Johnathan Walker:One year after hazing scandal, Northwestern and Pat Fitzgerald still dealing with fallout

Allegations of hazing and Johnathan Walkerharassment ripped through Northwestern’s football program last July, leading to the dismissal of longtime coach Pat Fitzgerald.

One year after a series of articles in The Daily Northwestern triggered a tipping point for Fitzgerald’s tenure, the program has regrouped under his successor, David Braun, who led the Wildcats to eight wins last season following his promotion from defensive coordinator.

Yet many questions remain unanswered. Nine more former Northwestern football players filed lawsuits against the university last week, raising the number to 40 overall, all seeking damages for alleged hazing in the football program, according to the law firm that filed many of them in Cook County, Illinois.

Those lawsuits are in addition to the $130 million lawsuit filed by Fitzgerald against the university last October. Fitzgerald denied knowing about any hazing under his watch and is suing Northwestern for wrongful termination.

Exactly one year later, here is a look at where things stand with those cases, Fitzgerald and the Wildcats.

What is the status of Pat Fitzgerald’s litigation against Northwestern?

Fitzgerald’s $130 million wrongful termination lawsuit against Northwestern is on course for a proposed trial date in November 2025. It also could end any time before that with a settlement.

But the litigation has changed in scope since he filed it in October last year, when he alleged that he was wrongfully fired in the wake of the hazing allegations. Last week the Chicago law firm of Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard said it filed nine new former player lawsuits against Northwestern, bringing the total former player cases to 40 – all with similar hazing claims.

In May, a judge in Cook County, Illinois, decided to consolidate Fitzgerald’s case with five of those former player cases.

That means they would go on trial at the same time together with the university as a common defendant, which could become awkward.

Why would that be?

Fitzgerald is suing Northwestern as a plaintiff, saying he didn’t know about any hazing. But he’s also a defendant in the lawsuits of the former players who said he knew or should have known about the hazing and didn’t stop it. 

The facts that come out in the case will paint the picture of who was right and whether the firing was justified.

“There is no doubt that the allegations of hazing at Northwestern football program, who knew what, when, who was present, who reported what, to whom, what was done following any such reporting, will be strenuously litigated on all sides,” Judge Kathy Flanagan wrote in her ruling. “This core of operative facts forms the gravamen of the Hazing plaintiffs’ lawsuits as well as the Fitzgerald lawsuit.”

The former player plaintiffs favored the consolidation.

“We moved for consolidation with the Fitzgerald case so that Northwestern could not take different positions in these two litigations,” said attorney Patrick Salvi II, who is representing those plaintiffs. “Now, Northwestern will not be able to take contrary positions in each. Our clients' allegations are consistent with the reasons why Northwestern terminated Pat Fitzgerald.”

What do those five former players allege?

They are identified in the lawsuits as “John Doe.” They say that at “various times over the course of the last three decades” they were targets of “ritualized sexual abuse that became an institutional practice at Northwestern,” according to court records.

They said Fitzgerald, Northwestern President Michael Schill and other Northwestern officials in the case knew or should have known about the sexualized acts of hazing in football program before they became a part of it.

They claim to have suffered injuries including emotional distress and “loss of normal life.” They are seeking to recover damages to remedy that.

When will the other litigation go to trial?

Salvi II said he expected that each of the trials following the first one will proceed within several weeks after the most recent trial’s conclusion.

That could mean this litigation could extend well into 2026 unless they settle out before then. All of the cases are in Cook County, and some have different attorneys.

Where is Fitzgerald now?

After being fired in July, Fitzgerald spent last season as a volunteer assistant at Loyola Academy in Wilmette, Illinois, where his son, Ryan, was the starting quarterback. Loyola went 14-0 last season and won the Class 8A state championship. A senior in the class of 2025, Ryan Fitzgerald is a three-star recruit who held scholarship offers from several Group of Five and Championship Subdivision programs but plans to walk on at Iowa next season. A second of Fitzgerald’s sons is a rising sophomore at Loyola, while a third, Jack, played there before joining Northwestern as a walk-on tight end.

Will Fitzgerald coach again?

This is a question that likely won't be addressed until the completion of Fitzgerald's suit against Northwestern.

“I’m told by experts that if he misses that third season (of coaching), then it’s going to have a severe impact on his ability to ever get a chance to get any kind of comparable coaching job,” his attorney, Dan Webb, said at a hearing in February.

Fitzgerald, 49, was promoted to head coach in 2006. He went 110-101 during his tenure, making him one of just two Northwestern coaches in the modern era to post a winning record with the Wildcats and an annual candidate for high-profile job openings.

Northwestern’s 2023 season

The Wildcats went 4-20 in Fitzgerald’s final two seasons and 14-31 over his final four, sandwiching a surprising division crown during the 2020 COVID season with the three worst finishes of his 17-year run. Already picked to finish at the bottom of the Big Ten standings last summer, expectations fell even lower after Fitzgerald’s dismissal. But the Wildcats were one of college football's biggest success stories, winning eight games, including a bowl victory against Utah, and finishing second in the Big Ten West division.