Northwestern's David Braun isn't half bad. Who saw all this coming?

INDIANAPOLIS — Northwestern football wasn’t any good. On the surface of things, interim coach David Braun didn’t seem to be much good, either.

It was only halfway through the Wildcats’ fourth game of 2023, but an observer to it all didn’t have to be much of a cynic to think, “Good Lord, just get this season over with.”

The Wildcats had been total no-shows in the opener at Rutgers, their 18th loss in their last 20 Big Ten games. They’d been blown out by Duke. Now they were getting rag-dolled by Minnesota, which led 24-7 at the half in Evanston.

Only 10 weeks removed from the firing of Pat Fitzgerald, it was beyond brutal.

Or was it?

“Coach Braun came in and just flipped the switch in everybody’s head,” running back Cam Porter said, “and it changed our mentality for the whole season.”

It might not be too big a stretch to say it changed Braun’s life, too. It certainly was a defining moment in his coaching career.

Braun had been an overachiever as an undersized defensive lineman at Winona State. He’d coordinated defenses on a pair of FCS national title-winning teams at North Dakota State, coaching with palpable passion. During his first spring as Fitzgerald’s brand-new defensive coordinator, Braun was so fired up that the whole team took notice, even the offensive players.

“We could all just tell,” Porter said. “We could see the qualities he had. He was a very strong individual. He was very determined.”

But as interim coach — the shock and suddenness of it all still fresh — Braun was so busy trying to hold things together that he’d kind of forgotten to let the beast within come out for occasional viewings. That changed at halftime of the Minnesota game. Right then and there, the Wildcats’ locker room became one hell of a scene.

It was what he said, the essence of it being that a successful comeback was about to begin.

And it definitely was how he said it. If Ryan Field hadn’t been torn down after the season, paint might still be peeling off the locker-room walls.

“We saw that he fully believed in us,” Porter said. “He had no doubt. When the leader of your team truly believes in you and doesn’t have a doubt in his mind, you go out there and play like it.”

The score was 31-10 with a little over 17 minutes left to play, but the Wildcats kept at it. Down 31-24, they forced overtime with Ben Bryant’s 11-yard touchdown pass to A.J. Henning with 2 seconds on the game clock. In OT, they won it on Bryant’s 25-yard pass to a wide-open Charlie Mangieri.

No team in college football was more surprisingly good from there. A 24-10 win at Wisconsin made the Wildcats 5-5 and nailed down a promotion to permanent head coach for Braun, an outcome not even Braun's bosses had been anticipating a couple of months earlier. Wins against Purdue, Illinois and Utah in the Las Vegas Bowl followed. Less than six months after Northwestern handed the keys to a young no-name in a time of utter crisis, Braun had eight victories under his belt and was the Big Ten’s coach of the year.

At Big Ten media days, Braun, 39, came and went while maintaining a relatively low profile. Fitzgerald was a media star, whereas Braun might have to win twice as much as Fitzgerald ever did to become half as famous. Outside expectations are that the 2024 Wildcats will be fair to middling. In a conference full of storylines that practically write themselves, Braun and his team aren’t creating much of a stir.

To the extent that reporters paid attention to Braun here, it was primarily to talk about the oddity of the Wildcats not having a bona fide football stadium in which to play home games. They’ll play five times on campus in a temporary structure along the lakefront — seating only about 15,000 — and twice at Wrigley Field in November.

That wouldn’t seem to be a positive for the dudes in purple.

“I think Northwestern football, when we’re at our best, we get a little bit of an edge to us, a chip on our shoulder,” Braun said. “If that’s something that drives that edge, then it’s OK with me.”

And what about when Braun is at his best? Is that what we saw from halftime against Minnesota until the Wildcats ran out of opponents to try to upset?

“I just harnessed who I am,” he said. “I deeply value personal connection, getting to know people, valuing relationships. I harnessed that with our players, harnessed that with our coaches, harnessed that with our alumni and our donors and [players’] parents. Also … ”

Here, he paused and flashed a devilish smile.

“Also,” he continued, “when I’m at my best? I am as competitive as [expletive].”