Jon

There was a brief moment when he had the ball before his back hit the line, but a timeout call there would have required the official to just be waiting for that brief moment when he possessed the ball. I don't think he actually called the TO. And holy cow, Kramer. Did you really just do that? I'm shocked they didn't call a foul despite there not being contact. Easily could have been a 3 point play.

Harbaugh. I'm not a fan of getting commits to go elsewhere because you found someone better by using the admissions office to "delay" clearing someone academically, particularly when they obviously qualify. The same goes for guys who were offered but have yet to verbal due to the delay. Kids will catch on soon enough. It has already started.

Twitter is amazing for NSD, but it's even better when you have a head coach who nearly immediately sends out a tweet for each NLI that comes in.

It should give you a pretty last 10(or 12) record. I don't think they put nearly as much weight on that anymore but I believe it's still a factor. Gun to my head, I'd bet you lose one of those roadies, probably to PSU. NU should still make it though, as long as they don't blow it in the cupcakes. I'd certainly take 5-1 out of those 6 games, but a win over Minnesota at home could possibly allow for 2 road losses out of Indiana, Iowa, and Penn State depending on what Illinois and Minnesota do. We also match up well against Wisconsin, so it's not like we have any bad matchups like Ohio State or Michigan State.

Good thing Wrangler jeans are built both tough and comfortable.

To the best of my knowledge, the actual formula has never been made public. 12 of the 17 letters of intent are in by 8 AM this morning for Northwestern. I'll have nothing to do to kill time at work at this rate.

Looking at their remaining schedule Northwestern should be in the tournament this year. The only issue is the lack of a "signature" win outside of Purdue at home. It's a case of doing nothing wrong (so far) but not doing enough right. Unfortunately, neutral court wins over Notre Dame and Iowa State with a road win over NC State aren't as strong as they may have seemed before the season started. A win in Wisconsin would help a ton, but that's the last chance. Taking care of Minnesota at home will also help and provide this team a cushion. But 6 against Indiana, Penn State, and Iowa isn't the toughest way to finish the 2nd half of a Big Ten season. Not only will a starting lineup of Thompson, Crawford, Shurna, Coble, and Mirkovic likely be the best in program history, but barring injury, it will also be the deepest team we've ever had. By far. Depth is the one thing we're missing this year.

Well, 24 commits to 20. To me, team rankings are incredibly useless. When you're trying to combine a bunch of kids who are ranked based on a faulty star system using an even worse team scoring system, you get a bunch of crappy numbers that don't mean anything. There's no decent way to compare recruiting classes so I don't even bother trying. It's hard enough trying to compare recruiting classes within the same program that you're quite familiar with. While I agree the star system and team scoring system are faulty, I still think it's worth considering. Taking either as gospel isn't the best idea, but using it as sort of a guide isn't bad. It comes down to a coaching staff's ability to evaluate talent and develop it, though. There are simply too many players to evaluate. You can take a look at the top 100 talent in the country and see how each team did recruiting those guys, but the biggest programs with the biggest subscribers tend to get the most focus when it comes to talent evaluation. Neither rivals nor scout has enough people to evaluate everyone, let alone re-evaluate them when new offers start coming in that catch people's attention. But it's not impossible to evaluate an individual player. You can look at highlight film, offer list, numbers, etc. The problem comes when those sites apply a secret formula to come up with a team ranking that relies almost as much on quantity as it does quality. It's impossible to compare a program that brings in nearly 30 kids every year to one that redshirts most of its freshman and signs less than 20. The difference between 25 and 30 is pretty significant, too. I just can't put any faith in the team rankings to even use as a guide as to how schools are doing. I know we all want to compare our program's recruiting to the rest of the conference, but it just can't be done right now. Personally, the best I can hope for is to compare this year's recruiting class for Northwestern to that of the last few years in order to get a sense as to how things are going. Part of that is which schools we beat out for each kid against our biggest recruiting competitors, but beyond that, the numbers are pretty meaningless to me. By the way, I found this list of rivals star rankings for this year's All Big Ten team: Defense: 5 stars (2), 4 stars (4), 3 stars, (6), 2 stars (1) Offense: 5 stars (0), 4 stars (4), 3 stars, (3), 2 stars (5)

