Well, believe it or not, Northwestern's "spring" practice starts tomorrow. They will go for three weeks, take a couple weeks for spring break, and then wind things up on April 9.
Unfortunately, only two of the spring practices will be open to the media -- the last two Saturdays, on April 2 and April 9. We do get media availability of coaches and players after practices on Tuesdays, but that's about it. Select media members (including me) were invited to have lunch with Fitz tomorrow to kick things off, like they did last year.
The bottom line, though, is that we won't be able to "see" much of anything this spring and have to rely on what coaches and players tell us.
As I've written many times, I don't blame NU for its closed practice policy -- it's much more in line with the rest of the Big Ten, and I certainly understand it from a competitive standpoint. As it was explained to me, it became to big of a hassle for NU to police the information being published from media outlets like ours, so they dropped it entirely. It was always a blurry line about what you could and couldn't publish. So I get it. But it did add a lot to our and others' coverage to be able to see practices live.
Unfortunately, only two of the spring practices will be open to the media -- the last two Saturdays, on April 2 and April 9. We do get media availability of coaches and players after practices on Tuesdays, but that's about it. Select media members (including me) were invited to have lunch with Fitz tomorrow to kick things off, like they did last year.
The bottom line, though, is that we won't be able to "see" much of anything this spring and have to rely on what coaches and players tell us.
As I've written many times, I don't blame NU for its closed practice policy -- it's much more in line with the rest of the Big Ten, and I certainly understand it from a competitive standpoint. As it was explained to me, it became to big of a hassle for NU to police the information being published from media outlets like ours, so they dropped it entirely. It was always a blurry line about what you could and couldn't publish. So I get it. But it did add a lot to our and others' coverage to be able to see practices live.
