For some reason, I don’t think this is good for NU.

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First, congrats to Aaron Donald on a great NFL career. I think he's the best DT of all time.

It is too early for the 2014 NFL draft class to make the listicles of all-time NFL classes, but it should rank pretty highly.

The class is headlined by Aaron Donald. 'Nuff said.

But it also includes the following:

First Ballot HOFers (after Donald)
Khalil Mack - 101 career sacks
Zack Martin - 152 starts, 9 All Pro and Pro Bowl seasons
Davante Adams - 3 All Pro and 6 Pro Bowls, 10,781 yards and 95 TDs and counting

Likely HOFERS
Demarcus Lawrence - 4 Pro Bowls and 58 sacks, plus the whole Cowboys thing should get him in
Mike Evans - 5 Pro Bowls, 11,000+ yards, 94 TDS and counting; very similar production to Adams, but seems to have less name recognition.
CJ Mosley - 5 Pro Bowls
Taylor Lewan - 3 Pro Bowls, 105 starts - hard to handicap OTs for the HOF, but I think he gets in eventually
Joel Bitonio - I admit I cannot recall him, but 2 All Pro and 6 Pro Bowl seasons over 144 starts should be enough

Solid Starters
Odell Beckham Jr
Brandin Cooks - 9,000 yards, 57 TDs and counting
Kyle Fuller - 1 All Pro, 2 Pro Bowls
Eric Ebron - 351 receptions
Ryan Shazier
Jake Matthews - 162 starts (he's probably also a HOFER)
Jadeveon Clowney - injuries diminished him a bit, but he still has 52 career sacks and 3 Pro Bowls.
Anthony Barr
Jimmie Ward
Allen Robinson - former Bear had a good career that was shortened by injury
Jarvis Landry
Kyle Van Noy
Morgan Moses
Gabe Jackson
Trai Turner
Pat O'Donnel punted a lot

Worth noting that this draft gave us Bear fans Charles Leno Jr. in the 7th round. He has made 141 career starts.

The thing the 2014 class lacks that will keep it out of the Pantheon of NFL Drafts is the lack of a franchise QB. Derek Carr is the headline QB of the class. Jimmy G is on it. Teddy Bridgewater deserves a ton of respect for having a career after destroying his knee early in his career (it was really bad).

Finally, the 2014 class also include Ha-Ha Clinton Dix, the best name in football history (or a headline from the NY Post on the Clinton-Lewinsky affair).

We suck. And will always suck in it.

Just checked my inbox and it looks like I had a season ticket renewal message sent to me mid-Feb. last year. I'm wondering if the timeline will be the same and what (literally) they will even have to say about where the games will be played. I've heard vague references to Soldier, Wrigley, and Seat Geek Stadium but ironically nothing actually official from the Athletic Dept or Ticket Sales Rep. Do we think that's quite because they're not actually sure what's going to happen yet...or where...or when?

I think NU would be wise to offer a good discount for ALL "home" games across multiple venues but also packages that include one or two venues. I worry this is really going to be a mess for those of us who would generally like to be at every home game.

I think most of us would prefer a 7/10 game than an 8/9 game, but it looks like 8/9 is most likely as of now. Though some prognosticators (like Palm) already have NU at a 10, I doubt they fall there even with a loss on Friday. So our better bet is to move up to a 7. Won't be easy. I thought we could use a thread to determine rooting interests.

In the Bracket Matrix (which, to be sure, is a combination of ALL of the predictions and may not accurately place NU in the same place the committee does), here are 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 as of this morning, along with the next time they play:


The Gonzaga/St. Mary's WCC championship is tonight. Given how hot Gonzaga has been and how close NU is to St. Mary's, I think we root for Gonzaga there. Everything else starts tomorrow at the earliest. I'll try to keep this up to date.

Suspicious betting patterns emerging in sports wagering now
By Phil Mushnick
Published March 14, 2024, 10:27 p.m. ET

What should’ve been the biggest story of the week — five Division I college basketball games being examined for highly suspicious or “irregular” betting patterns can’t compete with the latest speculation of free-agent linebackers of varied achievement. According to multiple reports and the schools’ acknowledgments, four of those games include Temple’s team and the other was played by Loyola (Md.). Both teams had rotten seasons.

