Medill grad student wants YOUR memories of the 1995 Cats

[lou v]

Here's a message from Medill grad student Jake Meister. Please help him out with this project he is working on.

Hello!

My name is Jake Meister. I'm a graduate student at Medill and am currently working on a story that looks back on the historic 95-96 season for the 'Cats. I assume most people have read all the oral histories and in-depth pieces that detail the team's run up to the game and all the key on field moments.

With that said, my partner and I have focused our story more so on the people and narratives behind the team which of course transpired into success on the field but also has established an extremely tight-knit group of individuals that remains close today.

Please use this thread to share why you think that team was special, and what it means to you nearly 25 years later. For those that went out to Pasadena, it would be great if you could describe what that experience was like for a group (both players and fans) that had virtually no reason to be out there prior to the start of the season.

Go Cats!

 

[Rebel_]

Here's a message from Medill grad student Jake Meister. Please help him out with this project he is working on.

Hello!

My name is Jake Meister. I'm a graduate student at Medill and am currently working on a story that looks back on the historic 95-96 season for the 'Cats. I assume most people have read all the oral histories and in-depth pieces that detail the team's run up to the game and all the key on field moments.

With that said, my partner and I have focused our story more so on the people and narratives behind the team which of course transpired into success on the field but also has established an extremely tight-knit group of individuals that remains close today.

Please use this thread to share why you think that team was special, and what it means to you nearly 25 years later. For those that went out to Pasadena, it would be great if you could describe what that experience was like for a group (both players and fans) that had virtually no reason to be out there prior to the start of the season.

Go Cats!

I was a middle school teacher in Vincennes. IN with two sons in the building. They ofcourse loved NU football along with me. The Notre Dame win perked their middle school football teammates to begin telling them Northwestern is awesome. I had a pride I had never felt before. As the season progressed they and their friends became bigger and better Cat fans. More pride. Right before the final games I started to hear them all say " Northwestern has the greatest uniforms. We love them." And then leading up to the Rose Bowl my son Nathan says "Dad my friends all say I'm so lucky because you went to Northwestern." Amazing what one great season can do for a university. I still have a box of NU Wheaties, my game tickets from Rose game, and two Wilson game balls used in the game. We have lived and died with NU football ever since! And the Cats have done very well.

 

[MotownMedilldo]

You probably know about Barnett's "taking the Purple to Pasadena" line when he was introduced at halftime of a men's basketball game. But if you get your hands on a 1995 football media guide, many of the players mention going to the Rose Bowl or winning the Big Ten in their bios. I knew (now Dr.) Ryan Padgett and played pickup hoops at SPAC with Darnell Autry and D'Wayne Bates during their redshirt year. They genuinely believed Barnett's words. But I remember Darnell's eyes lighting up when I was describing 100,000+ fans at the Big House and him saying, "It would be so cool to see that many people quiet." And his team did exactly that later that fall.

 

[Hungry Jack]

I think a real strength of the 1995 team was the secondary. The two CBs, Rodney Ray and Chris Martin, were very good players who could play man coverage against most receivers not named Keyshawn Johnson. This allowed RVL to deploy Hudhaifa Ismaeli as a multispeared weapon, especially on the safety blitz. The front 7 was good without any discernable weaknesses, but getting pass pressure typically required some blitzing against better offensive lines. This was made possible by the secondary, IMO.

For the record, Martin and Ismaili were Jerrified.

 

[elgatoloco]

Sitting on my couch watching the Notre Dame game, expecting the usual fight through the first half followed by frustration in the second half while I lose interest. Get through the first half, OK, great. Second half begins and the usual things that happen don't. The team is ... resilient. I keep watching, still expecting the worst. Then in the fourth quarter I'm wondering what the hell is going on? When they hold on, I'm on Cloud 9 -- only to come back to earth a week later after the loss. When they beat Air Force and Indiana, I shrugged.

But then Michigan. The rest of the season I felt like I was in a spell -- is this what winning is like?

 

[eastbaycat99]

I think a real strength of the 1995 team was the secondary. The two CBs, Rodney Ray and Chris Martin, were very good players who could play man coverage against most receivers not named Keyshawn Johnson. This allowed RVL to deploy Hudhaifa Ismaeli as a multispeared weapon, especially on the safety blitz. The front 7 was good without any discernable weaknesses, but getting pass pressure typically required some blitzing against better offensive lines. This was made possible by the secondary, IMO.

For the record, Martin and Ismaili were Jerrified.

