Team 1 has stormed back to tie the series at 3-3 with a six-vote victory in last week\u2019s Mount Rushmore of NUWB wins. It was the first Rushmore where the same team didn\u2019t win both the X and InsideNU.com polls \u2014 Team 1 on X and Team 2 on the site \u2014 and Team 2 is disputing the result, maintaining that the only \u201creal\u201d Northwestern fans are in the INU comment sections. <\/p>\n
We have one more Rushmore remaining after this one. While we have a tentative final category listed at the bottom, feel free to drop some more suggestions in the comments. Also as a side note, it\u2019s been fun to see commenters draft their own teams in the comments \u2014 the 18-22-year-old staff here at Inside very much appreciates the old-head knowledge.<\/p>\n
As a refresher, there are two teams made up of four writers each, and the goal is to select the best four-pick squad for each category. You can vote on which team you think is best on @InsideNU on X and in a poll at the bottom of this article until the next Mount Rushmore piece gets introduced next Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Team 1: Harris Horowitz, Brendan Preisman, Matt Campbell and Calvin Kaplan<\/p>\n
Team 2: Miguel Mu\u00f1oz, Yanyan Li, Sai Trivedi and Charlie Jacobs<\/p>\n
This week\u2019s category is: Individual plays in NU sports history<\/p>\n
1.01: Team 1 selects the buzzer beater over Michigan in 2017<\/p>\n
We saw the comments a few weeks ago, so this play wasn\u2019t getting past 1.01 by any stretch of the imagination. Amid an already-successful season, Northwestern\u2019s tournament hopes in 2017 were finally realized after a Hail Mary pass from Nathan Taphorn and a buzzer-beating layup from Dererk Pardon.<\/p>\n
The Michigan buzzer-beating play was an incredible moment on its own, but its broader significance just means more. Up to that point, Wildcat men\u2019s basketball had a historically woeful track record, having gone its entire history without an appearance in the NCAA Tournament. 2016-2017 finally put head coach Chris Collins\u2019 squads on the map, and after a shot for the ages, every celebrating fan in Welsh-Ryan Arena knew the \u2018Cats were finally going dancing that year.<\/p>\n
The Pardon shot was a game-changer that truly elevated the 2016-2017 season into Northwestern lore. Enough said.<\/p>\n
1.02: Team 2 selects the forced fumble against No. 14 Notre Dame in 2014<\/p>\n
Northwestern entered this matchup in a perilous spot: a 3-6 record, one loss away from losing bowl eligibility for the second straight season, facing a No. 18 Notre Dame team in its home stadium \u2014 a notoriously difficult place to play.<\/p>\n
NU found itself down 40-37 in a thrilling, momentum shifting matchup. Notre Dame had the ball on 2nd-and-8 with 1:36 left to play, needing a first down to ward off the upset with Northwestern out of timeouts.<\/p>\n
After a handoff to running back Cam McDaniel, Cornerback Ibraheim Campbell went straight for the ball, ripping it out of running back Cam McDaniel and enabling safety Jimmy Hall to jump on top of it. A stunning turnaround that resulted in quarterback Trevor Sienman marching down the field and kicker Jack Mitchell hitting a 45 yard field goal to send the game to overtime. Northwestern would go on to win the game and keep their bowl hopes alive.<\/p>\n
Back in 2018, Inside NU published a deep dive reflection into this play alone, <\/a>embedded with phone interviews from players taking us inside their minds during the fumble recovery and recognizing its implications. If that doesn\u2019t all but confirm this as an iconic play in Northwestern sports history, what else does?<\/p>\n 2.01: Team 2 selects Chase Audige\u2019s go-ahead three in 2023 win over No. 1 Purdue<\/p>\n With just under five minutes left in a hard-fought effort againt No. 1, Northwestern looked all but dead in the water. After another unstoppable baby hook from eventual two-time NPOY Zach Edey, the \u2018Cats found themselves down 55-47 and without any real momentum amidst a chance to grab a program-defining win.<\/p>\n Enter Chase Audige. The senior guard had just five points up until that point, but came alive at just the right time. After clawing the Wildcats back within three with seven straight points, his opportunity to flip the game on its head came with 1:40 left, with NU now down just 57-56 and with the ball in its hands. Audige drove down the baseline before passing to Brooks Barnhizer, curling around him and splashing a corner three to put the \u2018Cats up two, resulting in arguably the biggest crowd pop Welsh-Ryan Arena has seen.<\/p>\n Even though it was still just a one-possession game, the energy in Welsh-Ryan from then on felt like victory for NU. A steal and score would all but seal the game, and the \u2018Cats would go onto defeat the top-ranked Boilermakers en route to their second-ever tournament appearance. Without Audige\u2019s clutch shot, we may not have one of the greatest wins in Northwestern men\u2019s basketball history nor one of the most successful programs enjoyed by NU athletics today.<\/p>\n 2.02: Team 1 selects the forced fumble against Michigan in 2000<\/p>\n My favorite part of this Mount Rushmore series has been learning more about these awesome moments in Northwestern sports history from well before my team here. This Michigan game was absurd. There\u2019s the 54-51 scoreline, the national stakes, the game\u2019s importance in the emergence of the spread offense. We covered all that when we wrote about this game a month ago, but before this week\u2019s draft, I still didn\u2019t quite understand the bedlam that was the final two minutes of this game.<\/p>\n After a rare Michigan punt, Northwestern gets the ball back trailing 51-46 with 3:35 to play in the fourth quarter. Quarterback Zak Kustok marches the \u2018Cats to the red zone with a 21-yard run and a 36-yard completion to wide receiver Teddy Johnson. The Wolverine defense forces a fourth-and-goal from the seven, and Johnson puts the \u2018Cats in front with a touchdown on a wide receiver screen. The senior gets tripped up at the four but channels his inner-Space Jam-Michael Jordan to reach the ball over the goal line. Ryan Field loses its mind, but there\u2019s flag down. It\u2019s an ineligible man downfield. Northwestern has to do it all over again, this time from the 12.<\/p>\n Heisman finalist Damien Anderson slips open on wheel route. There is nobody within ten yards of the running back. For the newer Wildcat crowd, it\u2019s the Ben Bryant-to-Charlie Mangieri game-winner against Minnesota. The ball sits in the air for what feels like ten seconds. It\u2019s the lollipop of all lollipops. Except Anderson, who would go on to rush for a Northwestern 1,914 yards in 2000, drops it. He can\u2019t believe it. Anderson had 262 yards on the ground up to that point. Michigan players are consoling him on the field. It\u2019s the lone drop of his entire junior season.<\/p>\n Michigan takes over at the 12 with 1:38 remaining. Northwestern has two timeouts, so the Wolverines need a first down to seal it. Running back Anthony Thomas gains seven on first down. They call him the A-Train. Brent Musberger, on play-by-play duties for ABC, is already writing the eulogy. \u201cThis has been a wonderful college football game,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Thomas gets it again on second down, and he has space between the tackles. First down. If he goes down, the game is over, but A-Train has his eyes set on the end zone. There\u2019s so much space. Two Wolverine blockers pancake the Northwestern defensive backs in front of him. Thomas brushes by them, takes maybe two steps and then, inexplicably, he drops the ball behind him. Former-walk-on safety Sean Wieber, as he was, in his words, \u201cgetting pile-driven by the guard and fullback,\u201d had forced the ball loose with a swipe from his right hand. Wildcat cornerback Raheem Covington has it. Northwestern football.<\/p>\n