Photo by the author.

Members of the Secular Humanists for Inquiry & Freethought brought the Darwin fish to the Rock Thursday. SHIFT is a newly founded student group that advocates “religious freedom and freedom from religion.”

The same two friends met again on Nov. 8 after the New York Giants and San Diego Chargers played each other, catching up on all that had transpired since they last saw each other.

No, this story does not end with a pair of Medill grads talking about their time covering NFL.

Instead, it’s Barry Cofield (’06), defensive tackle for the Giants, and Luis Castillo (’05), defensive end for the Chargers — two friends who have found success as NFL linemen.

“It’s been a blessing,” said Cofield about his time with the Giants.

“It’s been a beautiful experience, that’s about the only way to put it,” said Castillo.

Both Castillo and Cofield have been starters virtually since they entered the NFL. Cofield, a fourth round pick in 2006 has started 55 of 56 regular season games, while Castillo, a first round pick in 2005, has started 57 of 60 games.

Cofield credits his time at Northwestern for preparing him for the rigors of an NFL season.

“We had difficult practices, we had difficult off-season training,” Cofield said. “It makes the NFL workload look easy.”

Head football coach Pat Fitzgerald reasons that it is something completely different that has prepared Cofield and Castillo for their success.

“Those guys worked really hard to get where they are today,” Fitzgerald said. “They put the time in the weight room and with the coaches to get to that level.”

Those efforts paid off for both Cofield and Castillo. Cofield won a Super Bowl in his second season with the Giants as a key contributor to the defensive line that propelled New York to victory over the New England Patriots. Castillo had a career high seven sacks in 2006 when the Chargers went a league-best 14-2, and was rewarded for his efforts in the 2008 offseason with a 5 year, $43 million extension from the Chargers.

It’s that kind of success that has made the Northwestern football program and Coach Fitzgerald appreciative of what the two have accomplished.

“It really shows the strength of our program that we can have those guys be successful in the NFL,” Fitzgerald said. “It’s helped us in recruiting.”

With defensive tackle John Gill (’08) signing a contract with the Indianapolis Colts practice squad and senior defensive end Corey Wootton destined for the NFL, high school linemen are taking notice. The success of players like Cofield and Castillo have already made impacts in recruiting, with the current class of 2010 featuring three defensive linemen and three on the offensive side of the ball.

Castillo and Cofield do their best to stay in touch with the program, even though they play in San Diego and New York, respectively. Castillo keeps in touch with a lot of former players like Napoleon Harris and Barry Gardner. Cofield stays in touch with Fitzgerald by exchanging texts.

“I’ll shoot Fitz a text every now and then,” Cofield says. “I was also able to come back on a bye week and catch up then.”

Naturally, they still closely follow the team on the field. After Northwestern’s huge upset over Iowa, Castillo compared it to the 33-27 overtime victory he and Cofield had over Ohio State in 2004.

“If I had to rank all the victories I’ve had in my career, that still remains number one,” Castillo said. “I’m sure that’s what a lot of the guys there are feeling now.”

Cofield said it is a lot of fun to play against other Northwestern alums in the NFL.

“Obviously it’s intense, playing for opposite teams, but it’s great to talk to them before the game and after the game, catch up and talk about old Northwestern stories,” he said.

So when Cofield and Castillo played against each other in a 21-20 Chargers victory, it was more cordial because Castillo said couldn’t get in the jabs he wanted to.

“After that experience with him [at the Super Bowl], I don’t think there’s much I can jaw at him for,” Castillo said.

They claim to love bacon, the numbers four and nine, and know that the answer to the trivia questions during games is always “C.” Their behavior borders on cultish but has the air of a friendship woven through and through with the thread of a common commitment. The fact that they spend the majority of their time playing instruments and wearing purple seems to be beside the point. And although they don’t come right out and say it, it’s clear that whatever it is they’re actually doing, they’re not doing it only for themselves.

The Northwestern University Marching Band is more than just a “band.” It’s a piece of university history — an artifact that evolves with each football season, no matter how good or bad the ‘Cats prove to be. And at the center of the group are two students, filled to the brim with school spirit and knowledge of all things Northwestern. They are the “SpiriTeam” (and yes, it’s with one “t”) – Juniors Jed Feder and Zack Moy as the “Spirit leader” and “Grynder” respectively.

“Hear Ye, Hear Ye. This band’s in session.”

It’s the opening cry that brings the band to order in Trienens Hall. And delivered by Feder, it’s also what sets the tone for the “spirit session” — a pep rally for the band, by the band — which follows.