I agree with almost everything in this post. Relative to receivers named Keyshawn, though, I have always thought that USC deployed a formation that may well have produced a similar result even if they did not have him: they came out with a slot receiver instead of using a tight end. They completely forfeited the chance at a ground game, but created multiple one on one matchups against the Cats’ secondary. It was, for the time, a gimmick that worked. If they had used it earlier in the season, I’m pretty sure VanderLinden would have been able to devise a coverage scheme that would have neutralized it. As it was, USC had three tall, quick receivers, and almost always were able to get quick separation to negate the pass rush schemes the Cats tried to negate the offense.

 

[its_the_sauce]

The Miami of Ohio game was a "return the favor" game for my dad who was always taking to Bears games. I took him to that game.

As the saying goes "it's the thought that counts" lol.

 

[SmellyCat]

When I was a freshman in 1989, one night two fellow freshman friends of mine and I (Rob and Jean) went out to the south beach, sat on a pier, and waited all night to watch the sunrise. It was the first time any of us ever saw the sun rise over Lake Michigan, and it was a memory I've never forgotten.

Fast forward to 1995, and Rob was in town to come watch the Air Force game with me on September 23 and staying at my place. I woke up super early on Saturday morning (I still can't sleep on game days) and realized it was the exact anniversary of that great 1989 memory. I drag Rob out of bed, and we walk out to the lake and we watch the sun rise again. Those might be the only two times either of us watched the sun rise over Lake Michigan, six years apart.

Then we went to Dyche Stadium a few hours later and watched Air Force get smoked. Air Force (in 1989) was the first NU game we ever went to.

Ok, so very little of this story is about the 1995 team, but I think about weird coincidences like that all the time. It was like it was somehow destiny.

 

[SmellyCat]

What I remember most about Pasadena on 1/1/1996:

* Very people stayed up to ring in the new year - we had to get up at a god-awful hour to go to the parade.
* The parade was the most boring three hours of my life.
* I put my ticket in my shoe. I was nervous all day long that I would lose the ticket, get pickpocketed, etc., so I felt my shoe was the safest place. I probably checked for it a dozen times throughout the day.
* Walking into the stadium = walking down the aisle at my wedding? It's close. Certainly two of the happiest moments of my life.
* The USC fans were really obnoxious around us, but in the bathroom at halftime, everyone in both purple and red were having a good time teasing each other. Still, I hope I don't have to hear their fight song ever again.
* The onside kick to start the third quarter might very well have been the high point of the entire season
* The missed field goal and Gary's sad smile may have been the lowest.
* Musso didn't fumble.
* Sitting on a bus after the game, I was sad, but not devastated. Though I'd never wanted to win a game more than this one (until probably 2013 Ohio State), I was kind of at peace. It was such a great experience, and 10-2! Wow. It was not a bad ride back to the hotel. No tears that I'm aware of from anybody. Still one of the best days of my life.

 

[GOUNUII]

Here's the condensed version in chronological order. From the perspective of a fan that suffered with the players and coaches from 1977 thru 1994.

