Chicago's Big Ten Team plays another of Chicago’s Big Ten teams in Chicago

In 2010, Northwestern University athletics began a marketing campaign with the tagline “Chicago’s Big Ten Team.”

“Some call it genius, and some call it stupid,” then-NU Senior Associate Athletic Director Mike Polisky said. “But it has resonated, and as a consumer product that’s the first thing you need.”

Wildcats football needs another good slogan these days. That’s even with it being a rather amazing 4-4 given that the program looked like a tire fire as the 2023 season started.

Popular, highly successful 17-year head coach Pat Fitzgerald was fired for cause on July 10 as part of corrective measures from a university-commissioned investigation of former players’ accusations of hazing in the program.

Over a dozen former Wildcat players have filed lawsuits against the school, many naming Fitzgerald as a defendant. Fitzgerald filed a $130 million lawsuit against the university on Oct. 5 for wrongful termination.

Here’s what they do at Northwestern when a scandal troubles the fans: Buy tickets to games.

The home-opener against UTEP had an official crowd of 14,851.

“The people that were here today were heard,” interim Wildcats head coach David Braun said after that game. Of course they were, there was no one to shout over them.

Last Saturday, Northwestern upset Maryland 33-27 on a sunny day before an announced attendance of 19,286. The largest of the ‘Cats’ five home crowds was 25,064, when Penn State was the opponent.

Chicago’s Big Ten Team? It may not even be Evanston’s.

But the Wildcats are playing Iowa Saturday in Chicago, not some leafy, stately suburb. It’s Wrigley Field, one of the most-iconic and most-beloved sports venues in America.

It will be a pro-Iowa crowd, perhaps even more than when the games have been held at the Wildcats’ Ryan Field, the home of Chicago’s Big Ten Team.

Ryan Field is not as beloved by traveling fans. It’s 97 years old and feels like it.

Northwestern wants to renovate the stadium and knock the capacity from 47,000 to 35,000. Over 200 faculty members signed a letter to the university administration saying the renovation should be delayed.

They said “disturbing evidence of harassment and abuse — and high-level efforts to minimize those problems — suggest that we need to get the existing house in order before expanding it.”

Evanston residents who live near the stadium aren’t too hot for it, either. There was a protest march in September. Power to the people, right on.

Saturday, Northwestern football is Chicago’s problem, er, guest. For a change, Hawkeye fans traveling to an Iowa-Northwestern game have a bar or two (or 20) in the vicinity to compensate for a shortage of parking.

Speaking of which, if you aren’t taking public transportation to the game you aren’t doing it right. The Red Line train drops you off right behind Wrigley. If you want to pay through the nostril to park in Wrigleyville, OK, rube.

I’m an ‘L’ train guy, happy to hop off with hoi polloi and get a juicy Italian Beef sandwich at Al’s in Wrigleyville.

Anyway, don’t get your hopes up that the Wrigley experience for football will be one you’d like to repeat one day. The seat locations and sightlines for most people range from mediocre to lousy.

When the first Northwestern game at Wrigley was played, in 2010, the offenses had to go in the same direction all game because of how close the ivy-colored outfield wall was to back of an end zone. That has been corrected.

What has not is the necessity for both teams to share the same sideline because the field runs from Cubs dugout toward right field. Putting the teams on opposite sides would block the views of fans in lower-bowl seats.

As for the game itself, the Hawkeyes need a win to have a reasonable hope of playing in an NFL stadium (Indianapolis) in December. Of course, the Las Vegas Bowl also is at an NFL venue.

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com