I'll actually agree with you

For all of our differences, I do firmly agree with you here.

Pat Fitzgerald is many things, including a terrible human being, but he isn't a bad coach.

The fact that he managed to take Northwestern to 10 bowl games in a 17 year tenure there is very respectable.

His downfall (aside from the sexual assault / hazing incidents) came after the transfer portal rules loosened up a lot starting in 2021 (the "one time transfer" rule got enacted), a lot of his better players got poached pretty quickly.