A momentous occasion

I was ready to make fun of Illinois from the very start of the season once they lost to Rutgers University.\nAs a New Jersey native, I know all about Rutgers football. The Scarlet Knights are more like Scarlet fever in the dirty Jerz. Their losing is a chronic illness, and the only antidote -- wins -- are few and far between.\nIn the first week of the season, the Fightin' Illini inoculated the Scarlet Knights, losing 33-0. I laughed and was tempted to put a "W" next to the IU schedule that read, "Oct. 7 at Illinois." But Rutgers hasn't lost a game since and remains unbeaten at 5-0. The Scarlet Knights have staved off their Scarlet fever, but IU and Illinois remain infected.\nIf the Big Ten were a family, IU and Illinois would be twins with leprosy. No one in our family will talk to us, acknowledge us or even admit that we're related. Quarantined and ostracized, these two football programs might as well be dead this season.\nSo what is important about this unimportant game? Only one thing -- the one thing Illinois has and IU has been without. It is momentum, and Saturday we'll find out just how important it can be. \nLadies and germs, this is it. This is the final game of the football schedule that IU should win. And in IU's true underdog fashion, the Fighting Illini enter the game flaunting full momentum, while the Hoosiers have all their momentum, of course, going against them.\nHow do you define momentum in college football? In an average 12-game schedule, one win or one loss can fuel or fool a football team. \nLast week, IU should have lost to Wisconsin. They did, 52-17.\nLast week, the Illini should have lost to Michigan State. They didn't, winning 23-20.\nThe Fighting Illini won their first Big Ten game in three years. IU lost its seventh consecutive conference contention. Repeat those last three words five times fast. Now, imagine that on a football field. The Hoosiers have stumbled, stammered and stuttered in their recent three-game homestead. They went from undefeated to only defeated, and Saturday they will stumble, stammer and stutter their way into Champaign, Ill., against a Fighting Illini squad that actually has a fight in it.\nAn inoculation, like the one with which Rutgers was treated with, is hard to come by several weeks into the football season. Now, it's about overcoming the disease dubbed losing, overcoming our leprosy.\nThat is the importance of being cured. That is the importance of being a good football team. That is the importance of being earnest about the rest of your season. And if IU can't shake off this sickness Saturday, that'll signify the importance of being momentous.