But the most conspicuously suspicious among the games in question was University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) at Temple on March 7, a barely contested 100-72 UAB win. As curious games go, this one stood out for not standing out. It was a so-what game between a 19-11 visitor and 11-19 Temple. Not a game of national note, which may not have been a coincidence. In the afternoon before the game, the line soared from UAB giving 1 ½ or 2 to giving 8 — and on the road — an enormous move that could only leave a stink given the final score. There was no good reason — not an injury or suspension — that could explain such sudden, one-way, heavy action on a visiting team. And these days, sophisticated game-fixers would avoid suspicions and detection by spreading their action among several legal bookmakers as there are now so many to choose from. That would prevent the line from sudden surges into shady territory.

Perhaps a two-point move would go unnoticed, but not six. That would ring the alarm that has been rung.

The most glaring in-game stat was that UAB outrebounded Temple by a stop-right-there 41-19. And UAB had 10 offensive rebounds to Temple’s one. Impossible to ignore as rebounds so often reflect effort. Less remarkable but nonetheless noteworthy was that Temple, which this season shot 72 percent from the foul line, was 16-for-24, 66 percent, and its average of six steals per game declined to three.

My educated guess is that if any of these games are found to have been fixed they’re inside or at least neighborhood jobs bereft of sophistication. Several players, in a losing season and with minimal professional basketball futures — not to mention the get-rich-quick commercial prompts that daily flood their senses — appeared to have had exceptionally bad games.

Read the rest (free, no need to sign up or anything) -

I saw this post on X or Twitter or whatever it's called. I'm always up for freebies so I stopped by and got the Boo Burger (it's an off menu bacon cheeseburger with an onion ring on top, very good). The owner was saying they have an NIL deal with Boo and he gets a cut of every Boo Burger they sell (or give away, in this case). I just wanted to pass that along in case you have all the merch from Boo's NIL store and are looking for other ways to put some money in his pocket, which we should be doing for Boo and in the interest of getting future Boos.

Here are @mshelton33's game takeaways from Minneapolis.

The moxie we had evaporated once Boo got rolled up on, it was palpable even after he came back in. He was trying to walk it off but you could tell he didn't want to do anything to make it worse. The 2nd half he was a bit more like normal and hit some big shots but not 100%. Hopefully a few days of rest and he will be back to where he was.

I honestly sensed at that moment that if we had somehow won that game, tomorrow would've been really rough, especially if Boo's issue was still lingering (which I think it would be, even though he said in the post game presser it was just a "stinger"). On top of that was some kind of shoulder injury to Preston which impacted him as well, and going up against Edey would definitely not have been just what the doctor ordered.

So, to lose by 9 points with all the missed shots and opportunities we had doesn't feel as bad to me as it would otherwise, and if we come out of this with the same health that we went into it for our game next week, that to me is an ok outcome.

n/m

That was absolutely brutal. And Boo is too easy to shut off when NOBODY else can step up and hit a shot. Disappointing 1st half from everyone not named Boo.
Somehow only down 4. But that was some of the most sickening basketball since the game-who-shall-not-be-named

The hope was that he could recruit a different kind of talent to NU but that hasn’t happened. For NU to compete with inferior athletes they need to be impeccably coached and Collins just isn’t a good X’s and O’s coach. He’s not working out here. Our program is going backwards.

Lots of red here at the Target Center as this Purdue game finishes, but at least some of it is OSU scarlet sonitsnhard to tell the distribution. Definitely a strong Wisconsin turnout, but if the other fans stay we may have a good crowd.

Would have thought they would have looked elsewhere, especially seeing how tOSU performed after he was let go

Also: Don't sleep on Wisconsin. Let's hope they used up all their hot shooting yesterday.

My story.

Hope the team has a large chip on their shoulder coming out tomorrow afternoon.

by losing in such a dramatic fashion today. Wisconsin not worn out and hyped for tomorrow's game.

Got to Minny in time for the Wednesday games. Maryland Rutgers was rough, but it was final four quality compared to this Michigan PSU crapfest.

Heading into the IU game, Buie is 19 points away from being the all time leading scorer for NU. What a great career for this young man. It would be fitting to get the record in a win on the road against Indiana.

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1. helmet communications, likely NFL style, in terms of active time for communication between plays, feed cuts with 15 seconds remaining on play clock or snap of ball (whichever comes first).

2. Acceptable use of tablets on sidelines for video purposes. Broadcast, sideline and endzone views would be accessible. (NFL only allows still images)

3. A Two-Minute warning at the end of eachh half. Basically an extra timeout and potentially another stoppage for television advertising

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Super long and skinny. Very developmental, but also very good movement skills.