When Penn State (13-7) travels to Rosemont, Illinois for its Big Ten matinee game with Northwestern (11-8), it will ultimately be a matchup between two grossly underachieving teams.
The Wildcats were featured as No. 19 in the AP preseason poll and were coming off a season in which they qualified for the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history. Northwestern’s two best players, Scottie Lindsey and Bryant McIntosh, were both back for the purple and black this season and experts figured the Wildcats to be a contender in the Big Ten.
The Nittany Lions had similar aspirations.