Northwestern football welcomed No. 4 Oregon to town on Saturday and suffered yet another loss. And while the game wasn’t exactly the blowout people were expecting, it also wasn’t a super strong showing for the ‘Cats. Here’s who is trending up and down after the match.
Stock Up
Running backs plus run blocking
With Cam Porter out for the season, it was expected that both Caleb Komolafe and Joseph Himon II would see an increased workload. However, both of them and the blockers around them rose to the occasion,
specifically against the Ducks in a game where rushing was heavily relied upon.
Komolafe, to continue a breakout season, rushed for 53 yards and scored his first career rushing touchdown. The redshirt-sophomore began the game with a 21-yard drive, which set the tone for the run game. Meanwhile, Himon had a 39-yard kick return to begin Northwestern’s second offensive drive and rushed for 59 yards. And to end the game, first-year Dashun Reeder made a 79-yard touchdown run — also the first of his career.
But beyond the stat sheet, it felt like the offense was in a better groove when it was running the ball with both Himon and Komolafe — rushing played a major role in some of the Wildcats’ longer drives. This took time off the clock to prevent Oregon from running up the score to the extremes that it did in prior games. Credit goes to the offensive line in front of them as well, who played a role in giving running backs the opportunities to do their job.
Robert Fitzgerald
The defensive back has emerged as one of Northwestern’s better defensive players, and it showed on Saturday — especially in the first half. He led all defensive players with a career-high 10 total tackles and three solo tackles, including a major tackle on Oregon running back Jayden Limar on second-and-11 in the second quarter, which eventually led to a three-and-out drive for the Ducks. After going the entirety of 2023 and 2024 without a single game with more than seven tackles, the Northwestern junior now has two games with nine-plus in 2025 alone.
The Northwestern defense as a whole deserves credit for making the game semi-competitive in the first half and for holding Oregon to considerably fewer points than its 69-3 blowout victory against Oklahoma State a week ago. Fitzgerald was one of the brighter spots on that unit.
(Somewhat) aggressive play-calling
After David Braun received some flak at Tulane for not taking a penalty that would have pushed the Green Wave out of field goal range, or for going for it on fourth down in the red zone, the “nothing-to-lose” mentality was very much in play in a game where the ‘Cats were heavy underdogs. It was apparent in the first drive, when Northwestern went for it on fourth-and-1 and succeeded. In addition, wide receiver Frank Covey IV attempted a trick play by passing the ball himself — though it was unsuccessful. Similarly, the ‘Cats went for it on fourth down three times in the second half, one of which led to the team’s first touchdown drive of the game.
Although these risks may seem small in the grand scheme of a blowout loss (and the ’Cats still made some passive moves like kneeling it out with 30 seconds left until halftime), it’s still a brief reprieve from some of the choices that Braun has previously been criticized for throughout his coaching tenure at Northwestern.
Honorable Mentions: Josh Fussell pre-injury, Mac Uhlein, Drew Wagner
Stock Down
Preston Stone
It might seem like a lot to keep piling on Stone, but Saturday is the transfer quarterback’s second consecutive game against an FBS team with a poor showing. He went 11-for-21 with no touchdowns and two interceptions, but didn’t complete a pass longer than eight yards in the first half. Like at Tulane, the struggles came early, as Oregon’s Dillon Thieneman picked off his pass on NU’s first offensive drive. Then, after picking up some momentum on a completion to Hunter Welcing in the second quarter, Stone proceeded to fumble the ball for a loss of 18 yards and virtually killed the drive.
Stone started completing more big-time passes in the second half, but his trend of ruining the momentum that he built up continued, like when he threw an interception at the Oregon 29-yard line just a few plays after completing a 31-yard pass to Griffin Wilde. These mistakes by the quarterback were detrimental to any major opportunities for the offense before garbage time.
Wide Receivers
Yes, Saturday wasn’t Stone’s greatest day. But the Northwestern receiving unit hasn’t really shown up either. At halftime, only one wide receiver, Griffin Wilde, put up anything on the stat sheet with an eight-yard reception. In fact, Komolafe and Himon had half of Northwestern’s mere four receptions at that point, with the team’s primary ball-catchers struggling to get open or create any form of separation. The receiving struggles continued into the second half. Although Wilde caught a few more passes, Ricky Ahumaraeze ended arguably Stone’s best drive yet by dropping a ball thrown right to him near the red zone on fourth down.
At the end of the game, Wilde was the only receiver with more than one reception, and the entire Northwestern team combined for 135 yards (and many of which came in either garbage time or were receptions made by tight ends or running backs).
Third-quarter defense
Although things were already looking bleak in the first half, the third quarter was when the game was officially put out of reach. Amidst Northwestern’s offensive miscues, Oregon was also ramping up on the scoring. The Ducks began the second half with a 66-yard rushing touchdown from Dierre Hill Jr, and then quickly scored after a drive that barely lasted two minutes to make the score 31-0. And while Oregon cooled off in the fourth quarter after Mac Uhlein intercepted Dante Moore (and then proceeded to put in two backup quarterbacks), Northwestern let its opponents run loose amid its own mistakes, which killed any chance of a comeback.
Honorable Mentions: The pregame weather, offensive decisions in plus territory
