The stage is set for Ohio State's late-season Big Ten Championship and College Football Playoff push, but one more tune-up game in conference play is in store first.
Northwestern
Wildcats
Northwestern might not be as bad as Purdue on paper, but the bar of competition isn't getting raised much for the Buckeyes from that game. There will be an allure to playing on hallowed baseball ground, as the two sides will meet at the Chicago Cubs' famed Wrigley Field, but the Wildcats are battling to reach the middle tier of the Big Ten.
Northwestern features one of the conference's worst offenses as it prepares to play at Wrigley for the fourth time in school history, and the dimensions of the ballpark brought a unique twist to the game the first time the Wildcats tossed a pigskin about the ballpark.
Braun Over Brains?
David Braun guiding Northwestern to an 8-5 record with a win in the Las Vegas Bowl in 2023 after taking over as interim head coach amid a hazing scandal was one of the better stories in the Big Ten last year. Sustaining that success has proved challenging.
The Wildcats are 4-5 in 2024, and with Ohio State, a road trip to Michigan and Illinois still left on their schedule, it will be difficult for them to reach bowl eligibility. Northwestern is just 2-4 in Big Ten play, one of seven teams with a record that bad or worse in the conference. One of its two wins was a 26-20 overtime thriller against Purdue, which has not won a game in league play.
While Northwestern's other Big Ten win was more decisive, coming in 37-10 fashion over Maryland, the Terrapins are another team that has been abysmal in conference play and are currently 1-5. On the other hand, the Wildcats' four Big Ten losses to Washington, Indiana, Wisconsin and Iowa have all come by at least 17 points.
Braun's seat shouldn't be warm yet, but he's still got work to do to establish Northwestern as a threat to win eight or nine regular-season games and make some noise in the conference. The former North Dakota State defensive coordinator won two FCS national championships with the Bison in 2019 and 2021, so he knows what winning football looks like.
Failure to Move the Rock
Michigan is the No. 130 total offense in a 134-team FBS this year, and many reading this are likely aware of the Wolverines' struggles for purposes of Schadenfreude. They are not the worst total offense in the Big Ten, however, as that honor belongs to Northwestern, whose 288.1 yards per game ranks No. 131 in the FBS.
Redshirt sophomore Jack Lausch won Northwestern's starting quarterback job over two veteran hands in Ryan Hilinski and Mike Wright, but the Wildcats' aerial attack has largely been grounded under his guidance. Lausch completes just 53.6% of his passes for 1,120 yards this season, with a meager 5.8 yards per attempt. He has five touchdowns against four interceptions. He's at least a threat to run the football, with 218 rushing yards.
In total, Northwestern is No. 119 in passing yards per game (176) and No. 128 in passing yards per attempt (5.9). Only Michigan is worse as Big Ten teams go in both categories.
Things aren't much better on the ground. Running back Cam Porter showed flashes in 2023 with 651 yards, but he's only averaged 4 yards per carry as Northwestern's leading rusher with 387 yards and six touchdowns in eight games. Joseph Himon II has provided a change of pace, with 44 carries for 230 yards (5.2 yards per carry) and two touchdowns, but the Wildcats are 115th in rushing yards per game (112.1) and 102nd in yards per carry (3.7).
Formidable Run Defense
Linebacker Mac Uihlein leads a stout Northwestern defensive front. (Credit: Mark Hoffman/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
Conversely to their offensive trepidations, the Wildcats have enjoyed a bit of success on the defensive side of the football, especially in stifling opposing ground games. They rank 16th nationally in opposing rushing yards per game (108.1) and 22nd in opposing yards per carry (3.4).
Linebacker Mac Uihlein is the centerpiece of it all. He's racked up 59 tackles – no other Wildcat has more than 44 – with 3.5 tackles for loss and two sacks. Xander Mueller, his top running mate at the position, has been dealing with a lower-body injury that held him out against Purdue and his status is unclear for Saturday.
Defensive end Aidan Hubbard leads the charge on the defensive line, with a team-high four sacks to go alongside 20 tackles. Cornerback Theran Johnson is the top player to watch in the secondary, with 10 pass breakups and two interceptions, including a pick-six, to go with 44 tackles. All told, Northwestern is 39th nationally in points allowed per game at 21.3.
Wildcats at Wrigley
Northwestern University is just a 25-minute drive from Wrigley Field, so it should come as no shock the Wildcats have played there before. Three times, to be exact.
The Wildcats fell to Iowa in a 10-7 slog last season and were boiled by the Boilermakers 32-14 in 2021, but the first time Northwestern played at Wrigley in 2010 against Illinois is easily the most notable. That's because it was played in only one direction.
When Wrigley laid out a football field upon its outfield grass, it only left a few feet of space between the end line of the East end zone and Wrigley's brick right field wall, which was padded but considered a hazard to player safety. So, both teams agreed that each offense would only go toward the West end zone.
As for the game itself, Illini running back Mike Leshoure ran for a school-record 330 yards with two touchdowns as Illinois won 48-27.
Barring a major upset on Saturday, Northwestern will fall to 0-4 at Wrigley, though it does get one more game there this year on Nov. 30 against none other than Illinois. The Wildcats played their other home games in their practice facility this season while constructing a new stadium set to be ready for their 2026 campaign.
Colorful Misconception
Many people who have heard of the school think of Northwestern's colors as purple and white, but in truth, the Wildcats only have one official color, royal purple. This is a fact that flies in the face of the school's alma mater, which includes the lyrics "Hail to purple, hail to white."
It wasn't always that way. Northwestern's first color scheme was black and gold, but so many other schools adopted the same pattern that it was quickly changed to purple and gold in 1879. That lasted 13 years before a university committee met to decide on one official school color, wanting to emulate the one-color schemes of prestigious schools in the eastern United States.
That committee settled on royal purple, and in the 1890s, Northwestern embraced white as its secondary color. But that secondary color has remained unofficial for 130 years.