Well, 24 commits to 20. To me, team rankings are incredibly useless. When you're trying to combine a bunch of kids who are ranked based on a faulty star system using an even worse team scoring system, you get a bunch of crappy numbers that don't mean anything. There's no decent way to compare recruiting classes so I don't even bother trying. It's hard enough trying to compare recruiting classes within the same program that you're quite familiar with.

Apparently if the Northwestern Wrigley Field game takes place in 2010, it will be against Illinois on 11/20 and not Iowa the week before. Northwestern still has things to work out, though. Also, stupid: http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/blog/dr_saturday/post/Eastern-Washington-literally-seeing-red-over-new?urn=ncaaf,216240 http://a323.yahoofs.com/ymg/ept_sports_ncaaf_experts__31/ept_sports_ncaaf_experts-167634974-1264688002.jpg?ymC.ylCDYf85uO8w

And Seattle has a player that likely will be a first-round NBA draft pick. Apparently Seattle went into foul mode coming out of the half since they were so far behind. 6 players for Seattle fouled out and they had to finish the game with only 4 players. 45 personal fouls is pretty damn impressive, not to mention 78 total for the game. I can only hope that arena was cleared out midway through the 2nd half. Anyone know where to find out how long the game lasted?

Wow: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/boxscore?gameId=300270264

Both teams played like horsecrap tonight. The difference was their depth and our exhaustion. And a few inexplicable non-calls in Minnesota's favor. NW certainly had their chances at the end between the possession that ended with 15 seconds left, and not being able to get the rebound on the Minnesota missed FT. Frustrating to see. Hoffarber hitting 2 quick 3s and then an uncontested Minnesota fast break layup after Thompson was demolished by a Golden Gopher put them in too deep of a hole. Playing 25 minutes of finding new ways to get your shot blocked with stupid drives into traffic didn't help, either. That was their second to last chance at a good conference road win. I don't envision a close game in East Lansing, so hopefully NC State finishes the year strong or they win in Wisconsin.

Both teams played like horsecrap tonight. The difference was their depth and our exhaustion. And a few inexplicable non-calls in Minnesota's favor.

Real tough break for Schofield, who did well in the East West Shrine game but tore his ACL yesterday during Senior Bowl practice.

Michigan State could be getting the Detroit Lions treatment: http://media.mlive.com/ganggreen/photo/split-old-new-spartans-logo2jpg-80cf96e5cad6ebe9_large.jpg Stupid and pointless, in my opinion. Stop screwing things up just to sell new merchandise, Nike.

I can't even comprehend that. What an amazing story that would be if he's able to come back by June.

Until next season. Or if he decides to intentionally overthrow another guy in a Wrangler jeans ad just so he has to dive in the mud.

Yes it was. The one called included a lift then drive into the ground. That's illegal. There wasn't any lift. Favre went up in the air because of how his body was balanced. The defender just drove right through him.

Well Favre is obviously done for the day. No way he'll just come out slinging the ball next series.

Nice to see NC State beat Duke. DePaul scored 4 in the last 10 seconds to stun Marquette 51-50.

Can we agree to not play centers and just go 4 on 4? A stationary metal pole would be far more productive right now.

I get Gus Johnson tonight doing the Northwestern vs. Ohio State game. A win and I think my life would be complete.

This is the first time I've heard anything about knocking down the exterior 3rd base wall. I have a hard time imagining what that would look like. Perhaps the biggest purpose of the triangle building will be the underground batting cages. Certainly something necessary when talking about renovations. Has there been any more talk about a potential hotel across the street? Is that moving forward?