It's been The Season From Hell, and we can all agree on that. The cake we were promised by the 2013 Northwestern Wildcats was definitively a lie, and even Golden Perfect Wonderful Amazing Coach Pat Fitzgerald is earning some well-deserved criticism for his team being 0-7, when by all rights they're talented enough to be at least 2-5.
Luckily, we get a whole offseason to talk about this. And even more luckily, this offseason is a month longer than we've grown to expect because the Wildcats managed not to earn a trip to a bowl game for the first time since 2007.
We've got one more game. For a few years, every game the Wildcats have played as been, in some way, meaningful: it's had some say in terms of bowl positioning, or the Big Ten championship race, or rankings. Even after going 0-4 to start Big Ten play, every game NU played had meaning in that the Wildcats needed to get to six wins.
Northwestern-Illinois is just a damn football game. There's nothing on the line besides pride. Pride, AND A DAMN HAT
WHY WE MUST BEAT ILLINOIS
BECAUSE DOOFUS MCWILLIAMSON OVER HERE
Photo via Bruce Thorson, USA Today Sports
Y'ALL WOULD BE OKAY WITH LOSING TO CHILD-COACH WHO IN 48 YEARS OF LIFE, HAS NEVER ONCE BEEN TAUGHT HOW TO SMILE LIKE A NORMAL HUMAN? THIS DUDE WITH MORE WORDS IN HIS NAME THAN BIG TEN WINS ACROSS TWO SEASONS? THIS JACOB SILJ VOICE IMMODULATION SYNDROME-HAVING DUDE?
THIS DUDE WHO ACTUALLY UNIRONICALLY CONSIDERS NORTHWESTERN-ILLINOIS A RIVALRY? THIS DUDE EVEN ILLINOIS FANS THINK IS A JOKE-HUMAN?
WELL, I AIN'T OKAY WITH LOSING TO HIM.
BECAUSE TESTICLES
BECAUSE IT'S NOT 1983, DAMMIT
AND WE DON'T WANNA GO 0-8. ONE WIN IS LITERALLY INFINITY PERCENT MORE WINS THAN ZERO WINS.
BECAUSE HAT
IT IS SOON TO BE WINTER AND OUR HEADS ARE TO BE COLD. UNLESS WE COVER THEM WITH HAT.