some reason, we could always get onto the field afterwards. We could even get near the locker room, since we knew the tunnel at Dyche Stadium that the players used. Dyche was like having a friend with a huge back yard; we hung out there as much as we could.
One of my favorite sports memories of all-time came in the fall of 1993 when the Cats were hosting Boston College. Northwestern was trailing 21-14 late in the game when Len Williams hit Lee Gissendaner with what seemed to be the tying score. Instead of kicking the extra point, the Cats went for two, and won the game 22-21. We didn’t have tickets, watching instead from just outside of the gate on the east side of the north endzone. When the clock hit zero and the Wildcats won, they opened the gate and let us charge the field. People were going nuts; this was the same B.C. team that would go on to beat Notre Dame a week after the Fightin’ Irish would hand the eventual national champion Florida State Seminoles their only loss of the season.
Fans covered the field like children on a pile of candy…guys were going up the goalposts, and somebody lifted me up to them. Unfortunately a police officer made me get down. Still, it was awesome. Just a flood of fans all going loco after our beloved Northwestern football team had come through with a huge win against a legit program.
After we left the field, my two friends and I went through the tunnel and down next to the laundry room where the players would drop off their jerseys. We high-fived each one as they came through the hallway, and to our surprise we weren’t the only visitors there. Former Northwestern running back and then-Bears fullback Bob Christian was in the house. He told us that B.C. alum and then-Bears receiver Tom Waddle—my favorite Bear of all-time—was going to come to the game with him but then backed out at the last minute. Even missing out on Waddle wasn’t enough to ruin the moment; Bob Christian turned out to be one of the real nice guys in sports, and he was a Wildcat/Bear, which was an outstanding combo. Still, most of our focus was centered entirely on the thrill of the victory.
We left and walked down Central Street. Everybody—everybody—everybody was in a festive mood. That game was the first time that I ever saw the Cats get pub in Sports Illustrated. Granted it was a blip in the “Inside College Football” section in the back, but still. This is Sports Illustrated we’re talking about! The magazine that usually runs stories on Michael and Montana had a story on our Northwestern Wildcats. Amazing.
Later in the week we were back at Dyche, running around the stadium as we always did, and to our surprise we saw that someone had gone out on the field and drawn white footprints on the turf, tracking the exact rout that Gissendaner ran on the final touchdown. Donny Burba and I took our ball and traded off jobs, one of us lining up as Williams and the other as Gissendaner, running the rout exactly as it was drawn on the field, and then celebrating the touchdown, and then switching so that the other person would get to experience the thrill of the score. We did this for hours that day. It was all we talked about in school…
Still, that was one game, nothing more, and since we were so used to watching school upon school come into Evanston and trample our Cats, we soaked up every little bit of victory we could find. Especially the Boston College game, which felt like the Rose Bowl. It was wonderful. And for a while, it was all we had.
******
The first indelible image of the glorious 1995 Rose Bowl season comes from the first game of the year. We were at Josh’s house, watching the Cats with Josh and his dad as they battled Notre Dame in South Bend. Northwestern had played great football for the entire game, and late in the fourth they led the Irish 17-9. Notre Dame scored a touchdown—I don’t remember how—and then they went for two and the tie, and here’s where it grabbed me. Notre Dame’s quarterback Ron Powlus dropped back to throw, slipped, and his knee hit the turf. And it took a second or two for the significance of that to sink in, but when it did…Oh my God! He slipped! He slipped! His knee touched! I think we just beat Notre Dame.
Is that possible?
I don’t remember what happened after that. I don’t remember if Notre Dame went for an onside kick. I don’t remember if the Cats were able to kneel the ball down or if they had to pick up a first. I just don’t remember. But that image of Powlus slipping as he went back to pass…that I will never forget.
Had it really happened? Had we really defeated the Notre Dame Fightin’ Irish, and in South Bend no less? NU had a bye week after the Notre Dame game, which gave everybody two weeks to enjoy the glow of that victory. The following week we hosted Miami of Ohio, and after taking a 28-7 lead into the fourth quarter, the Wildcats blew a pair of punt snaps and ended up losing the game 30-28. Ah, we thought. That’s Northwestern football. We were upset, but we Understood. Week 3 had the Cats running over Air Force 30-6, and Week 4 had us beating Indiana 31-7. We were 3-1, with one huge upset win, one awful heartbreaking loss, and two big wins over crap teams at home.
What was this team? They looked good, better than most people thought they would be. The Cats had gained notoriety after beating the Irish, even gaining the number 25 ranking in the AP poll. They lost that ranking after the loss to Miami, and that big question was born.
