[NU Sports] NIU game

[Jeff Beamsley]

Stephen wrote <snip>

Between that game, ND/Michigan and Texas/OSU, it's gonna be a heck of a
weekend for college football fans! I expect our little Chicagoland war with
NIU to be a fun game to watch and a closely fought contest as well.

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Had the opportunity to watch the UoM/NIU game on Saturday.  Don't know
whether it was a very poor UoM run defense or a very good NIU running game
(probably some of both), but if NIU runs the ball that well against NU, they
are going to be tough to beat.  NIU lost the game because they turned the
ball over, not because the UoM defense shut them down.  You've got to figure
NIU is going to address that this week in practice.  Carr has already said
that his fix is going to be starting some different folks against ND because
those who started against NIU didn't get the job done.    

Since NIU's spread is similar to NU (spread out the D to open running lanes
and cut back against the defensive flow), the success that NIU had against
UoM bodes well for NU.  Also our D sees a similar running game every day in
practice so they should at least be ready.

It was hard to tell on the radio how well the NU D played because Ohio was
just overmatched.  This Saturday is going to be the first real test of our
young D (and a yardstick of how they compare with UoM).  Hopefully they will
be up to it.

Jeff