1. August of 1995. OC Greg Meyer tells me we have a chance to be very good. The team will be more physical than ever before. As important, we have a WR and a RB that are legit play makers. Watch out, he tells me, for a couple guys named Bates and Autry.
2. The season opener at ND. Cats are 28 point dogs going into the game. My young family and I were at the 1994 ND game played at Soldier Field. The ND fans around us deserved to be shot for their classless, endless mocking of all things Purple. NU alum Brent Musburger calls the game and declares ND QB Ron Powlus capable of winning 4 Heismans. ND rolls to an easy and all too typical 42-15 win. One year later the Cats destroy Ron Powlus. NU has the more physical team. Bates, Autry and others make plays. None bigger than DT Matt Rice splitting the double team to stuff the ND ball carrier on a 4th quarter 4th and 2. Cats win in South Bend. Big 6 gets the last of more than a few Powlus sacks to preserve the win. OH MY! We not only beat Lou Holtz and ND in South Bend. The doormat of college football for 2 decades ends all talk of Powlus for the Heisman. How did this happen? Who is this guy named Gary Barnett? Can this last?
3. No. It can't. Former Frances Peay assistant and future Wildcat head coach Randy Walker brings his MIami OH Redskins to Evanston a week later and wins. Transitioning from loser to winner is hard. Cats go up 3 TDs and then snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Still, we are told to "Expect Victory."
4. Fast forward to October 7, 1995. Barnett and his boys have rebounded from the Miami debacle. The Big House and 100,000+ Michigan fans welcome them to Ann Arbor. Where the Cats had not won a game since Cadillacs had fins. I take my 3 boys. The 4 of us just specs of Purple in a sea of Maize & Blue. Fitzgerald stuffs Biakabatuka at the goal line. Ismaeli and Dailey and Rice and Fitzgerald sack Griese. Bennett and Collier with the INTs. Hartl with the TD catch from Schnur right in front of us. Cats win. After the game my grade school boys get to go into the Wildcat locker room. They meet all the stars of the game. All of them gracious to my boys. It hits me then. This was no big deal. The players expected to win. It was genuine. How did Barnett instill this and make it work? Unbelievable.
5. It's the week of the Penn St. game. The GOAT Keith Jackson will be calling the game from a still Dark Ages decrepit Dyche Stadium in Evanston. Transitioning from the look of a loser to that of a winner takes time. There is no regular season stage bigger than playing PSU with KJ calling the game. The anticipation in the GOU household is electric. Until our 7 year old is hospitalized and diagnosed with Type I diabetes. Calls from the players he met in Ann Arbor pour in. Our son is assured they'll be thinking of him even as they prepare to take on the Nittany Lions. I see first hand what great young men Barnett has brought to Evanston. They are winners and end up beating Joe Pa at his own game. Physical, fundamental football with a "relentless" passion. Somewhere along the way the players chose "relentless" as the one word that best described how they wanted to be remembered. It fits.
6.November 11, 2005. Red Letter Iowa comes to Evanston. Winners of 21 straight beat down victories over the Wildcats. Barnett had made Hawkeye head coach Hayden Fry the bad guy at the same time he declared Iowa the measure of what he wanted the Cats to achieve. Cats win in arctic conditions. Musso with the special teams score. Ismaeli with the scoop and score. That day set in motion a most remarkable turn around. Just 2 years removed from a 49-13 loss, the Cats would return to Iowa City in 96' and physically humiliate Hayden and his Hawkeyes 40-13. Over the next quarter century, 0-21 was transformed into a 13-10 Wildcat advantage. Barnett had sparked the turn around. What followed in Iowa City included the Brad Phillips stone cold take down of Shon Greene. Cats win. The Wootton end zone strip sack of Stanzi. Cats win. Odenigbo sacking Stanley ... over and over again. Cats win. Skowronek with a GOAT worthy catch to clinch a West Championship. A quarter century of big plays and successes never thought even remotely possible before that magical 1995 season.
7. January 1, 1996. I had grown up in Ohio thinking there was nothing bigger in college football than the Rose Bowl. And nothing more comically outrageous than the notion of seeing a Purple end zone in the granddaddy of them of all. In 1977-78-79 we would chant "Rose Bowl" repeatedly if NU got so much as a first down ... other than by penalty ... against the likes of OSU or Michigan. And now ... there it was. Purple in the end zone and throughout more than half the stadium. A moving testament to what can be achieved against all odds by great people dedicated to achieving great things. It didn't end well that day. We didn't have replay to overturn the Musso fumble call. We didn't have an answer for the ineligible Keyshaun Johnson. Injuries had taken 2 Wildcat all Americans out of the game. But the greatness of that team and its coaches was still on full display. It was a punch-counter punch affair against a worthy opponent.

20 years later at a chance meeting with Barnett he told me he would never have taken the job in 1993 if he had done his homework and knew the depths of how far the program had fallen. To which I responded. You achieved the greatest turn around in college football history in ways that have inspired so many. The depth of the despair you inherited is the measure of your achievement. To which he responded. Yea ... it turned out to be a great decision.

GOUNUII

 

[Catreporter]

I have many memories as a Chicago media member. I grew up a Cats fan in the 50s when the team was very competitive under Ara Parseghian. I had suffered through all the dismal years of crushing defeats. Among my memories, the morning of the Iowa game. I awakened to an a severe early November wind and snow storm (so bad, it destroyed ESPN Game Day's setup, forcing them inside to McGaw Hall). I wondered how it would affect attendance. When I got to the stadium, I was thrilled to see a capacity crowd with fans tailgating on the roof of the apartment building across the street, making for an electric atmosphere. The previous week against Penn State, sitting in the faculty section, I was amused to hear two professors who I had never seen at a game before, remarking how they were going to love rubbing it in to their Penn State brethren. And I remember going to cover the first practice for the Rose Bowl, held in Dyche Stadium with snowbanks all around (there was no indoor facility then). And then there was the experience of an early morning trip to the empty Rosebowl the day before the game with Gary Barnett's "Moses" interpreter in tow for a special show we were doing and seeing "Northwestern" written into the end zone. Magical doesn't even begin to describe the whole experience.

