Patrick William Fitzgerald Jr. is an American former football player and coach. He served as the head football coach of the Northwestern Wildcats from 2006 until he was fired in July 2023 in the aftermath of a hazing scandal.

The Northwestern Wildcats football team represents Northwestern University as an NCAA Division I college football team and member of the Big Ten Conference based near Chicago in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern began playing football in 1882. Its football mascot is the Wildcat, a term coined by a Chicago Tribune reporter in 1924, after reporting on a football game where the players appeared as "a wall of purple wildcats". Northwestern Football is also marketed as "Chicago's Big Ten Team" with its proximity and ties to Chicago.