When: Saturday, September 11th at noon EST. BigTen Network (channel 720 Cablevision, 472 Time Warner, 610 DirecTV)
'Dey old: While you may never have heard of Illinois State, it's certainly been there all along. Founded in 1857, Illinois State holds the distinction of being the oldest public university in the state (take that, University of Illinois). In fact, the university was brought into existence by legal papers written up by Abraham Lincoln. Though never having been there, I think its a safe bet that this fact is included in pretty much everything they publish (gotta have your claim to fame somehow). Like many schools back in the day, the university was established primarily as a place to train teachers, giving it the official name of Illinois State Normal University. However, this school has the particular oddity of also being located in Normal, Illinois, meaning that one could reasonably call the place Illinois State Normal University - Normal. I'll stop here.
Be happy: According to Wikipedia, ISU's motto is "Gladly we Learn and Teach" While this reads more like one of the wonderful English translations you'd find on the sign for a Chinese elementary school, it is in fact the actual motto. More dissappointing than the phrasing itself, however, is the fact that they were only two flipped words away from owning the motto GTL. Missed opportunities all around.
The school's alma mater should also be noted for the fact that it is written to the tune of the German national anthem. So, big picture, if they ask you if you are in fact gladly teaching and learning, you say yes and ask no questions. The More You Know *insert flying star and NBC song here*.
So who do I know?: Many of ISU's notable alums populate the world of entertainment, something us Northwestern fans can identify with pretty well. Gary Sinise, Gary Cole (Bill Lumbergh of Office Space) and Carlos Benard (Tony Almeida of 24) all called ISU home. I'll still see all these guys and raise them Charlton Heston...we win!
Who's mascot would win in a fight: A truly underrated piece of winning football games, whose mascot is tougher? As mentioned earlier, Illinois State is the home of the Redbirds, with a logo more or less the same as Louisville and every other cardinal-themed team out there. As any cardinal would realistically fly away from an attacking wildcat, I have my suspicions that this fight would be somewhat less than entertaining, but for posterity's sake, I'm giving this one to Northwestern (we so rarely win!).
So that whole football thing: Illinois State may be a 1-AA school full of the future teachers of America, but their roster is also full of former 1-A players, making them one of the more dangerous 1-AA teams out there.
In their season opener, the Redbirds threw for over 300 yards on route to a 55-54 victory over Central Missouri State. They complimented their arial attack with an additional 187 yards on the ground. While the opponent surely had something to do with these numbers, the Cats D will have their hands full and better come out playing early - the Redbirds scored 40 in the first half of that game.
More positive, however, is how terrifyingly bad a defensive effort Illinois State put up in that match: 33 first downs, 547 passing yards and 5 passing TDs for Central Missouri has to make any 'Cats fan think we'll have a better chance of scoring than Tiger Woods at a local IHOP. This begs the question, though...what does NU do on offense?
The seemingly obvious answer is to let Persa throw all day and tear apart the Redbirds defense. Realistically, Persa should be able to put up a 400+ yard, 3+ TD performance. However, I fear that NU will continue to try and force their ground game to be successful in spite of the passing opportunity in front of them. I can't help but be scared of this situation - if NU tries to force an unsuccessful rushing attack, they'll likely keep ISU in the game until late. As any NU fans knows, if you let a team hang around, you never know what can happen.
Fortunately, I have enough faith in our OC to believe he'll transition to a pass-happy offense by the 4th quarter if things are not going well, letting the 'Cats shut the door on the Rebirds. My call: NU 34 - ISU 17.
Till next time, GO CATS!
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