 

[Deeringfish]

May Dad told stories about growing up a few blocks away from the stadium and hopping the fence as a kid to get into the games.
In 1939 he was the Student Manager of the football team. I don't know exactly what that meant except things were different in 39 and there were fewer coaches and less staff. Anyway, he got his letter in Football which is kind of comical because he was never a very athletic person. Be that as it may, I still have his wool stadium blanket with his Letter sewed to it.
In 1949, he rode the train with the team to the Rose Bowl and acted as a team Doctor; taping up the guys before the game and assisting on the sidelines.
He was always a season ticket holder in football and basketball and we went to all kinds of games together. I remember the heady feeling I got when I was about ten, eating in the N Mens Club with dad and all the men smoking their cigars. That is probably best smell ever.
In 95 he was suffering a cancer where he needed to get red blood cells every 6-10 weeks and it sapped his strength and eventually his kidneys began to fail. He video taped all the games that season and watched them frequently until he passed later in 96. He was so proud that his Cats went out on top. He never stopped talking about it.

 

[SmellyCat]

What is the weirdest place any of you experienced a game from that magical year?

I was in a bar in Colorado right before a wedding (for an NU grad!) for the Wisconsin game. It ended (shutout!) about 20 minutes before the wedding was scheduled to start and we barely got there in time. Sang "GO U Northwestern!" at the reception, as there were many Wildcats there.

For the Michigan game, I was at my cousin's Bar Mitzvah in California. No cell phones back then, no TV I could watch at the synagogue, no radio of the game. I went out to the car and found a sports radio station. All I had were updates like every 20 minutes. It was brutal, but when it was over, I honked the horn and went inside to tell everybody, including my cousin. He says he became an NU fan that day (according to Jewish law, he also became a man that day), and graduated from NU in 2005.

 

[its_the_sauce]

While justifiably people are reminiscing about individual Cat games that year, watching the Mich/tOSU game was special too.

A major keepsake of that year for me is actually the 1996 media guide. It turns out the cover (crowd shot taken at the Rose Bowl) prominently features my then girlfriend/now wife.

 

[Hungry Jack]

What I most remember from the Wisconsin game was the final play when Wisky was trying to punch it in against our scrubs as Barnett empties the bench. I was seated near the southwest corner and thus I could not see the end of the play as the Badgers ran left facing north. But I knew the shutout was preserved when an immense roar erupted from the student section.

It was the loudest thing I can recall hearing at RF. Louder than OSU or Irish drunkards.

 

[eastbaycat99]

What is the weirdest place any of you experienced a game from that magical year?
.

I don’t consider it weird, but my wife and I were in Paris the week of the Michigan game. To show how much technology has changed, we had no access to what internet there was in those days (I believe the Netscape browser had just been introduced), international cable was pretty much CNN International, and we had yet to get our first cell phones. I remember getting a copy of the Herald Tribune on Monday that had the college football scores, and being shocked and happy at the result. Fortunately, my Mom, who was babysitting our kids for the week, taped the game and I was able to watch when we returned. I still have the VHS tape.

 

[Alvious]

So many memories, but I'll share just one. At the Homecoming game against Wisconsin, we stopped them near the goal line on the last play of the game to preserve the shutout. Almost snapped their ball carrier in two, as I recall. The surge of emotion I felt as we clinched at least a winning record for the first time in my memory was indescribable. I don't think I've ever yelled as loud since. As I walked down the ramp in the south tower after the game I thought "No doubt about it, we are going to the Rose Bowl!" There were still many games left to play and a few close calls, but that was the moment that I truly felt this was a team of destiny.

 

[Alaskawildkat]

OK, I cheated by heading over to the HailtoPurple.com archives to pull up the below copy-pasted account that includes some of my memories from that memorable Rose Bowl year. To preface the comments I should include the specific memories of that first game of the season with its win that shocked the nation. Cable as we know it today had not yet reached Alaska and about the only college football game we could capture on a Saturday was whichever team was playing the locked in NBC affiliate's broadcast of the Notre Dame game.

As luck would have it I turned on the channel and there was Northwestern playing Notre Dame. What an exciting experience it was just to get to see from Alaska Northwestern playing on TV. Then to see the Wildcats go on to get the win was even more memorable. Of course what followed in the months thereafter as Northwestern moved step-by-step towards the Rose Bowl was exciting to share with friends and family as Northwestern truly became "America's College Team."

One example was shared with me by my oldest son who was that year a freshman at Harvard. That fall, on the Cambridge campus, he wore a Northwestern cap which was met by approval from his classmates, and especially from one of his professors who proudly announced that he was himself a Northwestern alum.

