Northwestern has never been thought of as a “sports school”. Shocking, I know.
Now NU isn’t some bottomless pit devoid of hope and success. Just look at the lacrosse program from 2005 through 2012, where they dominated the sport to a degree near akin to the Boston Celtics in the 1960s. Of course, that still hasn’t changed the reputation that you should go to Northwestern for a degree rather than the athletic atmosphere. It sucks, but non-revenue sports just don’t garner the attention the same way football and basketball do, and those are the sports that NU has historically struggled at.