Keeping It Real with Northwestern Wildcats football in NCAA Football 2014

So there's this video game for college football. I like college football! Specifically Northwestern football. Say: I bet y'all are curious how Northwestern is in that game? Is EA Sports keeping it real?

So Northwestern is ranked as an 86. They're an 86 on offense, and an 87 on defense. That seems like it makes sense! I imagine if you're in the 90's, you're a pretty good football team, and Northwestern last year was a very good, although not great squad. They were strong enough to win 10 games, but never had to play a team that was ranked at any point in the year, and although they could've won every game, they didn't. Although they're returning both key members of a dope option-style attack in Kain Colter and Venric Mark, they also return eight of 11 defensive starters from a really quality defense, so it makes sense that Northwestern's defense is ranked ever so slightly higher than Northwestern's offense.

What's that you say? You want to see how Northwestern stacks up against other teams? I'm sure EA Sports' staff made sure to rank Northwestern accurately compared to teams they kicked the crap out of last year -- oh

Boston College: 86

Michigan State: 91

They made Michigan State FIVE POINTS BETTER than Northwestern. Northwestern beat Michigan State by three points in an actual football game.

Mississippi State: 88

(Oh, by the way, did you guys know the ENTIRE GATOR BOWL is on Youtube?

There are some other questionable rankings here -- Auburn is 88 after winning just three games, USC is 91 after a 7-6 year, Michigan is a 91 after a year they needed a crazy Hail Mary to beat Northwestern -- my point is, NU should be higher. At this point in time, it's weird, Northwestern is generally getting the respect they deserve. They won double digit football games last year, and they're gonna be ranked in the Top 25 when polls open -- either that or I'm going to get to write another post about supposed disrespect. But not so in NCAA Football, making all our lives slightly more difficult as we turn the game on to easy mode and dominate some 14-0 seasons regardless of what Northwestern's ranking is.

Conclusion: it has NOT been kept real. Northwestern is better in real life than they are in a video game. I'm kinda okay with that, tho.