I forgot to buy tickets for NU Day at Wrigley yesterday. My Norris Box Office online skills are second-to-none after grindin’ with Clipse (BRRRRRRRR) – that was meant to be the noise Clipse makes in that one song – last week, but I completely forgot about NU Day at Wrigley. And quite frankly, I’m not even bothering to check whether there are still tickets available. As I think about why I’d miss 2,000 NU students descending on a game nobody cares about to act silly, I remember: We’ve already had our NU day at Wrigley this year, and it wasn’t NU Day at Wrigley.

I speak, of course, of NU’s football game with Illinois in the stadium which every sports columnist is obligated to refer to as “The Friendly Confines.” Although NU came up short, I say it with no hesitation: The Wrigley game was ridiculously awesome.

However, I was a little perturbed by a report that came out like a month ago, but which I’m mentioning now because I’m timely, stating that NU was in discussions with the Cubs to make a Wrigley game an annual gig, provided certain renovations took place to make the Amicable, uhh … Inside-things (Thanks for nothing, thesauri) more football-friendly.

I can’t help but think making an annual Wrigley game would take all the spice out of a mighty spicy event. What made Wrigley awesome was its uniqueness: For a single November day, NU was the center of the football world. We traveled en masse on the El, we drank in Wrigleyville, we yelled at Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit and we enjoyed the novelty of seeing a purple marquee and goalposts attached to the ivy.

And although NU lost, we made our impression. When I look back on that day, I think of all the aforementioned awesomeness of that day – opposed to Mikel Leshoure repeatedly violating Northwestern’s run defense.

And that’s what the nation noticed. When ESPN made a highlight reel of the 2010 football season to accompany the 2011 BCS National Championship game, they ran highlight catches, trick plays and an appropriate amount of Cam Newton, but they didn’t show Leshoure; they showed Brian Peters scampering into the abandoned outfield end zone at Wrigley for a pick six.

The Wrigley game made people pay attention to Northwestern football, and I wouldn’t be surprised if NU attendance improves as a result of the heightened exposure. But there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. Would I watch the NBA if it was more like NBA Street Vol. 2? Well, probably, but then I wouldn’t play NBA Street Vol. 2.

The Wrigley game provided NU a moment in the college football spotlight, and we seized it, literally painting Wrigley purple and making it look like we have fans on TV. To make that game annual would make our gimmick even more gimmicky and ruin our respective memories of that November evening.

As for NU Day at Wrigley, maybe a year from now, I’ll remember that without it being overshadowed by other Wrigley-related NU events.

Sports editor Rodger Sherman is a Medill junior. He can be reached at [email protected]