Ann Arbor, Mich. – You could feel this win coming.
You could feel it last Tuesday against Iowa, when Northwestern was up 14 in the second half before falling just short. You could feel it Saturday against No. 15 Indiana, as the Wildcats pushed the Big Ten’s best team to the brink.
Tuesday night at Crisler Arena, the Purple wave finally broke, as the Cats swept Michigan away behind a barrage of 3s and a scrappy, tenacious Croatian that most NU students have never heard of.
Indeed, Ivan Peljusic might not be as well known as Kevin Coble or Craig Moore. But NU would not have ended its yearlong conference losing streak without him.
In the game’s first minutes, the redshirt freshman’s scrappy play was overshadowed by the team’s offensive explosion. After the last-minute losses to the Hoosiers and Hawkeyes, the Cats seemed determined to build a lead so big even they could not blow it. In fact, Moore seemed hellbent on beating Michigan all by himself.
The junior guard drained four 3s in the game’s first four minutes as the Cats raced to a 16-2 lead. The shell-shocked Wolverines could do nothing to slow the NU attack, while the Cats harried Michigan into turnovers and missed shots.
But after 20 straight Big Ten losses dating back to last February, the Cats would not get their first victory without a fight. Feeding off the home crowd, Michigan rallied on three separate occasions, keeping the ball out of Moore’s hands and frustrating Coble and point guard Michael Thompson.
The Wolverines had an answer for everything. Except Peljusic.
The 20-year-old forward was everywhere for the Cats. He battled Michigan’s big men in the paint, keeping forward DeShawn Sims away from the basket and grabbing a team-best seven rebounds. He became the focal point for NU’s offense, repeatedly receiving the ball in the high post and kicking it out to the open man. And he came up with big shots in big moments, hitting two key free throws late in the second half with the score tied at 50 and draining a critical 3-pointer on his way to a career-high 13 points.
But Peljusic’s biggest basket may have come in the first half, when the Cats were building their largest lead of the game.
With the score 34-17, he stole the ball from Sims and took off the other way, with the Michigan forward in hot pursuit. As Peljusic reached the basket, Sims caught up with him, and the two rose together to the rim.
Peljusic slammed the ball home in Sims’ face. Then he turned to the NU bench and let loose a guttural yell in his native Croatian.
“I don’t remember what I said,” he admitted after the game. “But it felt good.”
It was the signature play of a signature game for NU, which played with confidence for the first time all season. Even when the Wolverines took a 60-59 lead with just more than a minute to play, the Cats kept their composure, patiently running the Princeton Offense, calmly looking for the right shot.
And they found it, as Moore drained his school-record eighth 3-pointer of the game to seize the lead back for good.
Less than a minute later, it was over. Moore flung the ball into the air and leapt into the arms of teammate Jason Okrzesik. Nearby, Peljusic fell to the court, slamming the hardwood with both hands in his own victory celebration, vindicated after a sometimes rocky season.
“(Peljusic) drives me nuts,” coach Bill Carmody said. “But right now I like nuts.”
So do the rest of the Cats, who at long last left a conference game with a “W.”
Assistant sports editor Jake Simpson is a Medill junior. He can be reached at [email protected].
