There was no crying kid meme on the internet Saturday night after Northwestern was bounced from the NCAA Tournament with a 68-63 second-round loss to UCLA.
That televised moment from 2017 — when 11-year-old John Phillips, son of then-NU athletic director Jim Phillips, became teary-eyed during the waning moments of the Wildcats’ heartbreaking loss to No. 1 seed Gonzaga — went viral within moments of the final buzzer.
“Northwestern Kid” became a trending topic on Twitter, the subject of more than 20,000 tweets, and the spotlight on an NU program that had gone to its first NCAA Tournament was growing.
