NIU Football, Joe Novak, and Close Games

This post is inspired (stolen from) by Dog Pound member NIUtrav09 and this thread he posted. The guy really should write for this site no doubt in my mind if he has any free time (away from his girlfriend). Hahaha jk Trav. I did update a couple things. Writer invite sent out...


2005:
wk. 2 @ Northwestern L 37-38
-The infamous 2 point conversion play. Let's not forget NIU had a 14-3 lead in this game.

wk. 4 @ Akron L 42-48
-Lost in overtime

wk 9. @ CMU W 31-28
-Huge win.. got NIU back into the MAC title hunt

MACC vs. Akron L 30-31
-Does anything really need to be said?

2006:
wk. 2 vs. Ohio L 23-35
-In my opinion, we overlooked Ohio. Yes, they went on to have a good season but the Huskies should not have lost this game.

wk. 6 @ Miami OH W 28-25
-Boring game against a winless Miami OH squad. NIU really could never get things going and escaped with a win.

wk. 7 @ WMU L 14-16
-Had several chances to win this game but simply could not. The O-Line decided not to show up today and Wolfe could never get going.

wk. 9 @ Iowa L 14-24
-NIU played tough against a very good team. Another coulda, shoulda, woulda game.

wk 10 vs. Toledo L 13-17
-The infamous Fog Bowl game. 1st and goal and they couldn't punch it in. Questionable play calling.

2007:
wk 2 vs SIU L 31-34
-Choke job. Late recovered onside kick & TD.

wk 3 vs EMU L 19-21
-Choke job pt 2. Penalties hurt the huskies and late FG gets blocked.

wk 4 vs Idaho W 42-35
-Barely win this one, with Idaho recovering a late onside kick and almost scoring. We once led 35-7.

wk 5 vs Temple L 15-16
-We lose because of 2 botched extra points, which Nendick always usually makes.


Since 2005, our record in close games is 4-10


They say a good indicator of coaching strength is W/L record in close games...

Trav's thoughts:
Novak made us a good team. He brought us out of the lowest of the lows and gained NIU respect. Without him there is no Wolfe, no AAPC, no MACC, no Nationally televised games, no SI articles, no Silicon Vally Bowl, no Poinsettia Bowl, no 20,000+ ave attendance, etc.

However, Joe is not the guy to take NIU to the next level - whatever that may be.

Your turn. Is this 4-10 record the result of bad coaching? Bad players? Bad luck?

WE'RE 9 POINTS AWAY FROM BEING 4-2 THIS YEAR

And we outgained CMU significantly yardage-wise and were -5 in turnovers. Turnover margin was -3 in the Iowa game.