DEKALB, Ill. -- I need to get a disclaimer in here at the outset. Joe Novak and I did not know each other until this year. We are not buddies from coaching convention bull sessions. My only contact with him in years past was a handshake acquaintance as our Kentucky teams competed with him when he was the defensive coordinator at Indiana. His defenses usually knocked our teeth out, and while we respected him, we certainly had no reason to be friendly with him.
It turns out Novak is a feel-good story all by himself. A football lifer, he had a fine career as a high school coach in Warren, Ohio, for seven years, then as an assistant for 22 more at Miami (Ohio), Illinois, Northern Illinois and Indiana. He was especially effective as the defensive coordinator at Indiana with coach Bill Mallory. The Hoosiers were one of the best-coached teams in the country for 12 years between 1984 and 1995. The logical thing to do as he reached middle age might have been to move into administration, where demands are neither as great nor hours as long as in the tumultuous coaching arena.
It never crossed his mind.
When he took the head coaching job at Northern Illinois in December 1995, it seemed to have all the potential of dead-end street. When his teams won three and lost 30 the next three seasons, there were all the symptoms of a full-blown disaster. In today's quick-draw coaching crapshoot, there is little chance he would have survived, even with NIU's minimal expectations.
Fast forward to this year's Mid American Championship game in Detroit next week, and enjoy the fact that its Western Division representative will at long last be Novak's indomitable charges.
Early Thanksgiving
The first-ever berth in the championship game was clinched Wednesday in a dramatic confrontation with Western Michigan University. Under new coach Bill Cubit, the Broncos were 7-3, having already secured the most mathematically pronounced turnaround in Mid American Conference history. They were 1-10 in 2004.
The drama never quite happened as Novak's offensive line, led by center Brian Van Acker and tight end Jake Nordin, took over the game from the first snap and never relented. The game became a 42-7, three-and-a-half-hour celebration of Northern Illinois football's finest hour. Garrett Wolfe, the Huskies' amazing little tailback, ran for 277 yards and five touchdowns, looking for all the world like a Midwestern version of Reggie Bush. That he has played the season with a injured shoulder and a bad knee just adds to the melodrama.
Joe Tessitore, Dave Ryan, and I were assigned to broadcast the game for ESPN2, and we did the best we could to describe the moment on a blustery day at Huskie Stadium. Among the NIU faithful who turned out in festive fashion, there was remarkable emotion.
One gruff fellow stopped me as I made my way through the stands at halftime. "Hey, Curry," he said. "I know you! I've been an Alabama fan all my life and pulled for them except for the time Northern went down to Tuscaloosa and whipped them."
His hands were hard, like those of an offensive lineman or a mechanic. He gripped my right hand with both of his and looked me in the eye.
"This is a big day for the Huskies, just about the biggest since that day in 2003 in Tuscaloosa!" he exclaimed. "We've been waiting a long, long time!"
I wished him good luck and wondered whether anybody anywhere understood the passion of regular folks all over our country who never paint their faces or scream into cameras.
Wolfe had 156 yards and three touchdowns at halftime. With the score 28-7, halftime events were all celebratory, complete with an impressive fireworks display to celebrate the ground-breaking ceremony for the soon to be constructed academic/athletic facility.
Iditarod Huskies
Note the accomplishments of his NIU Huskies the last five seasons and you have the makings of the next Hollywood tear-jerker about the little laughingstocks whipping on some of the big boys and most all of the folks their size. The players graduate. The Huskies graduated 71.4 percent of its players between 1999 and 2004, ranking among the elite academic football programs in the country.
This is their unprecedented sixth consecutive winning season. NIU leads the MAC in attendance, averaging 27,052 in 2004. The Huskies have won 38 of their last 52 games (a 73 percent winning percentage), and 29 of their last 35 home games (an 82.9 winning percentage). In recent years, they have defeated Maryland, Alabama and Iowa State from the ACC, SEC and Big 12 respectively. There is discipline, enthusiasm and unselfishness at every turn.
"Coach Joe and His Iditarod Huskie Champions," or some such title would do for the movie. The obvious problem with the obvious title is that the Iditarod is considerably easier than the long, arduous road Novak and his pups took toward this moment.
Of just such courage and perseverance are built the programs that really do make football a vital force for a proper value system in our society.
Upon reflection, I have a proposal for NIU athletic director Jim Phillips and his major benefactors. How about this for the new athletic facility:
The Joe Novak Center.
ESPN college football analyst Bill Curry was an NFL center for 10 seasons and coached for 17 years on the college stage. His Center Stage examinations appear each week during the college football season.