March 31, 2005

Question:: Who Replaces QB Josh Haldi As Northern Illinois Open Spring Football Practice?

DeKALB, IL --- Questions. Sure, there’s questions. Tenth-year Northern Illinois University head football coach Joe Novak has plenty of them. But what better time to plug those off-season holes or try line-up changes than spring practice?

Coming off a victory in the Silicon Valley Football Classic and the program’s second straight Top 30 national poll finish and anticipating the 2005 season-opener at the University of Michigan, the buzz still surrounds The Huskie Nation.

Can Northern Illinois record its sixth consecutive winning season---the longest such stretch in Cardinal and Black gridiron history since the school-record 21-year success string during 1929-49? How competitive will the Huskies be against Michigan and Northwestern University that one-two Big Ten Conference opposition non-league schedule? Can there be a
better major-college tailback tandem in America than Garrett Wolfe and A. J. Harris? How well can the revamped Northern Illinois O-line front play in 2005? Can the Huskies win the outright Mid-American Conference West Division title and finally win at the University of Toledo for the first time since 1972?

Indeed, all rate as legitimate concerns around Camp Novak as the first of 15 practices started this week and culminate in the annual Northern Illinois Spring Game on Saturday (April 23) at noon (CDT) on Brigham Field at Huskie Stadium.

Roster-wise, NIU returns 36 letterman and 15 starters from its first bowl team in 21 years. The Big Question?

No doubt, it will be finding a No. 1 quarterback to replace the graduated Josh Haldi who produced a 25-8 career won-lost record as a three-year starter and led Northern Illinois to a 9-3 mark, a No. 29 spot in both final major polls, and a 34-21 triumph over Troy University in the Silicon Valley Football Classic last year.

“Sure, we’d like to establish a quarterback in the spring,” Novak said. “This happens all the time in football. Every three or four years, you’re looking for a new starter at a certain position. We do have some experience and some talent at quarterback, but you don’t immediately replace the experience that Josh had. That’s impossible.”

How does Novak’s staff replace that leadership, that moxie, that soundness, and those career statistics (427-of-776 passes for 6,015 yards, 55 touchdowns and 19 interceptions) that Haldi brought to the Huskie table? This was a team quad- captain with a 3.89 cumulative grade point average who went to the National Football League Combine this winter.

“Josh could make some big plays, but, most of all, he played sound football within our system,” Novak praised. “Everybody wants an athletic quarterback who can break contain and make a ton of big plays. No defense can stop that. That drives defensive coordinators crazy. (Michigan’s) Jack Harbaugh did that all the time to us at Indiana. At the same time, you can’t have a high-powered offense, make mistakes, and turn over the ball all the time. The turnovers will kill you.”

In between the lines, what Novak is saying is this: Northern Illinois ranked No. 17 in the nation in turnover margin (+0.7 per game average) and led the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division 1-A ranks with the fewest fumbles lost (one) a year ago. At the same time, the Huskie One Back attack rated No. 11 in NCAA team rushing (238.2 yards-per-game average), No. 13 in team 1-A scoring (35.1 ppg.), and No. 14 in major-college total offense (438.8 ypg.). NIU also set single-season team records in total offense (5,265 yards), scoring (421 points), and TDs (53) last season.

While football is the ultimate team game, Novak’s offensive scheme requires “the right” triggerman.

At this time, junior Phil Horvath (Naperville / Central) and soph Zach Ullrich (Winfield / Wheaton North) rank one-two on the Northern Illinois QB depth chart and rightfully so. But it’s two red-shirt freshmen named Britt Davis (Broadview / Riverside-Brookfield) and Dan Nicholson (Chicago / Brother Rice) that intrigue the coaching staff and the diehard Huskie fans. People have memorized Davis’ and Nicholson’s prep stats and heard about the amazing Scout Team performances.

The 6-foot-2, 200-pound Horvath went from zero 1-A snaps to 346 last year and won his first letter. In Haldi’s early-season absence with a right foot stress fracture, Horvath went 2-1 as a starter---including a near-perfect performance in the Huskies’ 34-17 trend-setting league success over GMAC Bowl-bound Bowling Green State University on ESPN2 last September. Under Horvath’s leadership, Northern Illinois generated 483 yards total offense in the BGSU victory. In that game, Horvath hit 16-of-23 passes for 191 yards and rushed for 32 yards and six carries.

