EVANSTON-You can be forgiven if you feel like you’ve seen Northwestern’s loss to Iowa before. It had a very familiar feel to it.
The Wildcat offense spun its wheels for four quarters, the defense kept the game close for as long as it could before eventually giving way, and the result was an ugly 20-0 loss to Iowa that was as dreary as the weather in Evanston.
It was the same pattern we saw in losses to Stanford, Michigan State, Wisconsin and Nebraska. And it’s getting old.
It was the fifth loss in a row for the reeling Wildcats, who now must win the remainder of their games to become bowl-eligible. With an offense that has scored just three points over the last eight quarters of football, it’s doubtful that many bettors will be rushing to sports book windows to lay money on that proposition.
Here are our takeaways from another disappointing game for Northwestern.
Fitz stuck with Smith despite everything: Aidan Smith got his third straight start and wasn’t able get the offense out of neutral all day. He finished 18 of 32 for 138 yards, with one interception. Those are mediocre numbers for most quarterbacks but represent considerable progress for the Wildcats, who threw for a total of 42 yards last week against Ohio State.
But unlike against Wisconsin earlier this season, when head coach Pat Fitzgerald benched Hunter Johnson in favor of Smith to give his offense a spark, he stuck with Smith in this one, even though his offense failed to get further than the Iowa 28-yard line all day. Whether Smith is that much better than Johnson in practice or if something else is preventing Fitzgerald from playing the transfer from Clemson, Johnson hasn’t taken a snap since he left the Wisconsin game with an injury in the fourth quarter. And that’s despite the fact that both of them are listed as co-starters on the two-deep for the last three games.
Northwestern ran 67 plays for 202 yards, a 3.0 average per play. You have to wonder how much worse things would have gotten with Johnson – or anyone else, for that matter – at the controls.
The defense just keeps thumping but can’t get any turnovers: The Wildcat defense once again did its job for most of the game, holding Iowa to 302 yards. However, they failed to get any takeaways for the third straight week. With an offense that can’t get out of its own way, the lack of turnovers is a killer.
Iowa’s first touchdown came on a big play in the first quarter: Nate Stanley hit Tyrone Tracy over the middle on an intermediate throw, and he gained about 30 of the 50 total yards after the catch after Trae Williams missed a tackle. Other than that play and a 41-yard pass to tight end Sam LaPorta, the Wildcats held Iowa in check for the most part.
Iowa had just two sustained drives of more than five plays: a 15-play, 57-yarder for a field goal in the second quarter, and a 13-play 59-yarder in the third that put them up 17-0 and virtually ended the game.
Where do they go from here? Northwestern has now lost five straight games, all against Big Ten foes. They are 0-5 in conference for the first time since 2013, when Fitzgerald’s squad finished 1-7 in the league. What’s worse, the Wildcats have scored a total of three points in two games and haven’t scored a touchdown in nine quarters, since the third quarter of the loss to Nebraska on Oct. 5.
The good news is that the schedule gets considerably easier, with hapless UMass on Nov. 16, and Big Ten matchups with Indiana, Purdue, Minnesota and Illinois. Of those, only the Gophers have a winning record in conference.
The bad news is that all of those Big Ten teams have a better record than the Wildcats and Northwestern will have to play with its impotent offense, which is beginning to reach historically bad levels that harken back to the Dark Ages.