What was this team? It seemed as if they had some stars—(I still remember Sports Illustrated’s one sentence preview of the Cats, something to the effect of: “Their best player is punter Paul Burton”)—with sophomore tailback Darnell Autry, junior linebacker Pat Fitzgerald, and freshman receiver D’Wayne Bates. They had a great rushing attack, a steady quarterback with great leadership and a decent arm in Steve Schnur, and a terrific defense…but still: what were they?
We found out on October 7th.
That was the day the Wildcats traveled to Ann Arbor and beat Michigan.
One of the thrills of going to Northwestern games was the chance to see the Big Ten’s best. No offense to NU, but when guys like Tyrone Wheatley or Desmond Howard came to town, it felt as if we were seeing, well, real players. Not that we didn’t love our Wildcats. We did completely. But we had no illusions as to the level of talent at Michigan, Wisconsin, and Ohio State compared to the level of talent in Evanston. I mean, their guys were headed to the NFL. Couldn’t say that for many pre-’95 Cats.
The Wolverines were undefeated heading into our game, and in front of a national television audience the Wildcats let everybody know that they were the team that beat Notre Dame, not the one that lost to Miami of Ohio. When Northwestern took a lead into the lockerroom at halftime, my friends and I ran over to Mustards for a quick burger/dog pick up.
Keith, Steve, and Jerry the owner were there with a small TV on the counter to watch the game. We were all buzzing with excitement, and though it was understood that our orders were going to be in and out with much less than the usual conversation, we were all sharing this experience of our beloved Wildcats being a half of football away from beating the mighty Michigan Wolverines.
Sure enough, the Cats held on, knocking off Michigan 19-13. This time we believed it. This time we knew it was true. Oh my God! We just beat Michigan! WE JUST BEAT MICHIGAN! WE JUST FUCKING BEAT MICHIGAN!!!
The Michigan win moved us up to number 14 in the AP poll. Now we were in the thick of the college football big wigs. Barring a complete demolition, it was unlikely that we would lose our ranking after just one week. Instead it was a 27-17 win over the Golden Gophers in Minnesota. Darnell Autry continued his wonderful season with three touchdowns, and the Cats rallied from 14-3 to win their fourth in a row, spoiling Minnesota’s homecoming in the process.
The following week was our homecoming, Wisconsin coming to Evanston. This was Important And Revealing Win Number Three, as the Wildcats trashed Wisconsin 35-zip. Now we were catching on, and the “first-time-sinces” were beginning to pile up.
The Wisconsin game was the first sell-out at Dyche since 1983 and the first shutout since 1986, a shutout they secured by stuffing the Badgers on a goal line stand at the end of the game. The win gave the Cats their first winning season since 1971, and made them bowl eligible for the first time since the 1949 Rose Bowl. When the AP polls came out that week, the Cats were ranked eighth in the country, cracking the top ten for the first time since 1963 and giving them 1,000 points in the poll for the first time since 1959.
4-0 in the Big Ten, 6-1 overall, eighth in the AP.
We were catching on.
Like anything in life, the Rose Bowl season had its ups and downs. The ups were obvious: the Wildcats were winning with a team full of likeable, personable, and—ta da!—talented guys. The downs were that we now had to deal with the sudden presence of a billion bandwagon fans. The Wildcats weren’t just the toast of the town; they were national darlings. In the words of Pete Venkman, they were a “legitimate phenomenon!” Everyone loved them. Suddenly, everyone was a “lifer.” Every famous to semi-famous NU alum in the country was going on TV to talk about “their Cats.” But it wasn’t really that big of a deal, because the real fans always know. Really, we were just thrilled to be watching this incredible season, this incredible team. This team that took us all on the greatest ride a sports fan could ever think to go on. In its own way, the ’95 Wildcats were as special as the ’85 Bears.
October 28th: Another homecoming game, another comeback from down 14-3. The Cats score two second half touchdowns in Champaign to beat the Illini, with Darnell scoring the game-winning TD late in the fourth. At this point, he had gained legit first name status. The Cats were now sixth in the AP, and mighty Penn State was coming to town.
This was a big one, with ABC in the house to broadcast the game. ABC. This isn’t cable we’re talking about. ESPN is a huge deal, but there’s something about being on a basic network where anyone with a television can find you…that was an amazing feeling. This was November now, two days before my birthday, and the Cats were 7-1 and riding a six-game winning streak. Everybody knew—everybody knew—and this was the game where we would get our opportunity to show every football fan in America what this team was all about. Schnur and Autry and Bates and Musso and Hartl and fifth-year senior center Rob Johnson. Fitzgerald and Chris Martin and Ismaeli and Dailey and Rice and Collier and Rodney Ray. Sam Valenzisi and Brian Gowins, and yes, Paul Burton. Gary Barnett…the Northwestern Wildcats.