Season-wise, Horvath wound up as the most productive No. 2 Huskie QB since Pete Genatempo (94-of-171 passes for 916 yards and five TDs in 1984) by hitting 72-of-123 aerials for 954 yards, six TDs, and seven interceptions. Against Independence Bowl entry Iowa State University, Horvath threw for a career-high (1) 285 yards, (2) four TD strikes, and (3) four “picks” six days prior to the BeeGee victory. “Phil learned,” Novak said. “He came to (offensive coordinator) John Bond and said ‘I’m not throwing any interceptions.’”

Ullrich saw limited duty in 2004, appearing in three games and 16 snaps and connecting on 1-of-2 passes for eight yards against MAC co-East Division champ University of Akron. The six-foot, 190-pound Ullrich has made the Northern Illinois travel squad ten times in the last two years.

“I thought Phil established himself in the Bowling Green game. That gives him an edge,” Novak said. “Zach has some playing time. Britt and Dan have tremendous potential. We have to see what happens this spring. I know this, as a staff, we will try to increase the snaps for all four quarterbacks. We’ll probably double up on the passing drills if we can.”

If there’s one phase of Huskie football that no one questions, it’s the running game. Northern Illinois has produced five consecutive First-Team All-MAC tailbacks, six straight 1,000-yard rushers and seven in Novak’s nine campaigns. The 1,000-Yard List: TB Charles Talley (1,008 in 1996), TB William Andrews (1,127 in 1999), TB Thomas Hammock (1,083 in 2000 and 1,096 in 2001), TB Michael Turner (1,915 in 2002 and 1,648 in 2003), and TB Garrett Wolfe (1,656 in 2004).

Start with the (1) nation’s top returning major-college rushing tandem or (2) America’s best one-two TB punch in Wolfe (Chicago / River Grove Holy Cross) and A. J. Harris (Wheaton / North) who combined for 2,478 ground yards and 22 TDs in 2004. “That is, in my opinion, the best running tandem in the country---bar none,” Novak said. “What a year both Garrett and A. J. had. They’re pretty darned good. With A. J. and Garrett, we’ve got a great change-up situation---one with power and another with speed.” Good enough that the veteran Northern Illinois head man wants to push both for 2005 All-MAC honors at the same position. And why not?

Wolfe and Harris lined up in the same backfield simultaneously? Not exactly. Novak toyed with that idea a few years ago with Hammock and Turner. How about moving either Wolfe (:04.47 speed in the 40) or the 219-pound Harris into the slot? The Wolfe-Harris duo represents the second-best ground-gaining tandem in the Huskie Record Book behind Kellar (1,719 yards) and TB Jerry Latin (884) in 1973.

The quicksilver 5-foot-7, 174-pound Wolfe (don’t you want to go “beep, beep” ala the “Roadrunner” in the classic “Looney Tunes” cartoons when No. 1 breaks one?) stepped into the national limelight in the second half of the Bowling Green State game on ESPN2 with 204 second-half rushing yards (202 overall) in relief of Harris (left ankle sprain). Even All-Century Huskie greats such as Turner, LeShon Johnson, and Mark Kellar could not match what followed. Wolfe rung up a Northern Illinois-record seven consecutive 100-yard rushing games, plus set the school’s single-game rushing (325 yards) and all-purpose yardage (341) records vs. Eastern Michigan, and NIU’s single-season scoring (126 points) and TD (21) standards.

By the end of 2004, Wolfe ranked among the nation’s Top 40 in at least 16 game and season statistical categories---including No. 3 in season scoring (11.5 ppg.), No. 3 in season all-purpose yardage (182.2 ypg.), and No. 5 in rushing (150.6 ypg.). The National Secret went from back-up tailback to team offensive MVP, First-Team All-MAC, four-time Mid-Am Player of the Week, and Honorable Mention All-America (by CNN-SportsIllustrated.com and Collegefootballnews.com).