Since the creation of the roles that now make up the SpiriTeam in the 1960s, the “Here Ye” has been an important responsibility of the Spirit Leader. It began as a way to introduce band personnel and instrumental sections to the opposing team’s band. Over time it has become increasingly dependent on the creativity of the current Spirit Leader. With Feder, it’s a forum for social commentary, inside jokes and other humorous anecdotes.

“The great thing about Jed is that he’s a really good performer,” says Moy. “His lines are really great too but his delivery makes the performance for him, no matter what.”

Pete Friedmann has had a front seat in the role’s transition. Friedmann spent the fall of 1978, his senior year, as the Spirit Leader. He returned to Northwestern two years after graduating and has been the band’s announcer ever since. Despite the growing complexity of the role he once had, he has enjoyed watching it change.

“It’s been a gradual and very natural evolution and just a lot of fun to be a fly on the wall and watch it happen,” he says.

Friedmann often attends the “spirit sessions” and knows first-hand the amount of work Feder and Moy put into their roles. After all, he was once in their shoes making up cheers, rewriting opponents’ fight songs, and giving his own “Here Ye” all in the name of, as he says, “getting the band psyched up.”

“These guys are great,” he said. “I think they’re under a lot of pressure because every year, every spirit team … wants to outdo what the previous spirit team did.”

But can they Growl?

Zack Moy. Photo courtesy of Tom McGrath.

Together the two bookend the session, Feder with his “Here Ye” and Moy with what in band lore is known as “The Grynd” — a two or so minute slam poetry reading that also invokes the upcoming game and jokes pertaining to the band.

From the start, Moy knew that he wanted to be the Grynder. Unlike the Spirit Leader, which requires an audition process, this position is passed down. As a sophomore, Moy asked the Grynder, then a senior, what he would need to do to secure his spot. Although he knew that the position had a history of staying within his instrumental section, the mellophones, he felt that would make things too easy. He wanted to deserve the position.

“I basically did as many spirited, crazy, ridiculous things as I possibly could. Whether it was the most extreme dress-up day or just being really quirky and loud and like being a presence in the band during rehearsals,” says Moy.

Moy eventually got the position and quickly went to work.

If it’s Feder that gets the group laughing, it’s Moy that gets them, well, growling. At the end of every Grynd, the Grynder asks for a little help. He starts off asking, “Wildcat Band, can you growl?” They do, but not loud enough to satisfy him. There’s a woman on his mind and she must hear it too. “That was pretty good,” he’ll say. “But there’s one person who couldn’t hear you, it was my mother.” The two groups banter back and forth a little more before Moy’s final call, “She couldn’t hear you, so Wildcat band, can you growl?”

And they growl, in the fashion of the “claw” done at football games. This satisfies Moy and the session ends with a performance by the drum line.

How do you like your Badger meat?

But their respective roles in the spirit sessions are only a small part of their leadership within the band. From standing on the ladders in front of the band during football games to preparing “spirit sheets” complete with jokes and football team reviews for the rest of the band to leading specific cheers, the roles are both a symbolic honor and a time consuming task.

It all converges into one idea: P & G, or “pride and guts.”

“It’s one of our mantras,” says Moy, “meaning pride in the school and the football team, [and] guts as [in] you will do everything perfect for the team.”

This means hitting the right notes, marching in the right step and being the loudest and proudest Wildcat supporters in the stands. Aside from leading the post-touchdown fight song both Moy and Feder have their own cheers or chants that they lead with band with.

“Even if it’s like for 20 seconds, we’re doing some dumb cheer,” says Moy.

Listen hard enough on Saturday and you might hear something like this: “Badger meat! Badger meat! How do we like it? How do we like it? Raw! Raw! Raw!”

Mark Woodsum, a 5th year member of the Wildcat football team, understands the band’s commitment in their support of the ‘Cats. He is often a guest at the spirit sessions, keeping up the recent practice by members of the football team.

“They’re great guys,” he says of Feder and Moy. “They’ve obviously got a lot of passion not only for Northwestern, the band and football but they generate and incredible amount of time.”

“The greatest band in the whole damn land”

And just as their commitment is recognized outside the band, neither does it go unnoticed within.

In his tenth year as the band’s director, Dan Farris has experienced the efforts of a number of different spirit teams.

“It’s an interesting history and what it’s kind of evolved to,” he says. “When I first came here, I was like ‘who are these people and what are they doing?’”

He quickly found out. Now, it’s not the band without them. Although this is the first year in their role for both of them, Farris is impressed with their leadership ability.

“I think it’s a really unique team and this is essential to bring spirit and unity to the band in the stands and during rehearsals … ” he says.

While Feder, Moy and the rest of the Wildcat marching band don’t seem to have any trouble generating school spirit, they keep their sessions closed to non-members.

