Super Bowl Sunday won’t stop the power rankings from rolling on out. The women’s tennis team continues building up a Patriots-like run, continuing to stay on top of the NU sports scene, while another women’s team continues a streak at the bottom of this list. Not too many major shifts, but a few changes here and there. Hope you had a fun Super Sunday. I miss football already.
1. Women’s Tennis - The seventh-ranked Wildcats went into Atlanta this week and squashed the number-one Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets 6-1. A gritty performance by NU, including rallies by Lauren Lui and Samantha Murray. Northwestern may be the top team in the country now.
2. Men’s Swimming - NU opened the weekend strong, downing the #16 Penn State Nittany Lions to open up a dual meet, but dropped the second half of the competition to Ohio State. So, a split. The competition was super strong though, so can’t knock the ‘Cats too much.
3. Willie the Wildcat - Pulled off the ever-impressive feat of being entertaining during the snoozer of a game that was Northwestern vs. Texas Pan-American. All 15 students who showed up got a good laugh out of the big cat.
4. Men’s Tennis - Notre Dame crushed the ‘Cats at the start of the week, losing 7-0 to the #11 Fighting Irish. But NU rebounded, sweeping Bradley 7-0 Saturday to break even for the week.
5. Wrestling - Another tough loss for the Wildcats after coming oh-so-close to knocking off top ranked Iowa last week. Northwestern lost another close contest, this time to the #8 Penn State Nittany Lions. So close, but so far.
6. Men’s Basketball - Not the prettiest win ever, especially considering the competition, but Northwestern did beat Texas Pan-American, and Kevin Coble looked smokin’. But the team stays winless in the Big Ten, after losing to Indiana Sunday. Still, NU stayed mighty close against a top ranked team.
7. Fencing - NU hosted a competition this weekend, but no results are known at this moment. So, this seems safe enough.
8. Women’s Swimming - Also no activity this week. Ho-hum.
9. Women’s Basketball - I’m running out of new ways to say NU can’t win a Big Ten game. Another terrible week, featuring losses to Iowa and Purdue. If the ‘Cats ever win a game, they’ll rocket to number one, I swear.