Roles reversed at the Silicon Valley Football Classic. When Wolfe got hurt (hip injury) after his game-changing 50-yard TD burst in the first quarter, Harris came off the bench and ran for a school 1-A era bowl record 120 yards (119 in the second half) on 23 carries, plus one TD, against the nation’s No. 7 defense against the rush. “That will tell you what kind of team player A. J. is, to step into such a situation where Garrett had been the man most of the season,” Novak said.

With Wolfe, Harris, senior TB Adrian Davis (Kenosha, WI / St. Joseph), Horvath, and Ullrich, NIU returns 93 percent of its 2004 rushing offense (2,655 of 2,858 yards), 89 percent of last year’s rushing TDs (25 of 28), and 88 percent of its 2004 carries (485-of-550). During the bowl preparations last December, (now) red-shirt frosh TB Montell Clanton (Rockford / Guilford) really impressed the coaches and his peers. Put soph Cas Prime (Janesville, WI / Parker), junior Foster Chambers (Bellwood / Melrose Park Walther Lutheran), and true frosh Justin Anderson (Chicago / Steinmetz) on the board and the locals go seven-deep at TB. As Wolfe told one interviewer: “We run the football. That’s Northern Illinois football.”

Losing only one fumble last year borders on Twilight Zone material. “Unbelievable,” Novak commented, “particularly all the times we ran the football. Unbelievable.”

Most of these Donald Trump-type numbers resulted from the Huskie offensive line front (“...the best overall, across the board, in my time here,” said Novak). With a little help from the NCAA, Novak could start three 2004 O-line regulars---(1) senior C Brian Van Acker (Crystal Lake / Prairie Ridge), (2) junior tackle Doug Free (Manitowoc, WI/ Lincoln), and (3) sixth-year senior guard Ben Lueck (Oswego)---against Michigan in the September 3 opener in Ann Arbor.

Novak believes Van Acker and Free deserve All-America consideration. The 6-4, 287-pound Van Acker---a First-Team All-Mid-Am selection in his first year as a regular and runner-up in team knockdown blocks (76)---made the 2005 preseason Rotary Lombardi Award “watch list. Free---the best all-around athlete on the Northern Illinois O-line---was a Third-Team Freshman All-America pick by The Sporting News in 2003 and earned Second-Team All-MAC honors in 2004. With 24 consecutive starts, including two at tight end, the 6-foot-6, 290-pound Free led the O-line in blocking grades (91 percent)
last year. The 6-4, 310-pound Lueck---a Second-Team All-MAC selection last fall---has applied for a medical red-shirt similar to ex-OT Mark Orszula received in 2004. Add senior OG Jake Ebenhoch (Sussex, WI / Hamilton) with his 16 career starts and junior OG Matt Rogers (New Lenox Providence) with his nine starts and the Van Acker-Free-Lueck-Ebenhoch-Rogers fivesome owns 71 collective starts. Back-up soph OT Chris Acevedo (Lyons / Chicago Curie) rates as the sixth returing O-line performer with experience. The future? In good hands. Novak’s six O-line frosh recruits average 6-foot-5 and 285.

Whomever gets the nod at quarterback will miss 2004’s top Northern Illinois receiving duo and big play ex-seniors, i.e., First-Team All-MAC TE Brad Cieslak (31 catches for 384 yards and three TDs) and Second-Team All-MAC WR Dan Sheldon (40 catches for 936 yards and nine TDs)---who both should be headed to the NFL after great senior campaigns.

Time for seniors-to-be Sam “Birdman” Hurd (San Antonio, TX / Brackenridge) and Shatone “Tone” Powers (Broadview / Riverside-Brookfield) to raise the bar and play more consistently at WR. Hurd caught 27 balls for 298 and three TDs and Powers made 19 receptions for 248 yards and four TDs last fall. Both can go deep. Watch for precocious soph WRs Marcuz Perez (Elkhart, IN / Central) and Matt Simon (Farmington, MN) on the flank or on kickoff returns. In an offense where the run sets up the pass, look for junior TE Jake Nordin (Lake Lillian, MN / Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City) to double his 2004 catch total (14 for 122 yards) and senior TE Pat Raliegh (Evergreen Park) to do more than block.

Next Week: 2005 Northern Illinois Defense and Special Teams

(For further information, please contact Mike Korcek) -NIU-