Northwestern practice notes: October 29

- It was cooooooooooold Wednesday morning, especially with a biting wind whipping off of Lake Michigan. And after spending the first 45 minutes of practice outside, the Wildcats moved indoors. Needless to say, us media members weren't complaining about that decision.

- The speakers were pumping in crowd noise. It was probably the second loudest I've heard them this season, with the Wednesday of Penn State week being the loudest.

- As was the case yesterday, Dan Vitale, Ibraheim Campbell, Kyle Prater and Miles Shuler (limited, red jersey) were practicing. However, Campbell did take some reps off, and when he did, Godwin Igwebuike, as would be expected, was at safety in his stead. Not sure there's any takeaway there though.

- Collin Ellis, who is out for Saturday's game with a concussion, was obviously not practicing. But he was out on the field in sweats.

- The bye week might have come at a perfect time for Trevor Siemian, who looked as good if not better than he has all season. He had one particularly impressive throw, a deep ball over the middle to Austin Carr. Fitz said on Monday that he was "healthier than he's been."

- Zach Oliver, on the other hand, missed some open receivers.

- Matt Alviti threw A LOT of interceptions. He's playing on the scout team, and his receivers don't get open, but still, it wasn't a pretty sight.

- One player who has sort of disappeared from the offense recently is Solomon Vault. He had a few nice runs (some after the catch) Wednesday, and could be a guy to whom the Wildcats' offense looks for a spark.

- Drew Smith laid a big hit on walk-on freshman superback Eric Lutzen on one pass play. You don't see that in practice too often.

- On a more interesting note, Smith was seeing a fair amount of time with the first team defense in place of Jimmy Hall. Against a team like Iowa who likes to establish the run game, we could see more of him than usual.