This from the HailtoPurple.com archives as it referenced my younger sons then still at home:

Hall of Fame inductee number eight is Alaskanwildcat, inducted October 16, 2002:

Alaskanwildcat, in environs.

Alaskanwildcat is a 1972 NU grad living in Anchorage, Alaska. When NU started its road to the Rose Bowl, Alaska promised his then college bound son that if he got accepted to NU and if NU qualified for the Rose Bowl, he'd take him and his brothers to Pasedena. When both of those events became a reality, he states he was never happier to eat his words. That son has now graduated and another is a student athlete at NU. He states, "Whether with friends or family, getting to share memorable experiences is what NU Football is all about."

Alaska's vocational bio can be found at LawAlaska.com, and his avocations apart from NU Football include cameras, coins, and cars. His most recent auto adventure was evading a collision with a car that rolled over in front of the SL500 he was driving on the Autobahn this summer.

 

[MotownMedilldo]

I almost forgot my favorite memory of the Rose Bowl trip. I graduated in June 1995, a few months before the season. My housemates, also recent grads, and I arrived in Southern California a few days before the game. We were restaurant and bar hopping in Huntington Beach, where we met two older couples decked in purple and started chatting. One of them said, "We were your age the last time the Wildcats went to the Rose Bowl, and said back then, 'We'll go the next time.' Well, wouldn't you know it? This is the next time!" From that moment, I vowed to travel for all milestone events in Northwestern sports like men's hoops first-ever NCAA tournament game in Salt Lake City.

 

[Alaskawildkat]

OK, I cheated by heading over to the HailtoPurple.com archives to pull up the below copy-pasted account that includes some of my memories from that memorable Rose Bowl year. To preface the comments I should include the specific memories of that first game of the season with its win that shocked the nation. Cable as we know it today had not yet reached Alaska and about the only college football game we could capture on a Saturday was whichever team was playing the locked in NBC affiliate's broadcast of the Notre Dame game.

As luck would have it I turned on the channel and there was Northwestern playing Notre Dame. What an exciting experience it was just to get to see from Alaska Northwestern playing on TV. Then to see the Wildcats go on to get the win was even more memorable. Of course what followed in the months thereafter as Northwestern moved step-by-step towards the Rose Bowl was exciting to share with friends and family as Northwestern truly became "America's College Team."

One example was shared with me by my oldest son who was that year a freshman at Harvard. That fall, on the Cambridge campus, he wore a Northwestern cap which was met by approval from his classmates, and especially from one of his professors who proudly announced that he was himself a Northwestern alum.

This from the HailtoPurple.com archives as it referenced my younger sons then still at home:

Hall of Fame inductee number eight is Alaskanwildcat, inducted October 16, 2002:

Alaskanwildcat, in environs.

Alaskanwildcat is a 1972 NU grad living in Anchorage, Alaska. When NU started its road to the Rose Bowl, Alaska promised his then college bound son that if he got accepted to NU and if NU qualified for the Rose Bowl, he'd take him and his brothers to Pasedena. When both of those events became a reality, he states he was never happier to eat his words. That son has now graduated and another is a student athlete at NU. He states, "Whether with friends or family, getting to share memorable experiences is what NU Football is all about."

Alaska's vocational bio can be found at LawAlaska.com, and his avocations apart from NU Football include cameras, coins, and cars. His most recent auto adventure was evading a collision with a car that rolled over in front of the SL500 he was driving on the Autobahn this summer.

To this day a collage of the shared with my sons Rose Bowl Game Day experience in photos hangs in my basement:

 

[CatVideos]

I was at the ND game. I have so many memories. I could go on and on.

I remember we were sitting next to some teenager in an ND shirt. As is my way, I thought I’d be friendly. The Wildcats were still ahead in the third quarter when I said to him, “I wouldn’t worry too much.” You know, friendly banter.

I wish I could accurately describe his arrogant, condescending voice as this little creep coldly stared at me and said, “I’m not worried.” Then with a turn of his head, I was dismissed.

I thought to myself, “Man, I hope we beat these bastards.”

You know the rest.

 

[nu greek]

What I most remember from the Wisconsin game was the final play when Wisky was trying to punch it in against our scrubs as Barnett empties the bench. I was seated near the southwest corner and thus I could not see the end of the play as the Badgers ran left facing north. But I knew the shutout was preserved when an immense roar erupted from the student section.

It was the loudest thing I can recall hearing at RF. Louder than OSU or Irish drunkards.

Chris Rooney stoned the Wisky RB and it was a day to remember!!!