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Matt Micucci Mane! 33 days left til Northwestern football, which means not David Nwabuisi, but Matt Micucci, a backup walk-on kicker/punter who did something very cool football-wise when he was in high school. Don't you want to read about it? Well, I want you to read about it, and if you don't I'm gonna cry and stuff. So please, please read it.
Origin myth
Micucci is from Lake Zurich, where he was the punter, kicker, and quarterback for Stevenson as a senior, blah blah bla-- wait, QUARTERBACK? Indeed: Micucci was not only the specialist, but also the guy under center, throwing for 1,600 yards with 12 touchdowns and two rushing TD's. But there's more: Micucci's Patriots went 9-3 his senior year, and had a second-round playoff matchup against Maine South, the three-time defending IHSA 8A champions, led by 4-star Northwestern QB recruit Matt Alviti, and Micucci went 20-for-32 with 247 yards, two TD's and kicked a field goal in a shocking 24-22 win. That's right: Northwestern's elite QB commit lost a playoff game to Northwestern's walk-on kicker. High school football, man.
Here's what that game looked like, if you'd like to see what Micucci -- and, you know, Alviti -- looked like slinging the ball.
(There's also a 15-minute long Micucci highlight video out there, but I think this gets the job done better.)
Anyway, everybody knew he was a kicker, not a QB at the college level, and now he's at Northwestern.
At Northwestern
Yo, take a guess
Anagram of choice
Discovering the Wildcats' true inner selves through spelling
Matt Micucci, anagrammed, is
CAT MIMIC CUT
Yo, that guy pretending to be a cat got what was coming to him. (These have been pretty nonsensical of late. Have more anagrammable spellings, guys!
Relevant musical choice
"It's Gucci Time," Gucci Mane
MICUCCI TIME! My blog is named after a Gucci Mane song, so, I don't really have much to say here.
How he can help
I WANT MATT MICUCCI TO BE OUR KICKOFF GUY. We talked about this the other day, but I think Northwestern needs a guy to handle kickoffs instead of Jeff Budzien to save his leg, and I think it should be the quarterback. I also see a trick play in this kid's future -- if he can be Northwestern's punter down the line and serve as NU's holder, other Big Ten teams should watch out for a fake FG pass, Little Giants style. Also if this ever happens I'm coming back to this post and copy pasting it and winning the award for most genius Northwestern football writer of all time.
(Update: he took snaps at WR in spring practice!)