And they delivered. On national television.
Northwestern 21, Penn State 10. Our first ever win over the Nittany Lions, and the first time that any school—ANY school, ever—beat Notre Dame, Michigan, and Penn State in the same season. The Cats were now guaranteed a January 1st bowl game, back in the days when that meant something. And for the piece-de-resistance: Darnell Autry found himself on the cover of Sports Illustrated. The same Sports Illustrated that usually had Michael or Montana on their cover put Darnell Autry on it, the running back for—that’s right—our very own, home grown, one and only Northwestern Wildcats.
I nearly cried when I saw that cover.
I still remember the headline: “DARNELL AUTRY LEADS POWERFUL NORTHWESTERN PAST PENN STATE.”
It was that “powerful” that got me. It was such a wonderful adjective, one I hadn’t heard yet. I’d heard “upstart,” “surprise,” “charismatic,” “charming,” “Cinderella,” “gritty,” “tough,” and even “ferocious,” but never “powerful.” Powerful. Powerful. The POWERFUL Northwestern Wildcats. It was a word of such authority, and it came from Sports Illustrated of all places. It felt so, so, legitimate.
Now we were waiting for the collapse. The Sports Illustrated cover curse. Seemed like a perfect team to happen to. But no: instead of a letdown, Northwestern beat Iowa 31-20, their first win over the Hawkeyes since 1973. This game had a sad side note: star linebacker Pat Fitzgerald broke his leg and was knocked out for the remainder of the season. Still, the Cats were now 9-1 and 6-0 in the Big Ten. We were tied with Ohio State for first place in the conference, and were now eyeing the coveted Rose Bowl, back when that meant something.
Unfortunately we did not play Ohio State that season, and due to the Buckeyes’ perfect overall record they held the tie breaker against us for the Rose Bowl birth. Still, a bowl game was a bowl game, and like the team kept saying: “Somewhere warm on January 1st.”
There was only one game left to be played: November 18th in West Lafayette against the Purdue Boilermakers. The Wildcats were looking to close out their perfect Big Ten season with a win, and once again the team showed that they were indeed a powerful group. Senior corner Chris Martin returned a pick 76 yards for a score, Steve Schnur hit Bates for a 72-yard touchdown, Darnell dominated with 226 yards on the ground, and the Cats took it to the Boilers 23-8. We had won the Big Ten, a perfect 8-0 record in the conference, our first Big Ten title since 1936. The only thing left to do was watch the November 25th game between Michigan and Ohio State. If the Wolverines won, the Cats were headed to the Rose Bowl.
You have to remember…the excitement for this team all around Chicago by November was nearly unprecedented. It was an exciting team with an exciting story; no doubt about that. But there wasn’t really much else going on at the time. The only game in town that rivaled Northwestern were the Bulls, who were starting their first full season with MJ since 1992-93 and their first season with Dennis Rodman. This was the year that they would go 72-10 and bring the championship back to Chicago, and while that was exciting, everyone knew that the Bulls would be playing through June while Northwestern was done on January 1st. The Bears were following up a surprising 1994 playoff run with a mediocre 1995, the Cubs and Sox had sloshed through the strike-shortened 1995 season, and the Blackhawks were no longer the power they were in the early 1990s. We were in a lull, and then along came this Little Engine That Could football team. They played hard, they played well, they ran the ball, they played intimidating defense (third in the country in points allowed), and they smiled a lot while doing it. What’s not to love?
Finally Thanksgiving came around, and two days later it was Michigan-Ohio State. What a day. Except for possibly the bitter Notre Dame fans—and, obviously, the Buckeye fans—we had the entire country rooting for Michigan. Ohio State was a machine, stocked full of pro players. Who wouldn’t want to see Michigan take it to them in Ann Arbor, simultaneously sending Northwestern to the Rose Bowl and bumming out all of Columbus? ABC ran a live feed from Evanston to show Coach Barnett and the NU players watching the game. I was in Evanston too, that day, watching the game at Sven’s house with the Staffords and many friends.
And wouldn’t you know it? The Wolverines took it to the Buckeyes, defended their home field, and sent Ohio State packing, 31-23. Northwestern erupted. We erupted. The Cats were going to the Rose Bowl.
NORTHWESTERN IS GOING TO THE ROSE BOWL! NORTHWESTERN IS GOING TO THE ROSE BOWL! NORTHWESTERN IS GOING TO THE ROSE BOWL! NORTHWESTERN IS GOING TO THE FUCKING ROSE BOWL!
******
The Rose Bowl.
