Rittenberg saying he doubts it. Northwestern has finals this week, and they have nothing to gain by playing Maryland again
I think the conference made a mistake when they "permitted" teams that got cancelled on to schedule another team that had a cancellation. That should have either been "required" or handled by the conference.
The finals excuse seems weak to me. I get it, they have finals, but that was true a week ago when they were scheduled to play a road game at Minnesota this Saturday. What is the difference now?
Your second point is right on although it misses an even bigger issue for the Wildcats.
As you said, Northwestern has nothing to gain by playing Maryland again. That is pretty universally true for the team that won the first meeting. The bigger issue for Northwestern right now is that so long as they do NOT play this weekend they are guaranteed a spot in the CG. They are sitting at 5-1, first place in the B1G-W.
Wisconsin also only has one loss, but with only three games played so far and only two more possible they will not be eligible for the CG unless all hell breaks loose and the average number of games played by B1G teams is less than six (depending on how you read that provision,
see discussion here).
Iowa has two losses but one of them was to Northwestern so they can't get to the CG unless the Wildcats lose twice.
If Northwestern doesn't play this weekend then loses to Illinois next weekend they will finish 5-2 and head to the CG because nobody can beat that.
If Northwestern plays Maryland again this weekend and loses then the door is cracked open for Iowa.
The one credible argument I can see for NU not to play is that their game against Minnesota was cancelled some time ago. It is plausible that they may have taken a few days off this week figuring they had the weekend off. Meanwhile, UMD was practicing this week, figuring they had a game against Michigan. That would be unfair to Northwestern but that problem would have been averted if the conference had taken over replacement scheduling instead of "permitting" it. In that case the conference could have notified NU a few days ago that their game at MN was cancelled and that they would be notified by midnight tonight whether or not a replacement had been found. The onus would have been on NU to maintain a semi-normal practice schedule for a possible game. For that matter, the Wildcats could have been really smart (it is Northwestern we are talking about here) and started practicing specifically for Maryland because Michigan's COVID issues have been public knowledge for some time. Moreover, it isn't like NU doesn't know anything about Maryland. They already played them once.
