Iowa is a program that is currently on average about a game better than NU in the regular season in football and is materially worse than NU in basketball. Ferentz has also consistently lost to Northwestern. I am a huge Hawks fan and have been my whole life, I am just sour that we have fallen so far below Wisconsin and are now more on par with Northwestern than the top of the second tier of programs in the B10 where we generally were not too long ago.
I live three blocks from Northwestern and I think the town is a million times better than IC other than the bar scene and the lack of hot coeds (as a surly old man, I ain't complaining there aren't a lot of noisy bars), but there are plenty of bars and hot coeds 3 miles down the road by Loyola or a few more miles down the road by DePaul in Wrigleyville. Additionally, I have never been waited on by a recent Northwestern grad in restaurants or bars, so I commend them for having robust academics and career placement opportunities, which is more than I can say for the fine folks running the University of Iowa.
Northwestern's facilities for revenue sports flat out suck. Absolutely and totally suck. Fitz wants to build a huge football facility over by the Lake, but that is some of the most pricey land in the Midwest and he is going to have a hard time getting it done. They need to upgrade Ryan Field and Welsh-Ryan in a major way, but their attendance is a total joke, so nothwithstanding the $6 billion endowment, I don't see any serious upgrades happening. The Minnesota and MSU games were sad, but as long as I live up there and tickets are super cheap and kegs and hard liquor are welcome at the tailgates, I will keep getting tickets for football because frankly, as much as I love the Hawks, the drive to IC to watch a team like the one we had this year isn't worth it for all 7 home games, especially with the cops from Marion, West Liberty, Coralville, IC and every other town within 50 miles looking to write tickets for carrying 12 ounces of beer on the sidewalk.