[Ed. Battle RoyHAIR among BigTen Defensive Coordinators. Round 1, Round 2.]

I made a startling discovery (to me anyway, but I think you all know that I’m no bastion of knowledge) when researching Northwestern Defensive Coordinator Mike Hankwitz – he’s one of our own. He played at Michigan, and was a graduate assistant during some good times: two Big Ten titles, a 30-3 record, three top-10 national rankings and a 1971 Rose Bowl appearance. He’s also a bit of a Big Ten whore (if you ignore all that time at Colorado and Arizona), having done stints at Purdue and Wisconsin before landing at Northwestern last year.

While Hankwitz suffers from the same horseshoe pattern as his Indiana brethren:

The squinting isn’t helping him either – reminds me of Puddy from TOEoS*.

It seems to be a perma-squint, judging from the few pictures available on Google Images.

However, I found something more disturbing:

Granted, this picture is from his Colorado days, but I bet it still applies. Compare his sideline style to our Gerg:

I much prefer the fitted look – Hankwitz may as well be wearing a potato sack. They look to be about the same size, but Gerg looks a lot svelter on gameday. We’ll have to keep an eye out for his choice of Michigan gear when the season rolls around.

Just for kicks, I ran both of them through http://celebrity.myheritage.com/ and shockingly, we have a commonality!

Gerg’s top three celebrity matches:

Prince William
Hal Sparks
Robert Redford

Hankwitz’s top three:

Gerald Ford
Hal Sparks
Clint Eastwood

I think Hankwitz looks more like Ed Begley myself.

Full disclosure: I ran my facebook picture through myheritage, and apparently I look like Sally Field, Melissa Joan Heart, and Barbara Walters. I had a girlfriend who got Art Garfunkel, so things could be worse.

GERG 3 BigTen 0

*That One Episode of Seinfeld