Craig Has The Scout - Northwestern 2025
Coming Up
Who: Northwestern Wildcats
When: 6:30 pm – Saturday, November 29, 2025
Where: Home Sweet Home
How: Fox
Battle for the Land of Lincoln Trophy
Opponent Primer:
Head Coach: David Braun
The story of David Braun is less a smooth, upward trajectory and more the itinerary of a greyhound bus serving communities where snow blowers are a necessity. He was born in the Chicago suburbs and was a high school football player in the Milwaukee suburbs. He landed at Winona State, a Division II program where he played defensive line, before paying his dues there as a GA. Next was a single-season pit stop as DC at Culver-Stockton in Division III before returning to Winona State as Co-DC. Then the ascent begins, slow, arduous, and completely unglamorous. UC Davis (FCS, Big Sky), then Northern Iowa (FCS, MVFC), culminating in the defensive coordinator chair at North Dakota State under Matt Entz.
Braun spent his formative years as a DC having his defensive philosophy forged in the crucible of stopping the exact kind of option-read, ground-and-pound schemes that dominated the B1G West. His success at North Dakota State brought him to Northwestern. One moment, you’re trying to stop FCS fullbacks in the snow; the next you're tasked with corralling Ohio State wide receivers in front of 100,000.
The timing, oh, the timing. Braun was hired to be the DC in 2023 at Northwestern. Braun never coached a game as just DC. Pat Fitzgerald’s tenure went away like grime in a car wash and Braun was handed the keys to Northwestern football like a substitute teacher inheriting a classroom full of feral raccoons. And yet, it worked. He coaxed competence out of institutional trauma; a quality the Northwestern brass couldn't ignore and handed him the reins full-time.
Braun’s career arc is a beautiful, messy portrait of preparation meeting pure, unadulterated luck. He’s capable, yes, having successfully run defenses across multiple collegiate tiers. But being in the right place at the right time is more valuable than any blitz scheme.
Offensive Style: RPO, inside zone and power runs with a heavy dose of motion.
Northwestern’s offense is steady but unspectacular. The offense is buoyed by Preston Stone’s competence and improved line play, yet hampered by inefficiency, lack of explosiveness, and conservative playcalling. The Wildcats offense blends Zach Lujan’s South Dakota State roots with B1G pragmatism, using heavy personnel groupings, play-action, and RPO wrinkles to attack defenses. The Wildcats emphasize inside zone, two-tight end sets, and safe passing concepts, while managing a balanced philosophy and preference for layered play-action. The Wildcats’ offensive identity is built on mistake-free football and grinding drives, but their inability to consistently finish possessions in the end zone remains the defining critique.
Zack Lujan is the offensive coordinator hired by Braun out of South Dakota State. A former SDSU quarterback turned assistant, he climbed the ladder by coaching running backs and quarterbacks before being handed the keys to one of the most efficient offenses in FCS. He helped to keep it rolling in Brookings, being the OC for back-to-back national championships. Once Braun had the job full-time, he brought Lujan to Evanston. Lujan brought with him the Jackrabbits’ playbook and was tasked with translating his FCS success to the B1G. Fitzgerald had a tendency to hire grizzled lifers for the Wildcats; Lujan’s bio is of a young schemer with a knack for balance.
Defensive Style: 4-2-5 with heavy Cover 2 and Cover 4.
Tim McGarigle’s Northwestern defense is built on a multiple 4-2-5 base with heavy linebacker involvement, emphasizing run fits and disciplined zone coverage. It is a unit that leans on physicality and gap integrity, while the back end is reliant on disguised pressures and bend‑but‑don’t‑break principles.
Tim McGarigle himself is Northwestern through and through, the program’s all‑time leading tackler turned defensive coordinator, a man whose bio reads like a love letter to Evanston. After a brief NFL stint with the Rams, he returned to the college game as a coach. He started as a Northwestern GA before joining Bill Cubit’s Western Michigan staff. He was retained by PJ Fleck before joining Lovie Smith at Illinois in 2016. From there he spent a year with the Packers before heading back to Evanston, where he took over the Wildcats’ linebackers and eventually the entire defense when Braun was promoted. McGarigle preaches fundamentals and patience rather than gimmicks.
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