In Pasadena.
The Granddaddy of them All.
This is the game where the best team in the Big Ten meets the best in the Pac 10. Teams play every year in those two conferences, hoping for nothing more than a shot at the Rose Bowl. Big time schools in other big time conferences get to go to any other bowl they want…but not the Rose Bowl. The biggest game in college football was by reservation only, and this year, Northwestern’s name was on the list.
Now it was official. Nearly everybody in America knew something about the Wildcats at this point. It was difficult not to. They were the biggest story in sports. Not just in college football or football or Evanston or Chicago or Illinois or the Midwest but all of sports. They spent the entire month of December as near superstars. They were ranked third in the nation, trailing only Nebraska and Florida, the two schools who would play for the national championship that year. Darnell Autry was invited to the Heisman ceremony in New York, where he placed fourth in the voting. A Wildcat fourth in the Heisman voting? Are you kidding me???!!! The Cats made it to a Wheaties Box, the true sign of American sports royalty. Injured stars Sam Valenzisi and Pat Fitzgerald were named All-Americans. Darnell and Gary Barnett were on the cover of TV Guide, the team did a turn on Leno, and everywhere you looked somebody was wearing purple. You couldn’t walk around the North Shore over that winter break without seeing somebody in their purple. It was absolutely impossible. What a feeling.
When it was finally time to look at the game, the Cats found the Trojans of Southern California waiting for them along with superstar receiver Keyshawn Johnson. USC was favored over Northwestern, and that was fine; when the game began I was busy looking at the crowd, a crowd filled with so much purple you’d think somebody had dumped a vat of grape jelly over the stands. I remember being so thrilled just to see NORTHWESTERN in big bold letters in the endzone, a big purple endzone. I remember Darnell being sick for that game with the flu, but still getting his 100 as he had in every game that year. I remember the Trojans taking a big lead on us—Brian Musso fumbling and someone on USC scooping it up and running it back for a TD—and a feeling of “Well, it’s been fun” settling into Ric’s basement, where we watched the game. I remember the glorious comeback, the Cats taking a 32-31 lead in the fourth quarter, and then having the ball with that lead. And sadly, I remember the Trojans turning it around with a touchdown and a field goal to ice the game by a final of 41-32. We fought hard, and we lost. So it goes.
That was the first game I’d ever cried after watching.
That was the first loss that ever filled me with true pride and joy.
The next day, still in winter break, there was a feeling around Evanston. Everywhere you went, people had the same look on their faces. It was a tired, satisfied, happy look, like we’d all gone on a great journey together that took us farther than we’d ever expected, and we were all just grateful for the ride.
I remember going into Mustards shortly there after. There had always been Northwestern stuff up on the walls. I remember a poster from the early 90’s promoting the season, with autographs from the five players pictured including Williams and Gissendaner and Patrick Wright. There’s a framed picture up to this day of Bob Christian with a handwritten note thanking Mustards for their great service and double cheeseburgers. There are team pictures of men’s basketball and women’s volleyball. There are pictures of the softball team and some swimmers. These pictures always came directly from the school, but now they were being joined with a Sports Illustrated cover, a TV Guide cover, a flattened Wheaties box. And now, after the Rose Bowl, the front page of the Sun-Times was hanging behind the counter over the buns. The headline was perfect: A SCORE YOU’LL FORGET; A YEAR YOU’LL REMEMBER.
So true.
******
The following winter, my family and I traveled to Israel with a group from our synagogue. Remarkably, the Cats had followed up their Rose Bowl performance with a 9-2, 7-1 season, losing only to Wake Forest and Penn State. This earned them a split Big Ten title, with Autry and Fitzgerald having great seasons once more. This time it was Ohio State that went to the Rose Bowl while we went down to Orlando to play Peyton Manning and the Tennessee Volunteers in the Citrus Bowl. “Somewhere warm on January 1st. Somewhere warm on January 1st.”
It was late December, and we were looking at a temple that had once survived a cannon blast. I was wearing a Tommy Nevin’s Pub t-shirt, and as I walked outside an older man who we did not know looked at my shirt.
“Tommy Nevin’s? From Evanston?”
He was originally from Evanston, but had lived in Jerusalem for ten years. I told him that I was with my synagogue, and he told me a bit about life in Israel, and as we were talking one of the fathers in our synagogue group walked by. He was wearing his “1995 Northwestern Wildcats Rose Bowl” sweatshirt. The man I was talking to saw the shirt, and then did the biggest double take you’ve ever seen, and with his eyes hanging out of his face he blurted out: “Oh my God! Northwestern went to the Rose Bowl???!!!!”
Still one the best stories of all-time.