Another year, another college football
bowl loss. The Northwestern postseason losing streak is becoming almost
as historical as the stadium in which they lost their bowl game today.
Falling to Texas Tech on New Year's Day, the Wildcats have now lost their last eight consecutive bowl games since their Rose Bowl triumph in 1949.
Dude, that's a long time ago.
But the Cotton Bowl Stadium is even older; opening in 1929. The
iconic venue has been home to bowl games which decided national titles,
the Dallas Cowboys, SMU in their heyday, the World Cup and even Journey
music videos. It would have been perfect venue to see a Chicago team end
it's postseason drought.
But Tech QB Taylor Potts, WR Lyle Leong and the rest of the Red Raiders kept that from happening.
Potts was 26-33 passing for 243 yards, 2 TD, 0 INTs, in the first
half alone. (He finished with the game MVP award, going 43-56 for 369)
Leong was just three receiving yards shy of a C-Note; in just the first
half of play.
Every time the Cats put together a nice drive, the Red Raiders sailed
right down the field to answer it. The Cats failed to get any
consistent pressure on Potts, and he just picked them apart all New
Year's Day.
"Yeah, I don't think we touched his flag once," NU Head Coach Pat Fitzgerald said.
"We wanted to try and get him out of rhythm a little bit and change
up some coverage concepts. We just didn't get the pressure we needed to
and that tailed off at the end of the year. We need to get that fixed
if we want to be a championship-caliber team."
Potts found receiver Austin Zouzalik for a first quarter TD pass;
with Zouzalik returning the favor on a lateral throwback to Potts, who
took it in 13 yards for a second quarter score. It was Potts' playground
as Tech was able to throw long, short, mid-range,sideline and middle of
the field. They were able to do pretty much anything they wanted on
offense. Eric Stephens also ran 14 times for 126 yards.
On the other side of the ball, NU employed a somewhat questionable
game plan. Facing the worst pass defense in the nation, they went to a
very run-oriented attack despite being sans their top three rushers. As a
consequence, Jeremy Ebert, the Big Ten's leader in receiving yardage, was held to just one catch for five yards through three and half quarters.
However, he did have a nice lateral throwback to third string
quarterback Kain Kolter for a 32 yard gain which set up a NU touchdown
run by starting QB Evan Watkins. Yes, they copied Tech's gimmick play
from the first half.
On a cold day in front of a 55-60% empty Cotton Bowl (40,121 was the
announced ticket sales in a stadium that seats 93,000), the Cats endured
issues in their passing game, kicking game, special teams and
especially their pass defense.
However, a huge bright spot was the play of their backup quarterback
Kain Colter. He entered the game third string, but if he isn't the No. 2
QB next year, then something is severely wrong with the coaches' depth
chart.
Colter gave the team a spark with his legs, as he rushed for a 100
yards in just over three quarters. As Evan Watkins struggled with a
terribly low yards-per-attempt Saturday afternoon (he finished 10-21 for
a meager 75 yards), it's clear Coulter should take his spot backing up
Dan Persa when the Cats' MVP returns in 2011.
Colter can run much better than Watkins, and he's probably even
faster than Persa- making him a better fit than Watkins for what NU
likes to do in their spread-option. He fits that perfect skill set NU
looks for in their QBs (see C.J. Bacher, Mike 
Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net, a Midwest webzine. He's also a regular contributor to Chicago Now, the Tribune's blog network, Walter Football, Yardbarker Network, and Fox Sports
You can follow him on Twitter @thesportsbank
He also does a regular weekly segment on chicagolandsportsradio.com
Filed under: Big 10, College Football, Northwestern Wildcats
Tags: cain koulter, cotton bowl, cotton bowl stadium, evan watkins, kain coulter, kain koulter, lyle leong, lyle leong texas tech, northwestern loses bowl game, northwestern loses ticket city bowl, nu loses bowl game, taylor potts mvp, taylor potts texas tech, texas tech beats northwestern, texas tech taylor potts, texas tech wins ticket city bowl, ticket city bowl
