Drew Crawford returning to Northwestern for his senior season

Awesome news from a Friday afternoon: Drew Crawford will be returning to the Wildcats for a senior season, as he announced via his Twitter:

I'm excited to be at NU next year for one last season! I love my teammates and we're all ready to embrace Coach Collins' vision. #GoCats

— Drew Crawford (@TheRealDrewski1) April 19, 2013

Apologies to Marquette and Missouri - Drew's ours.

You win some, you lose some. After Northwestern lost Jaren Sina to Seton Hall, I wasn't worried. But I did realize there was a significant chance that, should Crawford not return to Northwestern, we'd be starting off Chris Collins' Northwestern tenure on a pretty bad foot. All the momentum and fun of having an exciting new coach would be gone - and oh, yeah, the team would be historically awful next year.

Will Northwestern make the NCAA Tournament next year? Probably not. But with a all-Big Ten second-or-third-or-maybe-hopefully-if-he-has-the-season-of-his-life-first team player in Drew Crawford in the fold, they'll be competitive, and maybe - just maybe - be able to make a push. He'll be the star on this squad, and Northwestern will need every ounce out of him for that to matter. I think returning to NU is the best thing for his potential pro chances, and its obviously the best thing for the team. And let's not look at his first senior year stats when considering his potential - he clearly wasn't healthy last year before he finally decided to cut the season short.

I'm happy about all this. It was a Friday afternoon a few months ago when I left the house to buy beer and came back to the news Drew Crawford would be missing the rest of his senior season. This Friday afternoon, I left the house - not to buy beer, I still need to do that later - to find out he'd be getting another senior season. Here's to that senior seasoncounting.