The eastern side is in the eastern half. 
Though they’re on the cutting edge of play-by-play announcing:
Not sports schools, but in Connecticut (a tiny, tiny state) there are Central Connecticut State University, Eastern Connecticut State University, Southern Connecticut State University and Western Connecticut State University. I’ll bet that you could drive to all of them in less than an eight-hour workday.
You could do so, but these are all commuter schools and it’s best not to have an hour commute each way I’d think.
My point was only that they’re all very close together (as is everything in Connecticut).
I recall running a periodical off the press for Seattle Area residents from the Subcontinent, called Northwest South Asian.
Similar situation in North Carolina; eastern North Carolina is geographically, economically, and culturally very different from western North Carolina.
As for Northwestern, per Bruce Catton’s history of the Civil War, in the antebellum and war eras, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa were a distinct political and cultural region called “the Northwest”, just as the Confederate states were “the South” and the states northeast of New York “New England”.
My wife graduated from Western Reserve University (before it merged with Case) in Cleveland. Why was there a Western-anything in Cleveland? Because Northeast Ohio started out as western Connecticut.
Not college sports related, but speaking of overly elaborate directional regions, I live in a region often referred to by local broadcasters as “southeastern North Carolina and northeastern South Carolina.”
Could be worse. You could live in Albuquerque, where the various Northeast, Northwest, and Southeast Circles intersect at least a half-dozen times.
The interesting thing about Northwestern University–other than the fact that Illinois hasn’t been considered part of the Northwest since the Civil War–is that it’s one of the few national directionals. The only other ones that I can think of are Northeastern University in Massachusetts and Southern University in Louisiana.
No, Hail to the Victors was written in 1898, before even the first Rose Bowl was played. It refers to Michigan being the champion of the Western Conference, as the Big Ten was known in its early days before it had ten teams. In the Nineteenth Century college football landscape, anything east of the Ivy League was “the west”.
Are you an Aggie also?
I suspect it got that idea in the same way the “midwest” is mostly in the eastern half of the current 48 US states. Back when the school was built, it was one of the far western outposts of US civilization.
It didn’t leave “the West”. The West left it.
There’s also Southeastern University in Florida and Southwestern University in Texas.
As a native Kansan, the supposed location of the ‘midwest’ has always rankled me. The state of Ohio is often referred to as being in the midwest, yet the Pacific coast is four times farther from Ohio than the Atlantic coast. By what measure, then, can Ohio (or Michigan or even Indiana) be considered in the midwest?
OK, I’m done with my hijack rant. Carry on.
It doesn’t make sense geographically (in terms of where they are on the continent), but it does make sense historically (and maybe populationally). Kansas was once firmly part of the West—there have been many Westerns set in Kansas.
NCAA D1 schools:
Northwestern State University
University of Northern Iowa
Northern Kentucky University
Northwestern University
Northeastern University
Northern Illinois University
Northern Arizona University
University of North Texas
University of North Florida
University of Northern Colorado
Charleston Southern University
Southern Methodist University
Georgia Southern University
University of South Alabama
University of South Florida
Southeast Missouri State University
Southeastern Louisiana University
Southern University
Southern Illinois University Carbondale
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
University of Southern Mississippi
Southern Utah University
Texas Southern University
East Carolina University
East Tennessee State University
Eastern Illinois University
Eastern Kentucky University
Eastern Michigan University
Eastern Washington University
University of Maryland Eastern Shore
Western Carolina University
Western Illinois University
Western Kentucky University
Western Michigan University
Middle Tennessee State University
University of South Carolina Upstate
University of Central Arkansas
Central Connecticut State University
University of Central Florida
Central Michigan University
North Carolina Central University
The Last of the Mohicans which is a bit of a proto-Western takes place in upstate New York.
When the USA ended at or just beyond the Mississippi, and there was nothing but dragons, buffalo, and the red man farther out, labeling Indiana as midwestern and Ohio as the easternmost edge of the midwest made a certain sense.
185 years later not so much. Then again, the USA still has an electoral college and the penny. We’re actually not much good at this “making progress” thing.
As a native Californian, “the West” pretty well ends at the Colorado river. Most of us will give NV & AZ honorary status as “west”. But only honorary.
Everything else is “the East”. The “back east” picks up at the Missisippi or so.
As you said, I’m done with my hijack rant.