“I suppose if tons of students were like ‘we want to see this’ then Jed and I might do things a little differently, I don’t know,” Moy says. “But the thing is you’ll think we’re a cult. And in some aspects we are.”

So maybe they are a little selfish. Still, you can’t deny that their blood runs purple.

“You can join it for any reason,” he said. “Everyone’s different in there, but everyone’s also the same [in] that they just love that organization for what it does for the school and the community.”

He continues, “the fact [is] that we are the best fans for the Northwestern football team and for Northwestern in general.”

As Feder notes at the conclusion of his “Hear Ye,” they just might be “the greatest band in the whole damn land.”

Ask anyone on campus who follows Northwestern basketball, and most will tell you that if any team’s going to make the tournament, this is the one. Even ESPN.com’s Andy Katz said that he thinks the ‘Cats will make the tournament. The path through the Big Ten, though, is not easy.

What obstacles are in the ‘Cats way

Of course, all that hype was based on the presence of certain returning players. Now, however, if the ‘Cats are going to do what no other Northwestern basketball team has done in more than half a century, they’re going to have to do it without their best returning player, senior forward Kevin Coble, who is out for the year due to a foot injury sustained in practice before the season started.

Coble, who led the ‘Cats last year with 15.5 points and 4.8 rebounds per game, was expected to take the ‘Cats to the tournament this year. His absence, along with fellow senior Jeff Ryan, who will also miss this year due to a torn ACL, is a huge hit to the Wildcats’ aspirations for this season.

Besides dealing with the injuries to Coble and Ryan, the ‘Cats must also make up for the important loss of Craig Moore to graduation. Head coach Bill Carmody expects the ‘Cats to score “in a variety of ways” this season to handle that loss, featuring an inside game led by sophomore centers Kyle Rowley and Luka Mirkovic, as well as players such as John Shurna, a sophomore, to “take on more of the scoring load.”

Why it can still be okay

Rather than dwell on those losses, however, junior guard Michael “Juice” Thompson is looking at the players that will be on the court.

“We’re just going to have to play through it,” he said. “We’re just going to have to have people step up.”

According to Thompson, some of the players who are going to have to step up are forwards Shurna and Ivan Peljusic, a junior. Freshman forward Drew Crawford also refuses to throw in the towel with 29 games to go.

“We’re a resilient team,” he says. “We’re going to go out there, work hard, and do well.”

As for the leadership the Moore brought to the team, Thompson has stepped up into that role, taking on more of an active position on the team.

“I had to learn the offense inside and out,” said Thompson about his new duties as the leader of the team. “This year I’ve been more of a vocal leader, being more on top of guys, talking to them more.”

The players also seem to relish the competitive nature of Big Ten conference play, which may be the toughest in the country this year.

“It’s a lot of fun,” says Thompson. “It’s a battle out there.” Crawford echoes that sentiment. “It’s going to be unbelievable competition and something that I’m looking forward to.”

Expect big things from Crawford, as the freshman forward comes in as one of the Wildcats’ more highly anticipated recruits, and should get fans excited this year, according to Thompson.

“He’s going to give the Northwestern fans something they haven’t seen in a while,” says Thompson. “A lot of dunks.”

Carmody also praises the new addition, although more for the intangibles than for the highlight reels he’s going to (hopefully) be making.

“He’s a hard working kid,” says Carmody. “He picks things up quickly, and he’s going to get better and better for us.”

If the Wildcats can make the tournament this year, it would go down as a truly historical season, something that Thompson and his teammates relish.

“It’s something that drew a lot of us to the school,” says Thompson about himself and his teammates. “To be a part of history.”

This episode had a lot of singing and a lot of drama, so basically I was a happy camper. We meet Quinn’s (blond) parents, a former student who used to be in love with Will (warning: it’s creepy!), some moments between Kurt and Finn, a baby confession, three karaoke songs, an intense fight, and two bitchy scenes with Terri — one’s funny though. Finn shows his true colors, and the glee club shows their solidarity and support for Quinn and Finn. And of course, everything is solved by 8:57 CST.

Predictions: Well, at least one person knows that Finn isn’t the baby daddy. Considering how solid the glee club is, the baby-daddy drama may not be as bad as I may have thought. I just hope Sue will be back next week.

Music Tip: I tend to melt when Artie starts to sing, and especially when he riffs. His riffs during “Lean on Me” were simple, eloquent and not overstated. Also, it was refreshing to hear Will actually sing rather than rap. I love his rapping skills, but he’s been on Broadway multiple times, and this episode we really got to see why — to be honest, I was swooning almost as much as Emma and Rachel.