Northwestern’s Pat Fitzgerald ‘incredibly motivated’ by early losses, but is that enough?

Play as hard as you can for as long as you can. That’s “the Wildcat way,” according to Northwestern football coach Pat Fitzgerald.

But is playing hard in Evanston really any match anymore for what they’re doing in Minneapolis and Madison, in Iowa City and Happy Valley, in Ann Arbor and Columbus?

Northwestern, coming off a 3-9 flameout in 2021, has lost back-to-back home games against Duke, Southern Illinois and Miami (Ohio). Other than Nebraska, which is no longer even a shadow of its former self, there hasn’t been a worse-looking team in the Big Ten. If the Wildcat way were contagious, most around the conference these days would be trying not to catch it.

There’s no detectable scent in the air of a Northwestern upset of Penn State on Saturday. That road test easily could be the first of eight straight games the rest of the way in which Fitzgerald’s team is the underdog. It’ll be hard enough just to get back to 3-9. It’ll take a sudden, stirring turnaround to avoid a third losing season in the last four years.

But that’s why Fitzgerald gives the pep talks.

“We’ve got two-thirds of our season left,” he said. “Absolutely, it’s no doubt — I have full belief in these guys.”

And if the Wildcats don’t win this season, they can be right back in the thick of things in 2023, their coach insists. Just like when back-to-back losing seasons in 2013 and 2014 gave way to the best four-year stretch in school history — 36-17 overall and 26-9 in the Big Ten.

“Absolutely, 100%,” Fitzgerald said. “I expect us to compete for championships.”

Fitzgerald’s greatest strength has always been his stubborn insistence on believing in Northwestern football. For the record, it’s still hard as heck to win there. And with conference expansion, the transfer superhighway, pay-for-play and all the other breakneck changes in the college game, it’s not like it’s going to get easier. You thought Fitzgerald was a long shot when he stepped into the job at 31 as the youngest head coach in the country? The fifth-longest-tenured coach in the country is now — at 47 and signed through 2030 — in the fight of his career.

If he can’t beat an FCS squad or a MAC also-ran, are we just supposed to assume he has another Big Ten West title run hidden somewhere up his sleeve?

“I mean, that’s my job is to motivate the team and do everything I can to push the right buttons to help the guys be consistent,” he said. “And, obviously, I haven’t done that well enough for us to win games. That’s incredibly motivating for me personally.”

Even in its best seasons, Northwestern has lived on the razor’s edge. As Fitzgerald puts it, “We don’t win games 100-2.” No, his best teams have hung around, avoided costly mistakes and pounced late. Any win, by any score, has always been good enough. It has to be when you can’t just roll the ball out there and beat anybody purely on talent.

But the last two seasons have been a parade of punts, defensive breakdowns, killer turnovers and crises of confidence. At least, that’s what it has looked like from the outside.

Is there any magic left? Will NU ever find that double-digit-win ceiling again?

“The hallmark of my tenure here is that the teams that have continued to grind and work hard have improved and we’ve gotten better as the season has gone along,” Fitzgerald said. “There will be no flinch. There will be no anything besides right down the middle, going at it and attacking it every day with everything that we possibly have to win football games.”

Maybe that’ll get the job done. It’s what Fitzgerald will walk into work day after day and attempt to drill into his team. It might require a leap of faith for anyone — including some “fair-weather fans,” as Fitzgerald labeled them — to buy it.

“I don’t know if that’s what they want to hear,” he said, “but that’s what I’m going to do.”